Most Popular Books by Daniel J. Levitin

The author of the New York Times bestseller This Is Your Brain on Music reveals music’s role in the evolution of human culture in this thought-provoking book that “will leave you awestruck” (The New York Times). Daniel J. Levitin''s astounding debut bestseller, This Is Your Brain on Music, enthralled and delighted readers as it transformed our understanding of how music gets in our heads and stays there. Now in his second New York Times bestseller, his genius for combining science and art reveals how music shaped humanity across cultures and throughout history. Here he identifies six fundamental song functions or types—friendship, joy, comfort, religion, knowledge, and love—then shows how each in its own way has enabled the social bonding necessary for human culture and society to evolve. He shows, in effect, how these “six songs” work in our brains to preserve the emotional history of our lives and species. Dr. Levitin combines cutting-edge scientific research from his music cognition lab at McGill University and work in an array of related fields; his own sometimes hilarious experiences in the music business; and illuminating interviews with musicians such as Sting and David Byrne, as well as conductors, anthropologists, and evolutionary biologists. The World in Six Songs is, ultimately, a revolution in our understanding of how human nature evolved—right up to the iPod.

In this groundbreaking union of art and science, rocker-turned-neuroscientist Daniel J. Levitin explores the connection between music—its performance, its composition, how we listen to it, why we enjoy it—and the human brain. Taking on prominent thinkers who argue that music is nothing more than an evolutionary accident, Levitin poses that music is fundamental to our species, perhaps even more so than language. Drawing on the latest research and on musical examples ranging from Mozart to Duke Ellington to Van Halen, he reveals: • How composers produce some of the most pleasurable effects of listening to music by exploiting the way our brains make sense of the world • Why we are so emotionally attached to the music we listened to as teenagers, whether it was Fleetwood Mac, U2, or Dr. Dre • That practice, rather than talent, is the driving force behind musical expertise • How those insidious little jingles (called earworms) get stuck in our head A Los Angeles Times Book Award finalist, This Is Your Brain on Music will attract readers of Oliver Sacks and David Byrne, as it is an unprecedented, eye-opening investigation into an obsession at the heart of human nature.

New York Times bestselling author and neuroscientist Daniel J. Levitin shifts his keen insights from your brain on music to your brain in a sea of details. The information age is drowning us with an unprecedented deluge of data. At the same time, we’re expected to make more—and faster—decisions about our lives than ever before. No wonder, then, that the average American reports frequently losing car keys or reading glasses, missing appointments, and feeling worn out by the effort required just to keep up. But somehow some people become quite accomplished at managing information flow. In The Organized Mind, Daniel J. Levitin, PhD, uses the latest brain science to demonstrate how those people excel—and how readers can use their methods to regain a sense of mastery over the way they organize their homes, workplaces, and time. With lively, entertaining chapters on everything from the kitchen junk drawer to health care to executive office workflow, Levitin reveals how new research into the cognitive neuroscience of attention and memory can be applied to the challenges of our daily lives. This Is Your Brain on Music showed how to better play and appreciate music through an understanding of how the brain works. The Organized Mind shows how to navigate the churning flood of information in the twenty-first century with the same neuroscientific perspective.

This deluxe eBook (previously published as A Field Guide to Lies Deluxe) features six videos from Daniel Levitin, with more examples, anecdotes, and added visual guides. We’re surrounded by fringe theories, fake news, and pseudo-facts. These lies are getting repeated. New York Times bestselling author Daniel Levitin shows how to disarm these socially devastating inventions and get the American mind back on track. Here are the fundamental lessons in critical thinking that we need to know and share now. Investigating numerical misinformation, Daniel Levitin shows how mishandled statistics and graphs can give a grossly distorted perspective and lead us to terrible decisions. Wordy arguments on the other hand can easily be persuasive as they drift away from the facts in an appealing yet misguided way. The steps we can take to better evaluate news, advertisements, and reports are clearly detailed. Ultimately, Levitin turns to what underlies our ability to determine if something is true or false: the scientific method. He grapples with the limits of what we can and cannot know. Case studies are offered to demonstrate the applications of logical thinking to quite varied settings, spanning courtroom testimony, medical decision making, magic, modern physics, and conspiracy theories. This urgently needed book enables us to avoid the extremes of passive gullibility and cynical rejection. As Levitin attests: Truth matters. A post-truth era is an era of willful irrationality, reversing all the great advances humankind has made. Euphemisms like "fringe theories," "extreme views," "alt truth," and even "fake news" can literally be dangerous. Let''s call lies what they are and catch those making them in the act.

