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"Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
#1
"Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
Just came across this lead for my first summer's read. Can't wait to get my hands on it. I hope this lady is a good writer.

Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain, by Patricia S. Churchland. Norton. 304 pages. $26.95. [$18 on Amazon]

“You cannot understand the mind without understanding how the brain works,” writes the philosopher Patricia S. Churchland in this marvelous book, which uses recent findings from neuroscience and evolution to illuminate deep questions about human nature. After early chapters debunking the soul and afterlife, Dr. Churchland gives a nuanced account of sex, violence and morality, working up gently but ambitiously from brain chemicals to ethical norms. She predicts that consciousness, which she believes may be shared in some form by all mammals and birds, will eventually be understood by the convergence of “a million little important results,” not by a miraculous discovery. Throughout the book Dr. Churchland draws on episodes from her early life on a Canadian farm to illustrate her arguments. A trustworthy guide, she gives comfort not by simplifying the research but by asking the right questions."

I'm pre-ordering my copy right now.
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#2
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
Thanks, I'll have to add this to my list. I just borrowed Pinker's How The Mind Works.
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#3
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
I just found and watched this video of several minutes of the author being interviewed by my favorite theist, Bill Moyers. Nothing earth shattering, at least for me. Theists are always endangered of getting something shattered unless they can come to a position like that of the dalai lama which she describes in the beginning of the video.

http://youtu.be/X2DPKLRBuio
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#4
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland



I'm definitely interested, but from the blurb you posted, it sounds a lot like what I said of Damasio's book, Self Comes To Mind — the author has a lot of interesting information, but he's still looking for a model to tie it all together. A friend remarked that the field of neuroscience is "awash in a sea of data," without any higher level ideas to give it form and substance. It's possible that there simply aren't unifying ideas or an all encompassing model which explains mind and consciousness; it wouldn't be unexpected from both the biological and computational architecture of the brain. Or perhaps Churchland and others are jumping the gun and throwing in the towel prematurely.

Regardless, I would recommend her earlier work, "Neurophilosophy." It's my all-time favorite book, and I've just recently started re-reading it, and finding much to merit the re-acquaintance.


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#5
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
(June 25, 2013 at 3:08 pm)apophenia Wrote:


I'm definitely interested, but from the blurb you posted, it sounds a lot like what I said of Damasio's book, Self Comes To Mind — the author has a lot of interesting information, but he's still looking for a model to tie it all together. A friend remarked that the field of neuroscience is "awash in a sea of data," without any higher level ideas to give it form and substance. It's possible that there simply aren't unifying ideas or an all encompassing model which explains mind and consciousness; it wouldn't be unexpected from both the biological and computational architecture of the brain. Or perhaps Churchland and others are jumping the gun and throwing in the towel prematurely.

Regardless, I would recommend her earlier work, "Neurophilosophy." It's my all-time favorite book, and I've just recently started re-reading it, and finding much to merit the re-acquaintance.



Oh goody. Now I'm really interested, though I won't expect a great cathartic breakthrough. I won't be shocked if I go to the grave with consciousness as much a mystery as it is right now, though I do find that a little disappointing.
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#6
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
I don't think this is right.

The self is a symbolic entity-- an idea. Yes, the brain is the organ which processes and holds ideas. However, information has a kind of independence on the specific system in which it resides. That's why you could transcode an mp3 to hologram, to memory chips, or to arranged black-and-white seashells on the beach if you wanted to, and that information would be the same.

To say the self is the brain is to say that Casablanca is a bunch of pigmented film. It's not. The film is just the medium of convenience for carrying the ideas that make Casablanca a meaningful experience.
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#7
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
Sounds intriguing
"The Universe is run by the complex interweaving of three elements: energy, matter, and enlightened self-interest." G'Kar-B5
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#8
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
(June 25, 2013 at 11:43 pm)bennyboy Wrote: I don't think this is right.

The self is a symbolic entity-- an idea. Yes, the brain is the organ which processes and holds ideas. However, information has a kind of independence on the specific system in which it resides. That's why you could transcode an mp3 to hologram, to memory chips, or to arranged black-and-white seashells on the beach if you wanted to, and that information would be the same.

To say the self is the brain is to say that Casablanca is a bunch of pigmented film. It's not. The film is just the medium of convenience for carrying the ideas that make Casablanca a meaningful experience.

Well yeah, in a different context that makes sense. But this is about how the organic supports consciousness and makes possible a sense of self. That isn't a substitute for anyone's sense of identity or what they find meaningful. How it all plays out in anyone's life will not be affected by understanding the physics, chemistry, biology or psychology of the mind. But if you find the particulars of those things and the diversity we find across individuals amazing, then how can you not be enthralled to understand how that has become possible? It isn't either/or.
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#9
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
(June 25, 2013 at 1:28 pm)cato123 Wrote: Thanks, I'll have to add this to my list. I just borrowed Pinker's How The Mind Works.

Hi,

I'm a psychology graduate, so since you mentioned that book I figured I'd throw some info out there regarding that book and how it compares to Churchland's views. Pinker subscribes to a view of the mind called the computational theory of mind, specifically, a view based on the idea that the mind consists of formal operations on lingua-formal representations in a language of thought. In addition, his view of the mind is that it consists of modules, an idea formulated by functionalist philosopher of mind Jerry Fodor and expanded upon by other philosophers and psychologists.

The Churchlands on the other hand (Patricia's husband Paul shares the same views) subscribe to a connectionist perspective based around parallel distributed processing. They reject the idea of a language of thought as being based in a misguided folk psychology. If you have the time or interest, there's a chapter in her classic book Neurophilosophy called "functionalist psychology" (where functionalist refers to the philosophy of mind from which Pinker's views originate, not the older school of psychology by the same name) where she criticizes that view of psychology. It would be a good counter-point to Pinker's book.

Patricia sees the mind as a computer too, but it's not a "software" running on the "hardware" of the brain as some cognitive psychologists have suggested (again, based in functionalism). For her, the mind-brain is an analog, not digital, computer that computes based on inputs into various neural networks where the information is processed in a sub-symbolic fashion.

I'd also recommend her husband Paul's books A Neurocomputational Perspective and Plato's Camera.
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#10
RE: "Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain" by philosopher Patricia Churchland
(June 25, 2013 at 11:43 pm)bennyboy Wrote: That's why you could transcode an mp3 to hologram, to memory chips, or to arranged black-and-white seashells on the beach if you wanted to, and that information would be the same.
Not unless they all shared the same format, or were formatted. It can be -made to be the same-, would be a more accurate way to say this. Kind of the point of adopting any specific medium in the first place, from a standpoint of top down use. So that whatever information you wish to convey (be it the "meaningful experience" of casablanca -or- a series of slides-on-film of flesh eating bacteria) can be understood by more than one user. If I hand you a vhs cassette of casablanca..and you only have a dvd player...where did all that "meaningful experience" go?
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