my mind on books

Human: The Science Behind What Makes Us Unique by neuroscientist Michael S. Gazzaniga (Ecco, 2008) has a June 24 release date according to Amazon. (This was one of the books mentioned in the Neuroanthropology post “David Brooks Bonus” on ‘Neural Buddhists.’)

From the publisher:

One of the world’s leading neuroscientists explores how best to understand the human condition by examining the biological, psychological, and highly social nature of our species within the social context of our lives.

What happened along the evolutionary trail that made humans so unique? In his widely accessible style, Michael Gazzaniga looks to a broad range of studies to pinpoint the change that made us thinking, sentient humans, different from our predecessors.

Neuroscience has been fixated on the life of the psychological self for the past fifty years, focusing on the brain systems underlying language, memory, emotion, and perception. What it has not done is consider the stark reality that most of the time we humans are thinking about social processes, comparing ourselves to and estimating the intentions of others. In Human, Gazzaniga explores a number of related issues, including what makes human brains unique, the importance of language and art in defining the human condition, the nature of human consciousness, and even artificial intelligence.

Michael Gazzaniga’s homepage at UCSB

at Edge

[update 6/26] “Neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga awarded Humboldt Prize“