INSTANT TOP 10 BESTSELLER • New York Times • USA Today • Washington Post • LA Times “Debunks the idea that aging inevitably brings infirmity and unhappiness and instead offers a trove of practical, evidence-based guidance for living longer and better.”—Daniel H. Pink, author of When and Drive SUCCESSFUL AGING delivers powerful insights: • Debunking the myth that memory always declines with age • Confirming that "health span"—not "life span"—is what matters • Proving that sixty-plus years is a unique and newly recognized developmental stage • Recommending that people look forward to joy, as reminiscing doesn''t promote health Levitin looks at the science behind what we all can learn from those who age joyously, as well as how to adapt our culture to take full advantage of older people''s wisdom and experience. Throughout his exploration of what aging really means, using research from developmental neuroscience and the psychology of individual differences, Levitin reveals resilience strategies and practical, cognitive enhancing tricks everyone should do as they age. Successful Aging inspires a powerful new approach to how readers think about our final decades, and it will revolutionize the way we plan for old age as individuals, family members, and citizens within a society where the average life expectancy continues to rise.

From The New York Times bestselling author of THE ORGANIZED MIND and THIS IS YOUR BRAIN ON MUSIC, a primer to the critical thinking that is more necessary now than ever. This deluxe eBook features six videos from Daniel Levitin, with more examples, anecdotes, and added visual guides. We are bombarded with more information each day than our brains can process—especially in election season. It''s raining bad data, half-truths, and even outright lies. New York Times bestselling author Daniel J. Levitin shows how to recognize misleading announcements, statistics, graphs, and written reports revealing the ways lying weasels can use them. It''s becoming harder to separate the wheat from the digital chaff. How do we distinguish misinformation, pseudo-facts, distortions, and outright lies from reliable information? Levitin groups his field guide into two categories—statistical infomation and faulty arguments—ultimately showing how science is the bedrock of critical thinking. Infoliteracy means understanding that there are hierarchies of source quality and bias that variously distort our information feeds via every media channel, including social media. We may expect newspapers, bloggers, the government, and Wikipedia to be factually and logically correct, but they so often aren''t. We need to think critically about the words and numbers we encounter if we want to be successful at work, at play, and in making the most of our lives. This means checking the plausibility and reasoning—not passively accepting information, repeating it, and making decisions based on it. Readers learn to avoid the extremes of passive gullibility and cynical rejection. Levitin''s charming, entertaining, accessible guide can help anyone wake up to a whole lot of things that aren''t so. And catch some lying weasels in their tracks!

NATIONAL BESTSELLER Neuroscientist and New York Times bestselling author of This Is Your Brain on Music Daniel J. Levitin reveals how the deep connections between music and the human brain can be harnessed for healing. Music is perhaps one of humanity’s oldest medicines as well as its most universal: from China to the Ottoman Empire, Europe to Africa and pre-colonial South America, cultures have developed rich traditions for using sound and rhythm to ease suffering, spur healing, and calm the mind. Despite this history, musical therapy has long been considered the remit of ancient practice and alternative medicine, if not outright quackery and pseudoscience. In the last decade, however, an overwhelming body of scientific evidence has emerged that persuasively argues music can offer profoundly effective treatment for a whole host of ailments, from Alzheimer’s to PTSD, depression, pain, and cognitive injury. It is, in short, one of the most potent and remarkably promising new therapies available today. A work of dazzling ideas, cutting-edge research, and joyful celebration of the human mind, I Heard There Was a Secret Chord explores the critical role music has played in human evolution, illuminating how the story of the human brain is inseparable from the creative enterprise of music that has bound cultures together throughout history. Music insinuates itself into our earliest memories; it is intimately connected to our emotional regulation and cognition; its shared rhythms and sounds are essential to our social behaviors. As neuroscientist Daniel J. Levitin demonstrates in this mind-expanding follow-up to This Is Your Brain on Music—which revolutionized our understanding of the neuroscience of song—medical researchers are now finding that these same deep connections can be harnessed to create profound benefits for those both young and old.

