You're about to listen to a BBC podcast and I'd like to tell you a bit about the

podcast I work on. I'm Dan Clark and I commissioned factual podcasts at the BBC.

It's a massive area but I'd sum it up as stories to help us make sense of the forces shaping the world.

What podcasting does is give us the space and the time to take brilliant BBC journalism

and tell amazing compelling stories that really get behind the headlines.

And what I get really excited about is when we find a way of drawing you into a subject

you might not even have thought you were interested in.

Whether it's investigations, science, tech, politics, culture, true crime, the environment,

you can always discover more with a podcast on BBC Sounds.

Thank you for downloading the Life Scientific from BBC Radio 4.

My guest today is the neuroscientist an occasional stand-up comic, Sophie Scott,

professor of cognitive neuroscience at University College London. Her research involves

understanding exactly what goes on in our brains when we speak and when we hear

others speak and the rich complexity of all the information conveyed by the voice.

She's also fascinated by laughter.

What's it for?

What's the neuroscience behind it?

And why is it that laughter can sometimes completely paralyze our ability to speak?

She's also taken her research and turned it into a stand-up comedy routine

performed in clubs and bars to thousands of people.

Initially unsure about the idea, she now loves it and in her own words I madly enjoy it I'm very vain

and will do it whenever someone asks me sofy scot welcome to the Life Scientific. Is it true

...