ABSTRACT-Neuroeducation-a recent approach to educational policy-claims that a bridge should be established between education and mind-brain sciences, with the double aim of devising educational methods that work and of understanding why they work. The success of this encounter depends, among other conditions, on getting the science right; otherwise, neuroeducation and science-informed policies risk doing more harm than good. On several occasions, the cognitive and brain sciences have been misunderstood, and misused: neuromyths-the misconceptions about the mind and brain functioning-have blossomed, thus raising both theoretical and pragmatic concerns. This article addresses the origin, persistence, and potential side-effects of neuromyths in education. The hypothesis is put forward that the persistence of neuromyths is sustained by specific cultural conditions, such as the circulation of pieces of information about the brain and the appetite for brain news, but has its roots in deeper cognitive intuitions.

An ideal goal of virtual reality technology is to deliver a complete visual and sensorimotor duplicate of an object: a fully integrated haptic and visual set of stimuli that would make us feel as if we are in the "presence" of the real object in an ordinary situation. The goal is very ambitious, but what is a measure of success? An analysis of presence is much needed, and one of the main tenets of our paper is that an empirical study of the psychological aspects of the feel of presence would constitute the pivotal element of such an analysis; we shall argue that some interesting lessons can be learned about the ideal goal. To sustain our argument, we consider two case studies in turn. The tunnel effect case teaches us that actual stimulation is neither necessary nor sufficient to convey presence. The picture case teaches us that it is possible to learn how to interact to a high degree of success with very impoverished stimuli and successfully compensate for poor stimulation. Research should be thus oriented not towards potentially useless and costly "duplication" of reality, but towards the unexplored potentialities offered by new and complex interfaces.

While very popular in public discourse about education, critical thinking education is still a work in progress. Two key conditions for successfully addressing critical thinking education are lacking: (a) the availability of a clear, specific, and operational definition, and (b) a deeper understanding of the natural cognitive bases of critical thinking. We, therefore, propose a theoretical framework for critical thinking education, grounded on a cognitive approach. Starting from a restrictive characterization of critical thinking-defined as the capacity of evaluating the epistemic quality of information, and of calibrating one's confidence in relationship to it-we identify specific mechanisms subserving critical thinking that are present in early human development. We refer to these mechanisms as the natural building blocks of critical thinking. On this naturalistic ground, effective educational strategies can be envisaged that both harness the natural building blocks of critical thinking and help overcome its shortcomings.Critical thinking is the flavor of the month-invoked by teachers, parents, Ministries for Education, and international organizations alike as the necessary self-defense mechanism for fighting both misinformation and the fallacies of our own reasoning, especially in the light of recent trends in new media (

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