An anthology of core readings on cognitive psychology.

Twenty-first century society is drowning in information, and the highest achievers are the most at risk . . . Every day we are bombarded with new facts, figures, stories, theories and demands on our attention. We expect our brains to process ever higher volumes of data but all this information comes at a cost. Relentless external pressure leads to information overload- absent mindedness, poor decision-making, lowered efficiency and even a suppressed capacity for creative thought. Understanding this pitfall is ever more crucial to surviving and thriving in the digital age. In The Organized Mind, neuroscientist Daniel J. Levitin investigates and explains exactly how we got here, from the early building blocks of language to why email is so addictive. There is an alternative to wrestling with all this information- Levitin demonstrates how to ease your mental burden by storing information in the physical world instead. Case studies and worked examples cover smarter decision-making, improving memory and attention, identifying what information is and is not important, and organizing your time, your space and your relationships successfully. By analysing how your brain works, The Organized Mindwill help you function better, go further, and find more time to do the things you really want to do.

Two of the most important social skills in humans are the ability to determine the moods of those around us, and to use this to guide our behavior. To accomplish this, we make use of numerous cues. Among the most important are vocal cues from both speech and non-speech sounds. Music is also a reliable method for communicating emotion. It is often present in social situations and can serve to unify a group''s mood for ceremonial purposes (funerals, weddings) or general social interactions. Scientists and philosophers have speculated on the origins of music and language, and the possible common bases of emotional expression through music, speech and other vocalizations. They have found increasing evidence of commonalities among them. However, the domains in which researchers investigate these topics do not always overlap or share a common language, so communication between disciplines has been limited. The aim of this Research Topic is to bring together research across multiple disciplines related to the production and perception of emotional cues in music, speech, and non-verbal vocalizations. This includes natural sounds produced by human and non-human primates as well as synthesized sounds. Research methodology includes survey, behavioral, and neuroimaging techniques investigating adults as well as developmental populations, including those with atypical development. Studies using laboratory tasks as well as studies in more naturalistic settings are included.

Unindo as mais recentes pesquisas em neurociência do desenvolvimento e psicologia das diferenças individuais, Daniel Levitin aborda o envelhecimento como um movimento contínuo, que começa desde o nascimento, e oferece a leitores e leitoras uma série de orientações práticas valiosas para alcançarem uma vida longa e feliz. Com o passar dos anos, nem sempre é fácil encontrar maneiras de continuarmos ativos e engajados. Esse é um desafio que em geral envolve mudanças de hábitos e de mentalidade. Mas, nos últimos anos, a ciência mostrou que a qualidade de vida das pessoas, mesmo idosas, pode mudar de maneira significativa. E que não precisamos ficar presos ao que foi determinado pela genética, pelo ambiente e pelas oportunidades. Daniel J. Levitin traz estratégias e ferramentas que todos, independente da idade, podem — e deveriam — adotar. Os métodos apresentados neste livro mostram o caminho para a autoconsciência. Estar receptivo às possibilidades de crescimento, cultivar amizades, se relacionar com gerações mais jovens, ter entusiasmo pela vida e aderir a atividades mais saudáveis são apenas alguns deles. Somos capazes de aprender muito com aqueles que envelhecem com alegria, e adaptar nossa cultura para aproveitar ao máximo a sabedoria e a experiência dos idosos pode trazer muitos benefícios. O bom da idade é um livro transformador, com reflexões poderosas que desmontam concepções errôneas e persistentes, como a perda da capacidade intelectual na maturidade. Levitin recomenda a todos que vivam o hoje, uma vez que rememorar o que já passou não promove saúde nem alegria. " O bom da idade desmistifica a ideia de que o envelhecimento traz inevitavelmente debilidade e infelicidade, oferecendo em vez disso um tesouro de orientações práticas baseadas em evidências para viver mais e melhor." — Daniel H. Pink, autor de Quando: Os segredos científicos do timing perfeito

