Dyslexia affects up to 1 in 5 people, but the experience of dyslexia isn't always the same. This difficulty in processing language exists along a spectrum -- one that doesn't necessarily fit with labels like "normal" and "defective." Kelli Sandman-Hurley urges us to think again about dyslexic brain function and to celebrate the neurodiversity of the human brain.

The average 20-year-old knows between 27,000 and 52,000 different words. Spoken out loud, most of these words last less than a second. With every word, the brain has a quick decision to make: which of those thousands of options matches the signal? And about 98% of the time, the brain chooses the correct word. How is this possible? Gareth Gaskell digs into the complexities of speech comprehension.

What we call language is something more specific than communication. Language is about sharing what’s in our minds: stories, opinions, questions, the past or future, imagined times or places, ideas. It is fundamentally open-ended, and can be used to say an unlimited number of things. So what does language mean for humanity, and how did we come to have it? Michael Corballis investigates.

For as long as we’ve had language, some people have tried to control it. And some of the most frequent targets of this communication regulation are the ums, ers, and likes that pepper our conversations. These linguistic fillers occur roughly 2 to 3 times per minute in natural speech. So are ums and uhs just a habit we can’t break? Or is there more to them? Lorenzo García-Amaya investigates.

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