If you've been a neuroscientist for two decades and counting, you take notice when your field begins popping up in the mainstream discourse. While this is usually a good thing (it's mostly helpful when one's field receives public attention), it can also go too far, introducing confusion and misunderstanding into an already complex matter.

Case in point: dopamine, one of the many, many chemicals (aka neurotransmitters) found in the human brain, where it has many functions. However, if you were to go solely by the context in which dopamine is mentioned in much of modern culture, you'd be forgiven for concluding that it has just one fundamental, very specific, function in the human brain - producing happiness and pleasure.

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