my mind on books

Computing the Mind: How the Mind Really Works by Shimon Edelman is due out from Oxford University Press on Aug. 20 (according to Oxford) or Sept. 8 (according to Amazon) in the US.

Here is the product description:

In a culmination of humanity’s millennia-long quest for self knowledge, the sciences of the mind are now in a position to offer concrete, empirically validated answers to the most fundamental questions about human nature. What does it mean to be a mind? How is the mind related to the brain? How are minds shaped by their embodiment and environment? What are the principles behind cognitive functions such as perception, memory, language, thought, and consciousness?

By analyzing the tasks facing any sentient being that is subject to stimulation and a pressure to act, Shimon Edelman identifies computation as the common denominator in the emerging answers to all these questions. Any system composed of elements that exchange signals with each other and occasionally with the rest of the world can be said to be engaged in computation. A brain composed of neurons is one example of a system that computes, and the computations that the neurons collectively carry out constitute the brain’s mind.

Edelman presents a computational account of the entire spectrum of cognitive phenomena that constitutes the mind. He begins with sentience, and uses examples from visual perception to demonstrate that it must, at its very core, be a type of computation. Throughout his account, Edelman acknowledges the human mind’s biological origins. Along the way, he also demystifies traits such as creativity, language, and individual and collective consciousness, and hints at how naturally evolved minds can transcend some of their limitations by moving to computational substrates other than brains. The account that Edelman gives in this book is accessible, yet unified and rigorous, and the big picture he presents is supported by evidence ranging from neurobiology to computer science. The book should be read by anyone seeking a comprehensive and current introduction to cognitive psychology.

The author’s website includes a link to a table of contents.

Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection by John T. Cacioppo and William Patrick (W.W. Norton, 2008)

Product description:

John T. Cacioppo’s groundbreaking research topples one of the pillars of modern medicine and psychology: the focus on the individual as the unit of inquiry. By employing brain scans, monitoring blood pressure, and analyzing immune function, he demonstrates the overpowering influence of social context—a factor so strong that it can alter DNA replication. He defines an unrecognized syndrome—chronic loneliness—brings it out of the shadow of its cousin depression, and shows how this subjective sense of social isolation uniquely disrupts our perceptions, behavior, and physiology, becoming a trap that not only reinforces isolation but can also lead to early death. He gives the lie to the Hobbesian view of human nature as a “war of all against all,” and he shows how social cooperation is, in fact, humanity’s defining characteristic. Most important, he shows how we can break the trap of isolation for our benefit both as individuals and as a society.

The website for the book is www.scienceofloneliness.com

From The Wise Heart: A Guide to the Universal Teachings of Buddhist Psychology by Jack Kornfield (Bantam Dell, 2008) p. 39-40.

Through Buddhist analysis, consciousness, like light, is found to have two dimensions. Just as light can be described as both a wave and a particle, consciousness has an unbound wave or sky-like nature and it has particular particle-like aspects. In its sky-like function, consciousness is unchanging, like the sky or the mirror. In its particle-like function, consciousness is momentary. A single state of consciousness arises together with each moment of experience and is flavored by that experience. ….

Here is a description of the two fundamental aspects of consciousness:

Consciousness       ………         Consciousness
in its sky-like nature                in its particle-like nature
_________________                    _____________________
Open                                         Momentary
Transparent                               Impersonal
Timeless                                    Registering a sense experience
Cognizant                                  Flavored by mental states
Pure                                           Conditioned
Wave-like, unbounded               Rapid
Unborn, undying                        Ephemeral

“Computer science helps psychiatrist Niall McLaren explain mental disorders”

excerpt:

Dr McLaren says, ‘Like computer processing, a substantial part of human mental life consists of the silent, rapid manipulation of information.

‘Normal mental function falls quite readily into two distinct realms, the phenomenal or experiential, and the psychological or knowledge-based.

‘The differences between what we know and what we experience is exclusive: knowledge is acquired gradually and can be conveyed to another person, whereas the phenomenal contents arrive immediately and are wholly private experiences.”
…
Dr McLaren says, ‘So my theory is that the mind has two irreducibly mental components, cognition and conscious experience, which together account for the whole of mental life.”

Dr. McLaren is the author of Humanizing Madness: Psychiatry and the Cognitive Neurosciences.