Mind Hacks

Mind Hacks - Tips & Tools for using Your Brain - Stafford & Webb, published by O'Reilly

This is a great book, a not-so Dummy's Guide to the practical appreciation of the human brain, and how we can use it... better.

Positives

Full of wonderful, simple experiments about the senses... more specifically vision and hearing.

Full of usage of online materials for simple experiments. You know that your science museum has arrived when your online exhibits are listed alongside more serious experimental psychology studies.

Proper citations

And most importantly, the first scientific explanation (that I've seen, at least) of why putting a pen between your teeth makes you feel happier (Voluntary facial action generates emotion-specific autonomic nervous system activity Leverson, ekman, Friesen, Psychophysiology 27(4) 363-384), and why you should think that you are great, happy and confident -- and in a way giving some validity to all of that positive reinforcement self-help fairy dusts (concept priming, emotion as a social bonding/communication tool, contextual memory and all that autonomic responses to emotion... again)

Why caffeine addiction is less an addiction to the chemical compound itself, but more a conditioned response to the stimuli... and NO, I WANT FRESH MILK ONLY, not that curlish white thing you consider dairy

Negatives

What about studies that don't support the 100 hacks listed?