Predictably Irrational

A book I will be reading soon (thanks, Alex) by Dan Ariely. Neuroscience and psychology principles through the eyes of economics - interesting stuff.

He describes how placebos work in the video below. Another example of research on the effect expectations and top-down processing have on perception (in this case, pain and flavor). It's experiments like these that makes you realize how subjective and malleable ideas of pain and taste are.

Human experience is a messy operation - one science continues to analyze the same way we would balance a chemical equation. Most "data" in psychology and neuroscience is too confounded to be applicable.

(PS - not a huge surprise that he mentions how antidepressants don't fare much better than placebos.)