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21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
High hopes, poor outcome, April 16, 2009
I have been teaching "Mind, Brain and Behavior", and introductory course in Cognitive Neuroscience, for the past 10 years to college students at Columbia University and the City University of New York. After using Gazzaniga, Ivry and Mangun's "Cognitive Neuroscience: Biology of the Mind" for 8 of those years, I decided to try the Baars text because it appeared to have a strong overarching theme that would provide for greater pedagogy than my previous text. Indeed, skimming the text and the chapters suggests that it would be a beautiful, up-to-date and well-integrated treatment of cognitive neuroscience, with an emphasis on consciousness that is aligned with my own interests. So I assigned it to my class of 100.
I should have read it more carefully before doing that. In fact, I spent the semester trying to help them figure out what the figures really meant (since they didn't actually match what was discussed in the text much of the time), clarify concepts that came out of the blue, and generally apologizing to the students for all the clerical errors. It was frustrating for them and for me. Many of them wanted their money back from the publisher.
For students who are trying to learn new material, poor editing is particularly damaging because it creates unnecessary confusion (on top of the necessary confusion that comes with approaching challenging material). Even experts or interested laypeople shouldn't have to struggle through such poor editing in order to get information.
Needless to say, I'm not using the Baars text anymore. Hopefully, the 2nd edition will be better edited. I don't think it could be worse - in fact I've never read anything that was so poorly executed.
One positive note: I would say that the powerpoint slides that came with the instructor's version of the text were actually more useful than most instructor materials. Also, it has a cool bookmark.
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19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Great design, flawed execution, January 16, 2009
The design of this book is superb, and the approach to explaining a complex subject in a manner approachable to beginners and laymen is clever. Unfortunately, the execution is so flawed that the book is nearly worthless as a learning tool. The text often reads like a partially edited first draft, full of distracting inconsistencies, digressions, repetitions, and discussions that elaborate on concepts introduced later on, if ever. The index is grossly inadequate and references are often hazy. For example, on page 24, a quote is attributed to "Baddeley, personal communication." There is no entry in the index for Baddeley, but there are 5 entries in the bibliography for what would appear to be 3 different authors named Baddeley (A., A.D., and T.C.), although given the quality of the editing, they could actually refer to the same person. The book also desperately needs a glossary.
But the worst problem for a book that relies heavily on visual representation to get across its message is the frequent disconnect between text and illustrations. Some examples: In Figure 1.7, which introduces the major landmarks of the brain, the upper and lower portions are reversed from the way they are identified in the text. The framework upon which the entire teaching experience is based is introduced in an unnumbered figure at the front of Chapter 2, but what is labeled "Response output" in the figure is then called "motor output" in the text. The note under a truth table on page 459 ("Notice that the third Input column correlates with the Output") makes no sense because the input columns have been collapsed and appear to be a single 3-digit number. This kind of disconnect happens time and again throughout the book.
As an attractive coffee table book, this volume is not overpriced. As a textbook, the idea is great but I'd suggest waiting for a corrected second edition.
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21 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Overall, the best book I've read on the subject., June 16, 2007
I couldn't agree more with the editorial reviews of this book. It is excellent!
I'm reading the book just out of interest in the subject matter and I'm not involved professionally with neurology. I have recently read several books on the topic though and that list would include:
. Mapping the Mind - Rita Carter's excellent survey of brain functions (similar in some ways to this book and really excellent!).
. Exploring Consciousness - Another very good Rita Carter text.
. The Neuron - Cell and Molecular Biology - Irwin Levitan and Leonard K Kaczmarek's 500+ page non-light reading but fascinating book on neurons.
. Quest for Consciousness - Christopher Koch's (and Francis Crick's) insightful search for the neural correlates of consciousness.
. Wider Than The Sky - Gene Edelman's equally fascinating perspective on the same type of research.
. In Search of Memory - Eric Kandel's part autobiography, part neurology book.
. Etc.
Each of those books were wonderful and I plan on going back and reading them again just to see how my perspective has changed from what I've learned since the last time. But, if I had to pick one book to provide a survey of how the brain is organized and functions I believe this is the book I would chose. It is actually the first textbook I can remember reading in the past 40 years but it didn't remind me of the textbooks of that era.
Cognition, Brain, and Consciousness has the following assets:
. It is well organized and well indexed.
. The writing style seems to take advantage of the authors' understanding of the learning process.
. It provides more than a casual introduction to each of the topics it covers.
. I thought it provided a balanced view of conflicting theories and approaches, giving the pros and cons of each.
. The book is extremely well illustrated throughout. Each illustration seems very thoughtfully composed and selected.
. It should, as the editorial reviews suggest, appeal to a range of readers from "student through established researcher."
There are some typographical problems but they are minor (e.g. References to Appendix C - which doesn't exist). I ordered the book before its release date and actually received it before June 11th so I can imagine typos happening. There appears to be extensive support for the material on the publisher's website but I haven't checked that out as yet.
So I'm really writing this to thank the Bernard Baars and Nicole Gage for providing such amazing material. It is really outstanding and even though it is expensive I would say without hesitation that it is more than worth its price!
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