UNA NUEVA FORMA DE ENTENDER LA MÚSICA Y LA VIDA. Si todos sabemos (o intuimos) que la música nos despierta los sentidos, este libro nos ayudará a entender cómo lo hace. El músico y neurocientífico Daniel J. Levitin compone en estas páginas una amena sinfonía de la mano de Mozart, Ella Fitzgerald o los Beatles para mostrarnos por qué escuchar música es un gran placer. «Una visión de conjunto maravillosa, a manos del único neurocientífico que podía hacerlo. Un libro importante». OLIVER SACKS

Edição revista e atualizada. Best-seller internacional do autor de A mente organizada. Com exemplos musicais de Mozart a Eminem, passando por Bach, U2 e tantos outros, este livro nos leva a um entendimento científico abrangente sobre o modo como experimentamos a música e seu papel ímpar nas nossas vidas. * Eleito pela Billboard um dos 15 livros que todo fã de música deveria ler". A música é uma obsessão que está no cerne da natureza humana, e talvez seja mais fundamental para a nossa espécie do que a linguagem. Neste livro fascinante, o neurocientista, psicólogo e autor best-seller Daniel Levitin tenta entender o poder que ela exerce sobre nossa consciência, e estuda sua relação com a atividade cerebral: como o cérebro percebe a música, e o que a música nos ensina sobre o cérebro? Com base nas mais recentes pesquisas da neurociência e da psicologia, Levitin revela o papel da música na evolução humana, mostra como nossas preferências musicais começam a se formar mesmo antes de nascermos e explica por que a música nos oferece experiências emocionais tão profundas. A música no seu cérebro apresenta um novo olhar sobre a música e o que ela pode nos ensinar sobre nós mesmos. "Muito estimulante, com uma perspectiva fantástica. Um livro importantíssimo." — Oliver Sacks "O livro de Levitin é eloquente e poético. É gratificante acompanhar a pesquisa de um autor que é um notável músico, um conceituado cientista e alguém que ainda se encanta ao contemplar o universo." — Sting

Fascinante plongée dans les mystères de notre matière grise, L''Esprit organisé décortique le fonctionnement structurel de l''intellect et livre les secrets pour utiliser de façon optimale cet incroyable organe qu''est le cerveau. Dans une ère où nous sommes noyés sous les informations, Daniel Levitin nous offre les clefs pour recouvrer le sens de l''ordre et apprendre à réorganiser notre esprit. " Il y a environ cinq mille ans, quand les premiers humains ont imaginé une façon de consigner les faits par écrit, ils augmentèrent ainsi leurs capacités intellectuelles. Ils étendirent les limites naturelles de la mémoire humaine en conservant une partie de leurs souvenirs sur des tablettes d''argile, des murs de cavernes et, plus tard, des papyrus et du parchemin. Nous avons ensuite développé d''autres systèmes – calendriers, classeurs, ordinateurs et Smartphones – pour nous aider à organiser et à ranger les informations que nous avions préalablement écrites. "

O autor e neurocientista Daniel J. Levitin aborda o problema do excesso de informação no século XXI em seu novo best-seller do New York Times. Poderia a boa e velha organização ser o segredo fundamental para se navegar no mar de informações do mundo moderno? Enquanto notícias, textos, contas e aplicativos invadem nosso cotidiano, espera-se que tomemos rapidamente decisões cada vez maiores. Em capítulos instigantes sobre temas que vão desde a gaveta bagunçada da cozinha até cuidados com a saúde, David Levitin apresenta avanços recentes nos estudos sobre o cérebro e mostra métodos que podemos aplicar no dia a dia para adquirir uma sensação de controle sobre a maneira como organizamos nossos lares, nossos ambientes de trabalho e nossas vidas.

