Wider Than the Sky: The Phenomenal Gift of Consciousness

Edelman, Gerald M

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0300107617 ISBN 13: 9780300107616

Publisher: Yale University Press, 2005

How does the firing of neurons give rise to subjective sensations, thoughts, and emotions? How can the disparate domains of mind and body be reconciled? The quest for a scientifically based understanding of consciousness has attracted study and speculation across the ages. In this direct and non-technical discussion of consciousness, Dr. Gerald M. Edelman draws on a lifetime of scientific inquiry into the workings of the brain to formulate answers to the mind-body questions that intrigue every thinking person.
Concise and understandable, the book explains pertinent findings of modern neuroscience and describes how consciousness arises in complex brains. Edelman explores the relation of consciousness to causation, to evolution, to the development of the self, and to the origins of feelings, learning, and memory. His analysis of the brain activities underlying consciousness is based on recent remarkable advances in biochemistry, immunology, medical imaging, neuroscience, and evolutionary biology, yet the implications of his book extend farther--beyond the worlds of science and medicine into virtually every area of human inquiry.

Product Description:

20 cm. xiii, 201 p. : ill. Encuadernación en tapa blanda de editorial ilustrada. Idioma Inglés. Gerald M. Edelman. [Phenomenal gift of consciousness ]. Includes bibliographical references (p. 181-185) and index. Contents The mind of man : completing Darwin's program -- Consciousness : the remembered present -- Elements of the brain -- Neural Darwinism : a global brain theory -- The mechanisms of consciousness -- Wider than the sky : qualia, unity, and complexity -- Consciousness and causation : the phenomenal transform -- The conscious and the nonconscious : automaticity and attention -- Higher-order consciousness and representation -- Theory and the properties of consciousness -- Identity : the self, mortality, and value -- Mind and body : some consequences .. Este libro es de segunda mano y tiene o puede tener marcas y señales de su anterior propietario. ISBN: 0300107617; 9780300107616

Review:

"[An] elegant . . . laudable, [and] accessible exploration of what's happening in neuroscience, biochemistry, and other disciplines, and an insightful examination of the trait that defines humans above all other organisms."--San Diego Union-Tribune
"Highly readable."--Oliver Sacks, New York Review of Books
"Consciousness is a hot topic, but still a mystery. One of the leaders of the scientific approach to the study of consciousness, Gerald Edelman has written a book that is a good roadmap for the lay reader."--Francis Crick, author of The Astonishing Hypothesis