Mapping the Mind
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Mapping the Mind description
In the last decades of the 20th century, scientists have come to believe that the human brain is almost completely modular. Every bit of the brain does something in particular, and surprisingly specific abilities, memories, and responses are in localized areas. Journalist Rita Carter has drawn a map of what is known (and speculated) about the mind in a heavily illustrated field guide to the human brain. Carter and her scientific editor, neuropsychologist Christopher Frith, cover the state of the mind in a reasonably accurate, accessible way. They emphasize topics that are likely to be of some practical interest--such as Alzheimer's or attention deficit disorder--but not so much as to give a distorted picture of the field. Perhaps the most interesting parts of the book are the sidebars written by a variety of leading names in mind-brain science. Roger Penrose writes on computer minds, Francis Crick on consciousness, Steven Rose on memory, John Maynard Smith on social evolution, William Calvin on mosaic minds, Kay Redfield Jamison on creativity and bipolar disorders, and more. It's a stellar assortment, more than worth the price of admission--and there's a map of the mind on the cover, in case you misplace yours. --Mary Ellen Curtin |
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Mapping the Mind Customer Reviews
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♥♥♥♥♥
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Incredibly interesting, insightful, and easy to read, but also incredibly deterministic
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I gave this book five stars in spite of disagreeing strongly with almost all of her philosophical conclusions. I hope this tells you something about how good this book is. I find it hard to believe that there is a better introductory book out there on the topic of modern neuroscience. This one is incredibly easy to understand, is one of the most interesting non-fiction books I've read in some time, and is not one of the typical pseudo-science books floating around on this subject. Rita Carter has been reporting on scientific advances for many years, and her ability to explain science to non-professionals is an invaluable asset to us lay-readers. Usually even popular level science books are a bit hard to get through, but this one is truly fun and easy, while not falling into the trap of oversimplification that some popular level science writers tend to fall into.
There are only two complaints I have about this book. The first is relatively minor: there are too many illustrations. I really do appreciate her illustrations, as they help me visualize exactly what she is talking about, but there are just too many pictures of the brain with different sections lit up as she talks about them. She could easily have included a full-page picture of the brain with all the sections labeled and then as she got to them in the book we could look at that picture to see what she was talking about. Instead we probably got at least 50 pictures (I think that's a very concervative estimate) of the brain with different areas highlighted. It would have saved probably 10-15 pages to cut those out, and there would have been no loss.
The second problem I had is much more significant, and has been noted by previous reviewers. This is her unfortunate conclusion which pervades the book. That conclusion is reductionism. She assumes that since we know that the brain effects us, we are nothing but physical processes, and as a result, we are completely determined. She literally says that free will is an illusion produced by evolution to help us survive. Such a conclusion makes me wonder why you would taket the time to write this book, or even care about philosophy if that were the case. The idea that the physical state of our brain necessitates our actions pervades the whole book, and is somewhat irritating. She entirely fails to recognize the difference between being predisposed to doing something and being predetermined to do something. For example, she notes that damage to the frontal lobe often results in symptoms that are psychopathic in nature. She concludes from this that the people who behave in this way literally have no choice in the matter. The very fact that it is "most" and not "all," should be a clue that this is taking it a bit far.
A better conclusion, which she does not even mention as a possability, is that the our individual physical brains makes us far more inclined to certain behavior, but does not necessitate it. In some cases it does appear that brain damage can remove significant amounts of a person's free will. She notes the famous case of Phineas Gage to support this, as after having a metal spike driven through his frontal lobe he lost the ability to carry out plans, and lived only for the moment. There are two significant problems with using this to show that we do not have free will. (1) The very fact that he could make plans, even though he could not carry them out, seems to indicate that he did have free will, though it was severely limited. (2) It is quite a stretch to say that no one has free will because Phineas Gage's free will was severely limited because of a head injury.
Other than the unfortunate philosophical conclusions, this was a superb book that really unveiled the workings of the human brain. You may wish to read a book about different views on philosophy of mind before you delve into this, however, as that will really help you recognize when Carter is going beyond what is merited by the science and into her own materialist reductionistic philosophy.
Overall grade: A |
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