" Un livre magnifique, aussi exaltant qu''édifiant. " Oliver Sacks Dans ce livre passionnant, Levitin tente de comprendre le pouvoir de la musique sur l''esprit et étudie la relation entre musique et activité cérébrale : comment le cerveau perçoit-il la musique et qu''est-ce que la musique nous apprend du cerveau ? Les émotions sont des marqueurs neuronaux ; comme déclencheur, la musique nous éclaire sur le fonctionnement de la mémoire. Cet essai enlevé et plein d''humour aborde des thèmes aussi divers que la classification de la musique par genres, l''oreille absolue ou la mémoire instinctive que l''on peut avoir d''un morceau. En se référant à Bach, à Ella Fitzgerald comme aux Beatles, ou à U2, Levitin révèle le rôle de la musique dans l''évolution de l''humanité.

Rock Around the Brain Musik ist für unsere Gehirnzellen wie eine Droge. Sie kann uns mitreißen, Glücksgefühle bescheren und in einen Rausch versetzen – oder auch traurig oder melancholisch machen. Aber warum ist das so? Woher bezieht Musik ihre Macht, ihre Magie? Und warum kann sich kaum jemand ihrer Wirkung entziehen? Daniel Levitin, der die Neugier des Neurowissenschaftlers mit der Erfahrung des erfolgreichen Musikproduzenten verbindet, erkundet in diesem Buch die vielfältigen Beziehungen zwischen Musik, Gefühl, Gehirn und Geist. Absolut anregend, ein wunderbarer Überblick, wie ihn nur ein zutiefst musikalischer Neurowissenschaftler geben kann. ... Ein bedeutendes Buch. Oliver Sacks Diese Lehrstunde über die Erklärungskraft der Kognitionspsychologie ist ein Muss für alle musikinteressierten Studenten und Fachleute. Gehirn und Geist Musik scheint eine geradezu eigensinnige, schwer fassbare Qualität zu besitzen, die einer einfachen Erklärung nicht zugänglich ist, so dass sich immer neue Fragen stellen, je mehr wir darüber wissen, ohne dass unser Bohren ihre Macht und ihr Geheimnis entschlüsseln könnte. Es mag kein Ende und keine einfache Antwort in Sicht sein, aber die Reise selbst ist aufregend, insbesondere wenn man sie mit einem Autor unternimmt, der nicht nur ein ausgezeichneter Musiker und ein hartnäckiger Forscher ist, sondern auch jemand, der das Staunen über die Welt nicht verlernt hat. Sting Daniel Levitin hat ein wunderbares und faszinierendes Buch geschrieben – für Musiker, Psychologen und alle, die die Faszination an Musik teilen und schon immer verstehen wollten, was mit uns geschieht, wenn wir Musik hören. Das Orchester Die englische Originalausgabe dieses Buches, Your Brain on Music, stand zwölf Monate lang auf der New York Times-Bestsellerliste.

Estamos rodeados de noticias y datos falsos que en algunos casos no dejan de repetirse. Y, como sostiene Levitin, seguramente somos demasiado puntillosos cuando nos referimos a las falsedades. Quizá en un esfuerzo por mantener la concordia, hemos empezado a utilizar eufemismos para aludir a cosas absurdas: teorías marginales, medias verdades, verdades alternativas, hipérboles... Pero "la verdad sí importa. Una era de la posverdad es una era de irracionalidad deliberada, que se opone a todos los grandes avances de la humanidad (afirma el autor)... y la mejor defensa contra los embusteros taimados, la defensa más fiable, es que todos nosotros nos convirtamos en pensadores críticos". Este libro nos proporciona herramientas y estrategias para valorar la información y ver que muchas cosas simplemente no son como se nos dice.

