Scientists at Oxford University recently discovered a possible breakthrough in cognitive neuroscience. By inducing a small, barely palpable electric current through a subject’s parietal lobe, near the back of the brain, they were able to either enhance or severely impair one’s ability to perform numerical calculations.

For the experiment, it was a current of about a milliamp– hardly enough to trigger any feeling in human sensory nerves– and the direction in which the current ran actually determined the effect. Running the current from <—–Right to Left resulted in an enhanced ability to solve numerical puzzles and calculations. Running it the opposite way, Left to Right—–> impaired subjects’ ability to solve math problems to an extent such that they were as helpless as “an average six year-old.”

The scientists obviously were not on record advocating the usage of electric shocks to improve math performance, and so are not liable for the crowds of math and common sense-impaired DIYers that will inevitably try this and be fried to vegetables.

*hooks up electrodes* Harvard, here I come!! 😉

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