The communication between these tiny thingies is crucial for your, umm, everything, so let's see how exactly they do it. Basically, they send electrical signals using chemical substances (this sounds pretty much sci-fi already and we haven't even properly started yet). When a neuron is activated, an electrical signal (called action potential) travels all the way through until it reaches a synapse: a tiny gap between two neurons where the information exchange actually takes place. This electrical signal makes the active neuron release neurotransmitters which tells the receiving neuron what to do next (to become activated too or rather to stay passive) into the synapse.

Say a cell notices there is a nice sandwich in front of you. It gets activated and sends some dopamine to another cell which, in turn, knows that dopamine means that a reward is expected. This computational process in your brain makes saliva fill your mouth in joyful expectation.

Now there are some numbers which are as incomprehensible to me as why people love Kanye: there are about a hundred billions neurons in the brain. And this electrochemical process I just described? It happens in fractions of milliseconds. Moreover, an average neuron is connected to thousands other ones meaning a total of about hundred trillions synaptic connections in total. However, even though these numbers sound astronomical, beware of the common myth about "more synapses in the brain than stars in the Universe" as it's not true (what is true though is that number of our synapses surpasses the number of the stars in our galaxy. In your face, Milky Way).

2. What is the brain made of?

As our brain developed in an inside-out fashion, its oldest parts lie deepest within our skull. And when I say "old" I mean it: we share these parts of our brains with our remote relatives that have conquered land around 320 millions years ago. Their main functions are quite simple (but still able to save our ancestors' asses and allow us to exist): it makes sure our heart is beating, our lungs are breathing, our temperature is regulated and so on. This part goes by the name "brainstem". If i throw a stone at you you're gonna duck your head without much conscious thinking -- your anciently wired reflexes did that for you. You never need to remind yourself to breathe (unless you're talking to Beyoncé) -- your million of years old wiring is responsible for that too. Just next to the brainstem another ancient structure lies -- the cerebellum, literally meaning "the small brain" (it really does look like a mini-me of the brain). It makes sure your movements are well-coordinated and fine-tuned and you don't move like a robot whose circuits have just exploded. It constantly compares what movement you actually wanted to perform and what your limbs are really doing and interferes if there is a mismatch. Cerebellum is also your guy when it comes to the accuracy of your movements and motor learning -- when playing darts, for example, you should thank it for your improving performance. With every throw it adjusts your movements a little bit more until it finds the right position.