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In 1993, inspired by H G Wells’s short story ‘The Country of the Blind’ (1904), the renowned neurologist and writer Oliver Sacks set out to study life on Pingelap – a small Micronesian island where an estimated tenth of the population has achromatopsia, a rare genetic disorder that leaves people close to or entirely colourblind. The results of Sacks’s investigation, compiled in his book The Island of the Colorblind (1996) and explored in this brief animation featuring audio excerpted from a 1998 radio interview, attests to the brain’s – and societies’ – astonishing ability to adapt to changing circumstances.
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Film and visual culture
Space and time expand, contract and combust in this propulsive animation
5 minutes
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Consciousness and altered states
‘I want me back’ – after a head injury, Nick struggles with his altered reality
7 minutes
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Bioethics
What a 1970 experiment reveals about the possibility and perils of ‘head transplants’
6 minutes
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Neuroscience
This intricate map of a fruit fly brain could signal a revolution in neuroscience
2 minutes
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Neuroscience
Dog vision is a trendy topic, but what can we really know about how they see?
11 minutes
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Cities
A lush, whirlwind tribute to the diversity of life in a northern English county
3 minutes
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Values and beliefs
A Zen Buddhist priest voices the deep matters he usually ponders in silence
5 minutes
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Film and visual culture
Stop-motion origami unfurls in a playful exploration of how senses overlap
3 minutes
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Mood and emotion
An Oceanic lullaby, ‘Gimme Shelter’ and more elucidate how music taps into our emotions
58 minutes