"If a pill could ease your heartbreak or enhance your relationship, would you...

The CBC Radio program called "Ideas" has an episode entitled "If a pill could ease your heartbreak or enhance your relationship, would you take it?". Here's the companion article from the CBC website, which includes a link to where you can listen to the program:

 

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/if-a-pill-could-ease-your-heartbreak-or-enhance-your-relationship-would-you-take-it-1.5985496 

I don't know if this is related or not but, I find it interesting how some animals can exhibit an extraordinary level of social bonding (love?). For me, I've noticed this behavior to be especially strong in dogs. Dogs, colloquially called man's best friend, can seem to provide almost unconditional love & comfort toward humans even under very adverse circumstances. Dogs are often used in the treatment of PTSD patients and they are often willing and eager to provide this bonding behavior toward more than just one human at a time. I wonder if dogs somehow better utilize an endogenous chemical/hormone, such as oxytocin, more so than some other animals such as humans? 

Like Viagra... 

Like Viagra... 

 

Actually, it's more like this:

 

Mapping love in the brain

 

Since functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology first made it possible to map the brain in the early 1990s, scientists have been peeling back the curtain on the neuroscience of romance.

 

By the early 2000s, fMRI studies that scanned the brain activity of people deep in the throes of passion and heartbreak were giving us a glimpse into the chemical underpinnings of love.

 

And as researchers continue to study the key brain circuits and hormones at play when we fall in and out of love, new ways of manipulating those processes are beginning to emerge.

 

"We don't have a choice to remain in the dark about it any more," Earp said.

Like Viagra... 

 

Actually, it's more like this:

 

Mapping love in the brain

 

Since functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology first made it possible to map the brain in the early 1990s, scientists have been peeling back the curtain on the neuroscience of romance.

 

By the early 2000s, fMRI studies that scanned the brain activity of people deep in the throes of passion and heartbreak were giving us a glimpse into the chemical underpinnings of love.

 

And as researchers continue to study the key brain circuits and hormones at play when we fall in and out of love, new ways of manipulating those processes are beginning to emerge.

 

"We don't have a choice to remain in the dark about it any more," Earp said.

 

Well that’s just a ridiculous idea isn’t it... ☺️