It's great to have a buff frontal cortex to do that harder thing - for example, help a person in need rather buy some useless, shiny gee-gaw.

If I had to define a major depression in a single sentence, I would describe it as a "genetic/neurochemical disorder requiring a strong environmental trigger whose characteristic manifestation is an inability to appreciate sunsets.

Brains distinguish between an Us and a Them in a fraction of a second. Subliminal processing of a Them activates the amygdala and insular cortex, brain regions that are all about fear, anxiety, aggression, and disgust.

But if you get chronically, psychosocially stressed, you're going to compromise your health. So, essentially, we've evolved to be smart enough to make ourselves sick.

I had never planned to become a savanna baboon when I grew up; instead, I had always assumed I would become a mountain gorilla.

We live well enough to have the luxury to get ourselves sick with purely social, psychological stress.

Give lab rats oxytocin and, according to that meme, they get better at talking about their feelings and sing like Joan Baez.