Cyrix

Ahhh ok excellent, thanks people for your help! Let's hope these borrowed speed reading books can speed the process along

Ok, so I'm doing my computer science course with maths methods as a subject, which is a prerequisite to do this course, but I never done it in high school but somehow they accepted me (due to the fact I done another tertiary course in IT then went into Computer Science in university). So anyway, I figure they'll just revise the math methods formulas and such, and although I'll be a little behind, I'll be able to catch on quickly and wing the tests. So, heres the dilemma -not only are they not revising ANY math methods / specialist / calculas concepts, the lecturer is flowing through it like WATER! The people in my class have done 2 extra years of advanced maths in high school which I haven't done. Everyone else in my lecture theatre is nodding away and you can hear the faint whispers of people calculating the formulas in their head, all the while I'm sitting poker faced realising how deep in dog shit I am. So, I need a crash course in math methods / specialist and calculas, PRONTO. Have a small test next week, and positively everything the lecturer said today, I hadn't the slightest clue what he was talking about except for the algrebra...but the formulas and theorems he was using mind blew me. Does ANYONE know of any free ebooks online for math methods / specialist and calculas? A quick google search guided shit all results, and my local library had basically nothing, or if anyone is kind enough to send me some notes , my goodness, I would be forever in your debt! From australia with love, lol -Cyrix

Ah thanks for the suggestions ashennell. I guess what I really would like to get into is the connection between synapses in the brain as well as the various chemicals in the brain, dopamine, endomorphins and the like...bit of a broad overview i guess heh but that's my narrowing down

Been playing recently some puzzle I found on the net, the ones where you're in a room and you've got to get clues and find yourself out. I played one called "Crimson Room" which was OK, but by far the best is "The Mystery Of Time and Space" or just do a google search of MOTAS, and click the first link...could almost not sleep just to finish it, been giving me hours of fun.

Really wanting to learn about neuroscience. I know there are tons of material out there, but just wondering if anyone has any book recommendations for someone who is just starting out to learn about it?

Spammers couldn't care less if you go to their sites or not. Spammers get paid believe it or not, by selling email addresses to other spammers. When those spammers get more email addresses, they sell them to other spammers. It's a whole vicious circle of life.

So this may sound as a very paranoid 19 year old but from recently doing some google searches on smoking vs intelligence, there seems to be some conclusive results that smoking can be linked into losing approximately 3% of one's IQ, with the variables of they smoke a pack a day for about 10 or so years. I'm 19 and I used to smoke as a kid from about 14 - 17, quit for a year, then started to smoke recently again for the past say 6 months, but now am definetly stopping from the evidence I've discovered. However, my question, and googling this answer gets a lot of mixed results so I thought a science forum would be an ideal place to ask. Can your brain make a full recovery from one who has smoked as short time as I have? Would there be any noticable or unnoticable impacts that smoking has caused on my intelligence? Knowledge is the most important thing to me and thinking that I may have hindered a part of my brain responsible for learning and memory worries me! What could be some effects it has on me, and am I able to recover mentally completely?

I know I'm a little delayed in this discussion, but speed reading is definetly possible - and you're able to retain a high comprehension then 'normal reading'. I've been learning to speed read lately using 2 programs - EyeQ and FReader. Do a google search on speed reading and you'll find heaps of information, and lots of terminology....sub vocalisation, regression, finger pacing and some more jargon. It took me so long to get the techniques right but I finally feel like I'm on the right track. I can read about 700 words per minute and retain a higher comprehension when I used to read 'normally'. There's so many things we've grown up with to reduce our speed reading like sub vocalisation - people have to feel they need to say the word in their heads to read it, and this is actually linked in the brain activating your vocal cords like you were actually speaking. The true power of speed reading is increasing your field of vision and learning to read more words at a time...this takes training and discipline, but I don't read any other way anymore. Send me a message if you'd like to know more, and the whereabouts of speed reading programs can be acquired.