The Mind's Past [Paperback]

Gazzaniga is a clinical researcher, not a field worker. This doesn't impede his stressing an evolutionary development for how our minds work. Gazzaniga posits an "interpreter" as residing within our left brains. The distinctive roles of the left and right halves of the brain have been the subject of intensive research during the past years, but his assessment has some novelty. It is rather more than the classical "Cartesian Theatre" which has held sway in the minds of many psychologists and philosophers over the years. Gazzaniga's "interpreter" outperforms the role of "observer" postulated by Descartes. It has moved from Descartes' pineal gland to the left cortex. In Gazzaniga's view, the "interpreter" has a more active role, even powered to stimulate activity in sensory areas, previously thought to be wholly reactive. This device is rooted in our animal ancestors, living in a dangerous environment, needing to predict events for survival and reproduction. We have progressed beyond those roots, but the function has had long career, according to Gazzaniga. He stresses that we must learn more about its abilities and operations.

His use of sources is awkward. While utilizing the work of numerous researchers in his account, his attributions are hazy. The appended notes are collected by chapters, but relating the list to the text is difficult. Countless workers noted in the text fail to appear in the notes. We have only Gazzaniga's assurances that his references are valid. While his approach makes for easy readability, one's own "interpreter" sits uncomfortable at these omissions. Many well-known figures in consciousness studies are omitted. He builds a superb case, but it seems to rest on a shaky foundation. Still, his assertions need response and it will be fascinating to see who answers his contentions.

The second half of the book trails off into monotonous case studies and lacks the zing of the opening chapters. I rated this book a five however because it carries such a seminal point that in itself is of astounding significance. The human brain is no where near as plastic as it's given credit for being in the popular literature. We all know what a brain looks like. Just thinking of the word brings to mind a fixed image we've all seen in myriads of represnetations. They all sort of look the same, and guess what, they all sort of function the same way too: function follows form, or, as Sartre said, the essence is revealed in the appearance, not concealed by it. This is not to say that the brain functions how it looks, but an analogy illustrating that a brain's function is based on its form, or, its anatomy and physiology. You'd think this would be obvious but apparently for some reason it isn't. It's is an important point and Gazzaniga breaks it down very plainly and simply. The idea that neural function follows form is not immediately apparent to the lay person because it is a very politically unpopular view. Not a neurologically unpopular view but a politically unpopular view. Think about it. Contemporary social policy strongly prefers a view that the brain is molded by environment so it can sell policies to solve problems. The brain, long evolved over eons has its own agenda however. Any pediatric neurologist can tell you, tragically, how the brain tolerates very little variation in local structure and chemistry; kids born with slight variations in brain anatomy and chemistry are subject to acute difficulties. We're all really very much more similar in terms of how our brains function than we generally allow for. The brain is, to be blunt, a product of genetics, "those pesky little robots of nature" as Gazzaniga calls them. Obviously, as E. O. Wilson learned, the world is not yet ready for sociobiology. Gazzaniga ignores such political correctness and proceeds to discuss how the brain actually functions, not how some may wish it to. Gazzaniga would have us consider behavior based on neural function as an endocrinologist would consider diabetes relative to pancreatic function; by material cause and effect. Can you imagine the chaos such a view would cause in a cultural system based on the idea of free will from the Protestant aesthetic of John Winthrop? More, it seems, of people's behavior is based on their brain structure and chemistry than on environmental factors, an idea clearly counter to popular beliefs.

Gazzaniga also takes great pleasure in pointing out that we unconsciously lie a lot and concoct in voluminous quantities. This is how our brains are evolved to function, that is, to lie and create fantastic realities; and to great adaptive success one might add. This idea is not necessarily new for sophisticated idealists, although it is still not palatable to uprightly moral types because they tell the truth (really they do). We make the world we observe to a very large extent in our materially imaginative minds and Gazzaniga elucidates such a fantastic notion in a straight forward discussion that raises as many questions as it answers.

All in all a short, sweet, easy read on how brains function by a highly qualified observer.