Since the development of medical sciences, our understanding of the human brain and its various functions has been constantly evolving. One of the first proposals for the purpose of the brain was by Aristotle in 335 BC, who claimed that it served to ventilate blood in the heart, which would otherwise overheat. Around two thousand years later, we recognise the brain as the seat of intelligence, memory, personality and emotion. 

It is easy to assume that without connection to the rest of an organism's anatomy, brain cells do not possess any ‘inherent’ intelligence and therefore cannot ‘think’. However, scientists from UCL’s institute of Neurology and Australian biotechnology company Cortical Labs prove otherwise after creating DishBrain.

A relatively large segment of medical problems are caused by unnatural changes to the environmental pattern our bodies have evolved to exist in harmony with - a key example of which is our optimum levels of sleep being incompatible with our daily routines. This results in somewhat harmful alterations stemming from our lifestyles and regular activities that can cause negative long term impacts on our health, which we may view as mere minor discomforts in our lives.

Throughout our lives, many of us have heard the phrase, ‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,’ or that, ‘Beauty is subjective,’ in relation to who and what we as individuals find attractive, as something unappealing to you can be perceived as the ideal by another person. As well as this, it is not just people we may see as beautiful, but various forms of art, natural landscapes, many genres of music and something as simple as the arrangement of flowers - the list is endless, and the feelings we have in response to beauty are intricate. Beauty beyond survival and reproduction is in fact, as a concept, a very human experience. Our complex psychology allows us to feel pleasure from simply allowing our senses to experience things which, from a perspective completely devoid of the meaning we give it, are really just shapes, colours and textures. And to further indulge in that feeling we have actively created art, since prehistoric times, such as the handprints on cave walls, or the small sculptures formed out of rocks and wood. Yet, why do we feel this way about certain features in the world and what exactly determines which of these we enjoy and which ones we dislike?

Dementia is an umbrella term describing neurological conditions and the loss of cognitive function as a result of damage to nerve cells and their connections in the brain. It primarily affects thinking, skills, memory and logical reasoning skills; causing symptoms like personality changes, forgetfulness, a lack of social awareness, language processing and planning. Anyone can develop dementia. Almost a million people in the UK alone suffer from this disease and the debilitating impact it has on their lives, and the lives of those around them. Due to its unpredictable nature and unclear causes, it was claimed to be a disease impossible to cure. In recent years, with research, it appears that there have been some breakthroughs indicating that drugs could be used to reduce the effects of this disease.