Sleep & Consciousness
Sleep stages, why we sleep and dream, body clocks, the puzzle of consciousness and the question of free will.
8 articles
Sleep & Consciousness
Intermediate
Free Will and the Brain
Libet's famous experiment, the readiness potential, brain scans that predict choices seconds early, newer reinterpretations — and what neuroscience can and can't say about free will.
September 8, 2026 · 3 min read
Sleep & Consciousness
Beginner
The Stages of Sleep
Light sleep, deep slow-wave sleep and REM sleep: what happens in the brain during each stage, how they cycle through the night, and how sleep changes across life.
August 20, 2026 · 3 min read
Sleep & Consciousness
Advanced
Theories of Consciousness
Global workspace theory, integrated information theory, higher-order theories, recurrent processing and predictive processing — what each claims, how they differ, and the adversarial collaborations testing them.
August 3, 2026 · 3 min read
Sleep & Consciousness
Intermediate
What Is Consciousness?
The 'hard problem', the search for neural correlates of consciousness, blindsight and split brains, and the difference between being conscious and being conscious of something.
June 10, 2026 · 3 min read
Sleep & Consciousness
Intermediate
Anaesthesia, Coma and Disorders of Consciousness
From the first public ether operation in 1846 to modern intensive care: how anaesthesia switches consciousness off, and how doctors distinguish coma, vegetative state, minimally conscious state, locked-in syndrome and brain death.
April 24, 2026 · 3 min read
Sleep & Consciousness
Beginner
Dreams
What dreams are, when they happen, why they're so strange, theories from Freud to activation-synthesis and threat simulation, lucid dreaming, and what brain scans of dreamers reveal.
March 2, 2026 · 3 min read
Sleep & Consciousness
Beginner
Why We Sleep
Memory consolidation, synaptic rebalancing, waste clearance, energy and repair: the leading theories of why every animal studied sleeps — and what happens when we don't get enough.
February 16, 2026 · 3 min read
Sleep & Consciousness
Beginner
Circadian Rhythms: The Body Clock
The suprachiasmatic nucleus, clock genes and the 2017 Nobel Prize, light-sensing ganglion cells, melatonin, jet lag, shift work and why some people are larks and others owls.
November 29, 2025 · 3 min read