Comments on: Urban Life is Bad for Brains

By: Ali S.

Ali S. — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 23:33:04 +0000

Potted plants people. Trust me they help keeping me somewhat sane. :p

By: Rocky Rook

Rocky Rook — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 18:19:17 +0000

"The mind is a limited machine," says Marc Berman

What are we ... cows? What a depressing outlook on the human mind. I've always been taught just the opposite. The mind is an unlimited machine.

By: spud

spud — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 23:19:45 +0000

hahaha Dave I had the same thought.... I have long wondered about this, the thought which usually comes to mind is the experiments with rats, when there are too many rats in a cage, they start to tear each other apart. The responses to your comment prove your point.

By: Dave

Dave — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 18:19:00 +0000

@CheeseDuck: BIOYA. Way to be a jerk. Did nobody else wonder what effects might be produced if the results of this study are correct, or are there too many urbanite readers here? Or should I have prefaced my comment with the stock "Although Neatorama isn't a political site..."? That seems to work for the primary site contributors.

As for your suggestion to take it to the forums, to put it mildly, the forums suck.

By: James Joyce

James Joyce — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 17:15:09 +0000

Oh yeah. Living in hicksville is much better for people's brains - it teaches tolerance and challenges you by having absolutely NO stimulation!

Seriously, has anyone ever done a good comparison of city vs. suburb? It is both sobering and disheartening.

By: Empty

Empty — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 10:09:42 +0000

"Ahh, this explains why cities are the common habitat of the Urban Liberal!"

No, the word "urban" explains that.

By: PK

PK — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 09:22:44 +0000

If the study is true, it seems to favor neither urban nor rural lives, but instead, suburban lives. I live in the city for I like the amount of social interaction I can get (good for brains!) while I work in the suburb where forests can clearly be seen outside my window. The best of both worlds with heavy commute! Yay!

By: Gary B

Gary B — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 04:10:30 +0000

Ahh, this explains why cities are the common habitat of the Urban Liberal!

(*GB ducks to avoid incoming missiles...)

By: Nathan Miller

Nathan Miller — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 00:07:29 +0000

gatherdust brings up a very valid point.

I also question the veracity of such claims but my argument comes from the subject of Universities.

While many many American schools in rural areas are elite, it seems to me that the greatest schools I can think of are in or around cities: Columbia, Harvard, Rice, UCLA, to name a few across the country.

If city environments are indeed so poor (and if NY is indeed so taxing on the brain), then how could Columbia or NYU continue to be so productive?

This argument may seem ridiculous because it is only a tiny percentage of a city's population, and because it could easily be an anomaly, but it's what came to my mind.

By: CheeseDuck

CheeseDuck — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 23:37:44 +0000

God dammit, Dave. STFU. Take it to the forums.

By: Idil

Idil — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 22:41:53 +0000

Hmm. Maybe this is nature's way to get us back on track and save nature.

By: chet

chet — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 21:27:37 +0000

Wow, way to inject partisan politics into an otherwise completely apolitical thread.

By: Dave

Dave — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 21:08:07 +0000

This is interesting, especially in light of the results of the last few national elections, with significantly higher percentages of voters in urban areas favoring Democrats.

By: gatherdust

gatherdust — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 19:37:12 +0000

This research may well be illuminating but I sense that the independent variable is well defined. The 17th century European city was a different beast than 19th century London which is a far cry from a crowded Manhattan sidewalk. In fact, this research seems to be part of a long anti-urban tradition in social science. Downtown Manhattan or any downtown business district - with it's overbuilt environment that is entirely beyond human scale is a limiting case. And urban sociology pointed to the negative consequences of population size, density, and diversity nearly 80 years ago. But the modern world isn't a city sidewalk. It's a mixed environment. I wish we might move beyond this simplistic brain science.