Science

One confused teenager, one wrong school, and a brain stuck on autopilot

Sometimes the familiar route wins before the new reality catches up.

Last week, I pulled up in front of the Junior High, stopped the car, looked over at my son and delivered the traditional “Have a good day!” He looked back at me like I had lost my mind.

Fair. He’s been in high school for a month. I had driven to the wrong school.

As Paulina Maxim explains in this story, our brains lean heavily on familiar landmarks and well-worn routes, sometimes triggering turns before we consciously think about them. Apparently, a month of high school was no match for years of muscle memory. It is the same wonderfully stubborn brain that can cling to habits and needs a little extra work to make new information stick.

The science behind that deeply humbling school drop-off gets surprisingly fascinating, because when old memories and new information disagree, different parts of your brain may be lobbying for completely different routes. And sometimes Junior High wins.

Do you have a GOOD picture to share?

Send us your best images, and we may feature them as the image of the day. Be sure to tell us a bit about your pic.

And what did we learn?

In yesterday’s issue, we TK (link to Tuesday’s issue).

So what’s the small, ordinary thing that reliably makes a GOOD reader happy? Over 35% of you gave the crown to your pups and I’m right there with you.

• Sunlight through a window (27.8%)

• The first sip of coffee (17.4%)

• A dog that is clearly pleased to see me (35.7%)

• Finishing a to-do list (10.0%)

• Something else (share your answers). (9.1%)

Then the write-ins rolled in. The moon. Waves crashing. Fresh-mowed grass. Real honest-to-goodness ice cream in a cone. A husband who still shows up with hugs and a hot cup after 33 years. A cat who has decided you are worthy.

But the one we keep rereading came from 93-year-old gordonna23. “So I make a list of about 3 things I’d like to accomplish each day. It might be Do a load of laundry. Do the dishes leaving a clean empty sink. Finish writing the letter I started to my granddaughter in Washington. I feel good if I check off at least two!”

We're going to go make a list.

Culture | Courtesy of Upworthy

Health

The most extreme amnesia case ever recorded, captured in one brutal diary page

A single diary page turns an abstract condition into something painfully real.

I took my wife to see 50 First Dates on one of our first dates. Adam Sandler courts Cameron Diaz’s character, whose memories reset each morning. It was a cute, funny little romp, but by the time we got to the car, we’d clocked the many, many horrifying implications of such a condition.

Now imagine the same premise, but every 7 to 30 seconds. That’s been Clive Wearing’s life since 1985, after a rare viral infection damaged the memory-forming parts of his brain. His days became a loop of “waking up,” over and over, with no reliable bridge from one moment to the next.

As Adam Albright-Hanna reports, a single diary page from January 13, 1990, recently resurfaced online. It’s messy, scratched out, rewritten minutes apart, and weirdly unforgettable. And buried inside it is the detail that flips this from pure tragedy to something almost defiant: even when his mind can’t hold onto time, some parts of him still show up, instantly, every time.

On September 16, 1987, nations signed the Montreal Protocol, agreeing to phase out chemicals that were eating away at Earth’s protective ozone layer. It would have been easy for the story to end with scientists identifying a giant environmental problem and everyone agreeing that, yes, that certainly sounded bad. Instead, countries acted.

Nearly 99 percent of the ozone-depleting substances covered by the agreement have since been phased out, and the ozone layer is on track to recover. Thirty-nine years later, it remains a pretty encouraging case study: we spotted a problem, listened to the science, coordinated across borders, changed what we were doing, and it worked. 

Do you have something GOOD to share?

We’re always on the lookout for uplifting, enlightening, and engaging content to share with readers like you. If you have something you think should be featured in the Daily GOOD, let me know!

💬 From the group text…

I don’t endorse mischief, but should you have an honorable need to pick a classic Master lock, here you go!

Join the Group Text! Send us your social media gold.