Western musical intervals are derived from speech tendencies, according to Duke scientists. Specifically, "most of the 12 chromatic scale intervals correspond to peaks of relative power in the normalized spectrum of human vocalizations." A somewhat more layperson-friendly summary of the study is here. [more inside]
posted by univac on Mar 15, 2009 - 42 comments

Oliver Sacks on Manic-Depression.
posted by vronsky on Sep 7, 2008 - 30 comments

Musicophilia. Metafilter's own digaman interviews Oliver Sacks on his forthcoming book and a lifetime's worth of loving music and studying its effects on the human mind. [more inside]
posted by melissa may on Sep 26, 2007 - 52 comments

The Abyss. Oliver Sacks writes about Clive Wearing (recently discussed here). [Via MindHacks.] [more inside]
posted by homunculus on Sep 19, 2007 - 30 comments

A Blog entry about a guy who melted a kilo of Iridium in New Jersey with Oliver Sacks. There are also pictures and movies of the 200,000 eV electron beam furnace in action.  Theo Gray, co-founder of Wolfram Research was there too (the pictures are all his). For any laymen who may have wondered in, Iridium is not a phone company, it is a precious metal that shares an element group with the likes of Platinum and Rhodium.
posted by pxe2000 on Aug 31, 2004 - 22 comments

2003 Reith Lectures. Neuroscientist Vilayanur S. Ramachandran, Director of the Centre for Brain and Cognition at the University of California, talks about a number of fascinating neurological disorders and the insights they provide into mental functioning.
posted by srboisvert on May 24, 2003 - 10 comments