brain story

August 9, 2007 11:01 AM

Excellent BBC Brain Story series available online. One of the best TV series on psychology and neuroscience ever produced, the BBC's Brain Story, is available on public bittorrent servers for download. It is a six part series covering virtually every area of contemporary neuropsychology, including the major researchers, discoveries, techniques and even many of the patients who have been the subjects of classic case studies that have helped us understand the curious effects of brain injury.
posted by nickyskye (17 comments total)

Now this is how I spend my vacation.
posted by kingfisher, his musclebound cat at 11:06 AM on August 9, 2007

Be careful you don't download Brain Candy by mistake.
posted by Flashman at 11:11 AM on August 9, 2007

Cool, this sounds great. BBC neuroscience, my next favorite thing to BBC nature docs. Thanks for linking to this, I'll be downloading it later. I'm looking forward to some familiar initials.... H.M. anybody?
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 11:47 AM on August 9, 2007

Looks very cool...thanks for this.

Is this the one where they interview the guy with anterograde amnesia?
posted by anazgnos at 11:48 AM on August 9, 2007

This looks awesome. Thanks!
posted by JPowers at 11:58 AM on August 9, 2007

Super, I've been reading about mitochondria apoptosis and trying to understand how it relates to maintaining consiousness/identity. As a layperson, I really don't understand it all, but this looks like a great place to start! (I think I waded in too deep, and this looks much, much better.) Many thanks.
posted by mightshould at 12:27 PM on August 9, 2007

is this something I would have to have a brain to understand?
posted by vronsky at 12:34 PM on August 9, 2007 [2 favorites]

as I recall from the show: the technical part was of interest but the plots were worthless. Tucci was great but deserved better show.
posted by Postroad at 12:36 PM on August 9, 2007

vronsky, That's one of my favorite songs! :) I sing it all the time.
posted by nickyskye at 12:38 PM on August 9, 2007

This sounds really interesting. I plan to download and share with my colleagues and students.
posted by craniac at 12:49 PM on August 9, 2007

I think your brain is big enough for the both of us nickyskye;)
posted by vronsky at 3:15 PM on August 9, 2007

well, i finally got the first part downloaded and am watching it now. frankly, it's not very good. so far it's mainly the presenter repeatedly asserting that the brain's physical processes are responsible for "everything" and a series of "look at this brain damaged person" vignettes.

there's not much in the way of theory tying anything together. nothing you couldn't learn in a sunday newspaper magazine article. a bit disappointing.
posted by andrew cooke at 8:08 PM on August 10, 2007

this is an interesting site on shadow puppets nickyskye:)
posted by vronsky at 3:09 PM on August 11, 2007 [1 favorite]

omg vronsky, what an exquisite gem of a link!!! I adored that! Balm for the brain and so charming.

What a beautiful gift. Thank you. :)
posted by nickyskye at 7:50 PM on August 11, 2007

I've managed to download the first episode and the soundtrack is very disconcerting; there is an English language track and a Chinese language track playing at the same time. Does anyone have any idea how I can fix this?
posted by matildaben at 1:10 PM on August 12, 2007

matildaben: Try updating your codecs, and/or looking for an option to disable one of the audio tracks.

Media Player Classic will use its own multi-channel aware filters, or if all else fails, Video Lan Client is an excellent standby for playing just about anything, though it can feel a little clunky in places.
posted by Freaky at 2:19 PM on August 13, 2007

Thanks for the practical viewing tips Freaky. :)
posted by nickyskye at 8:14 PM on August 15, 2007