A deep, important book written in a disarming style.

books:


	• Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind V. S. Ramachandran, Sandra Blakeslee Harper Perennial, 1999 - 352 pages average customer review:based on 93 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Exemplary lateral thinking

I *truly* enjoyed this book - not just for all the fascinating new things I've learned about how the brain works, but because of Ramachandran's whole approach to research and writing. He doesn't seem to take himself, others, or research overly seriously - he exudes warmth, humanity, and humor, while being interesting and rigorous. His creative way of looking at things is an inspiration - it is an approach that we all would do well to apply to our own field of study. We all have lots to learn from dysfunction - in my own field it's the language mistakes of my students that have taught me so much about English. Rather than being something to disdain or be impatient with, dysfunction offers clues to all kinds of human riddles. The key lies in making the effort to find what it can teach us, something Ramachandran does like few others I've encountered. Super, super book.

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You don't have to be a doctor to enjoy this book

You don't even have to be involved in the healthcare profession, all you have to do is be interested in the workings of the brain.
This book is filled with examples of how the brain works - how a stroke will lead a woman to neglect and even deny the existence of of the non-functioning part of her body. How you can do experiments with your own "blind spots" and watch how your brain supplies the missing information. It explains how different traumas affect the brain and the outcomes of this trauma.

But it's told in an engaging humorous way, on a personal level by somebody who is absolutely fascinated by what he (and she) find out about the workings of the brain. You don't have to sit with the medical dictionary by your side, pausing every few sentences to look up a term. Medical terms are explained in laymen's language so you always know exactly what is being discussed.

But it's not an easily absorbed book. It makes you think about how psychology and physical trauma to the brain are interrelated.
It may, depending on your own history, make you nod in recognition at various diagnosis. You won't want to read this all in one setting because you will need time to process the information.

But if you're interested in how the brain works, if you're willing to stretch your reading a bit, this is a great book to read. I recommend it highly.

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A deep, important book written in a disarming style.

Rama is a brilliant, world renowned neuroscientist. Phantoms recounts personal experience and personal, sometimes humorous observations, and could be read for these qualities alone. It is a great book because of what it has to say. The subject is how the brain works from a conceptual viewpoint, with a focus on consciousness. Typically, the behavior of patients with brain damage suggest hypothesis, and these hypothesis are investigated by additional experimentation, as well as by brain imaging, which can detect which neurons are firing in response to stimuli. The physiology of the brain is considered, but only to the extent necessary to the narrative. A warning to the reader: the book is disarming in that some very difficult material is presented in a wonderfully simple and engaging style; this is not a book to be read in one sitting. I would have benefited from more material in the last chapter on what is the essence of conscious perception; while the ideas are exciting, I need more examples to pin them down. To nitpick, I think Rama. slights the artistic capabilities of animals, and is a little condescending, and perhaps not very knowledgeable, about psychiatry. He makes fun of evolutionary psychology, but also makes use of it.

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Fundamental questions and answers.

This is without a shadow of a doubt a very important book, written with a lot of humour by a true humanist.
To name a few very important topics: this work proves incontestably that the brain doesn't work like a computer. It stresses the essentiality of an evolutionary perspective. It shows that the self is an illusion and that every human brain possesses a genetically fixed innate human body image. It shows that our observations are based on comparisons and not on absolute values.
It poses crucial questions like: is there a place for God in the brain and could we really surgically take God out of it?

And last but not least, it gives a solution for one of the oldest philosophical problems on which numerous authors spent thousands of pages: the body/mind problem. Prof. Ramachandran proves correctly that the body/mind duality is a translation problem.

These are only a few items treated in this superbly written rich scientific exploratory expedition of the brain. A must read.

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, page 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19

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