Loài người đã trải qua một lịch sử dài tìm cách nâng cấp hệ thần kinh, hay nói cách khác là khiến bộ não, mà ngày nay chúng ta có được nhờ tiến hóa, càng tiến hóa hơn. Bằng óc sáng tạo vô hạn, chúng ta tạo ra các hệ thống giúp giải phóng bản thân khỏi những điều vụn vặt, để lưu giữ những thông tin không ai có thể đảm bảo sẽ nhớ và tăng cường khả năng cho não bộ, hoặc giảm tải một số công việc để những nguồn lực khác đảm trách. Không hệ thống nào hiệu quả với tất cả mọi người, bởi ai cũng muốn làm việc theo cách riêng. Nhưng cuốn sách Tư duy có hệ thống sẽ đưa ra những nguyên tắc chung mà ai cũng có thể áp dụng theo cách của riêng mình để lập lại trật tự và tránh thất thoát thời gian do vật lộn với một tư duy thiếu hệ thống.

Fie că asculți Bach, The Beatles sau Eminem, muzica joacă un rol esențial în viața ta – chiar dacă nu ți-ai dat seama niciodată de asta. Cum se face că muzica îți evocă emoții atât de puternice? Răspunsul începe să devină mai clar mulțumită progreselor din cadrul neuroștiințelor și al psihologiei evoluționiste. Creierul nostru muzical oferă cititorului nespecialist o viziune de ansamblu asupra studiilor din domeniu, răspunzând totodată unor întrebări foarte diverse: sunt preferințele noastre muzicale dobândite în perioada intrauterină? Există o limită de vârstă dincolo de care nu-ți mai poți schimba gusturile în materie de muzică? Diferă plăcerea ascultării unei melodii de celelalte plăceri? Pentru a oferi o viziune cât mai cuprinzătoare asupra muzicii, Levitin o abordează din perspective diferite, descriind culturi în care cântatul este considerat o capacitate umană fundamentală și în care toți membrii comunității cântă în mod regulat – spre deosebire de societățile moderne, unde interpretarea muzicii a devenit apanajul unor cunoscători. Studiile asupra pacienților cu boli neurologice care îi împiedică să guste muzica și asupra persoanelor înzestrate cu ureche muzicală absolută, care pot reproduce o compoziție după o singură audiție, oferă și ele numeroase detalii despre cum anume transformă creierul nostru vibrațiile instrumentelor în sunete și melodii. Foarte bine documentată și scrisă într-un limbaj accesibil, cartea de față este un omagiu adus frumuseții muzicii în toate formele ei, de la ritmurile tribale până la rock și hip-hop, propunându-și să elucideze modul în care datele noastre biologice se îmbină cu educația pentru a da naștere experienței muzicale. „O privire de ansamblu asupra muzicii pe care doar un neurocercetător ne-o putea oferi.“ Oliver Sacks, autorul bestsellerului Omul care își confunda soția cu o pălărie „Levitin explică muzica pe înțelesul nemuzicienilor și al celor nefamiliarizați cu știința, ajutându-ne să înțelegem de ce suntem atât de fascinați de universul armoniilor sonore.“ Los Angeles Times Book Review „O carte scrisă cu talent și ingeniozitate, plină de detalii științifice captivante.“ The New York Times

Best-seller internacional. Lições fundamentais sobre pensamento crítico que precisamos aprender e compartilhar o quanto antes. Fatos e números sobre absolutamente tudo estão ao nosso alcance, mas são muitas vezes tendenciosos, distorcidos ou mentirosos. Dos números do desemprego às urnas de votação, dos testes de QI às taxas de divórcio, somos bombardeados por estatísticas aparentemente plausíveis sobre como as pessoas vivem e o que pensam. Neste livro, o renomado neurocientista Daniel Levitin nos ensina a questionar: podemos realmente saber disso? E como eles sabem disso? Neste guia acessível e revelador, repleto de exemplos fascinantes e dicas práticas, Daniel Levitin nos mostra que compreender as estatísticas nos permitirá julgar de forma mais inteligente o mundo ao nosso redor. "Um manual do pensamento crítico. Todas as páginas são reveladoras." — Charles Duhigg, autor de O poder do hábito "Um guia para quem deseja testar a autenticidade das informações que nos inundam de cada canto, iluminado ou escuro, da internet." — The Washington Post

Uitleg over de werking van het brein, cognitieve overbelasting en het effectiever organiseren van informatie.