FW: Spam: To Jeffrey c/o LG

Great talking w/ you this morning, Jeffrey..looking forward to picking up where we left off next week -

Meanwhile, the ex-lyricist in me has been wordsmithing a new name for our institute that manages to at once remain true to our mission and sound appropriately elite-and-effete at hoity-toity cocktail parties/country clubs: 

The Institute for Cultural Neuroscience.

Something you said about the term "pop culture" being "bad" for the target audience got me to turn it around...and it fits with exploring perception and cognition (and looking for universals w/ biological underpinnings) in different cultures/subcultures/ethnic groups within and outside the U.S.  It also fits with the "environmental/cultural preservation" theme....

But not w/ curing diseases, unless we make it "Cultural Neuroscience & Medicine" - actually, there's an initiative within NIH and elsewhere (e.g. HMS) to work on medicine-related differences between races/ethnic groups/men and women, because we all have different disease risk factors and don't respond to pharmaceuticals the same way (e.g., effectiveness of beta-blockers for hypertension in Euro-Americans but not Afro-Americans.)

As you know, "Social Neuroscience" is taking off, so it's probably a matter of time before someone comes up with "Cultural Neuroscience", if they haven't already.  (As in songwriting, the latter possessiveness/paranoia is probably a good sign that the lick/lyric/name is a good one.)

Many thanks for your inspiration, support, and friendship,
Mark
mtramo@hms.harvard.edu