PRODUCTIVITY & COGNITIVE SCIENCE | FEATURE ESSAY Why deliberate mid-momentum stopping is the single greatest unconventional life hack for eliminating morning friction, hijacking working memory, and sustaining deep creative flow. 1. The Trap of Conventional Productivity Most conventional productivity advice tells us to ride a wave of focus until the tank is completely empty or a major milestone is checked off. We are conditioned to believe that discipline means pushing throu

The new book by Prof. Hemant Pandey, The Augmented Mind, explores how artificial intelligence is changing the way we think, learn, reason and solve problems.

1. The Question Behind the Question When a student struggles with a difficult mathematical idea, we often make a surprisingly quick judgment: perhaps the student is simply not intelligent enough to understand it. But what exactly does that mean? Does an IQ score of 100 place a boundary around the ideas a person can understand? Is there a level of mathematics beyond which an average student simply cannot go, or are we sometimes confusing difficulty with inability? For a studen

AI is changing the economic bargain behind higher education. As knowledge and intellectual labour become increasingly abundant, universities must rethink their purpose—from transmitting knowledge and preparing students for predictable jobs to developing judgment, research capability, problem-solving skills and access to exceptional people and environments. The question is no longer simply what students should learn, but what a university can provide that AI cannot easily repr

From books and television to smartphones, social media and AI — how technology can strengthen learning or replace the thinking behind it. 1. The Question Has Changed For a long time, the educational debate about technology was framed as a simple question: Is technology good or bad for students? That question is now too crude. A book, television programme, search engine, smartphone, social-media feed and generative-AI system can all be called “technology,” yet they ask very di

Your brain is not fixed. But changing it is not a magic trick either. For years, popular neuroscience has promoted the idea that we can “rewire our brains” simply by thinking differently, visualising success or performing a few mental exercises. There is a real scientific idea underneath that phrase: neuroplasticity. The brain changes in response to experience. Learning, practice, attention, sleep, physical activity and the environment all influence how neural systems functio