"You need to cool off!"

Ever have your computer get overheated and not work as well? Apparently our brains can experience something similar. A lot of thinking can easily lead a brain to becoming overheated. It's interesting the wisdom in sayings like "you need to cool off"—sometimes we need to literally cool our brains. An overheated brain doesn't function properly, and this is a scientific fact.


Yawning
Scientists believe that yawning is a method of cooling the brain. You can see the heat released from a yawn by yawning in front of a window glass. In fact, right now, put your hand in in front of your mouth and breath normally... now yawn, notice the difference? Apparently the more a person thinks, the warmer the temperature of their brain becomes. Unfortunately, the warmer the brain gets, the more impaired/fatigued it becomes. Yawning is one of those behaviors that are socially suppressed, but shouldn't be. We all know that stereotype of the kid yawning in class and the teacher flipping out on them. For a teacher to tell a kid not to yawn is doing them a huge disservice. Yawning should be a complement to the teacher, it is a sign that the kid is trying to pay attention. Yawn as much as you need to when doing mental activities.


When yawning isn't enough
Wipe cool water on your forehead with a rag, or splash water in your face (people do it all the time to wake up, but perhaps they are unaware that they are literally cooling their overheated brain). Doing this is very effective at cooling the brain. Also an icepack can be effective. When studying, always be mindful of your brain overheated, and take the steps necessary to ensure that it stays at its optimal temperature. If you are really dedicated, you can also get your hair soaked, which obviously would be incredibly effective—it is why people often feel refreshed after taking a cool shower (unlike a hot shower that can cause the brain to get too warm, leading to fatigue).

I also imagine that this is the reason for why we have so many blood vessels on our head, and it's also common knowledge that we "lose" most of our heat from our head. In modern times we are forced to do more thinking than previously in our history, perhaps our biology is not able to maintain temperature as effectively as before. Anyways, just food for thought, I hope you enjoyed reading this post and thanks for stopping by the Atheist Perspective site :)