Customer Reviews

Cortex and Mind: Unifying Cognition

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According to some estimates the sum total of all medical knowledge is doubling every three and a half years, and in neuroscience it is doubling every two years.

It is no surprise that we are seeing a proliferation about the brain, and its relationship to cognition, consciousness and emotion. These books vary enormously, from the arcane at one end to popular overviews at the other. This is an intelligent and well-written book that can be read for pleasure and intellectual stimulation by a scientist as well as the educated non-scientists interested in learning what one prominent neuroscientist has to say about the age-old question about the relationship between the mind and the brain.

One novel idea that Fuster has is of the "Cognit:" a generic term for any representation of knowledge in the cerebral cortex. As he says, "A cognit is an item of knowledge about the world, the self, or the relations between them. Its network structure is made up of elementary representations of perception or action that have been associated with one another by learning or past experience."

But it by no means his only novel idea: the book is full of insights by a prominent scientist who has thought deeply about the fabric of Cognition.

The book follows a logical structure and is broken down into eight chapters and an interesting though not totally convincing Epilogue about consciousness:

1. Introduction; The Problem; Cognitive Networks: Theory; Cognitive Networks: Neuroscience; The Cognit
2. Neurobiology of Cortical Networks; Phylogeny of the Cortex; Ontogeny of the Cortex; Cognitive Network Formation; Extracortical Factors; Basic Structure of Cognitive Networks
3. Functional Architecture of the Cognit; Structure of Knowledge in Connectionist Models; Categories of Knowledge; Cortical Modularity; Cortical Hierarchy of Perceptual Networks; Cortical Hierarchy of Executive Networks; Heterarchical Representation in Association Cortex
4. Perception; Perceptual Categorization; Gestalt; Cortical Dynamics of Perception; Perceptual Binding; Perception-Action Cycle
5. Memory; Formation of Memory; Short-term Memory; Perceptual Memory; Executive Memory; Retrieval of Memory
6. Attention; Biological Roots of Attention; Perceptual Attention; Working Memory; Executive Attention; Set and Expectancy; Execution and Monitoring
7. Language; Neurobiology of Language; Hemispheric Lateralization; Neuropsychology of Language; Functional Architecture of Semantics; Cortical Dynamics of Syntax
8. Intelligence; Development of Intelligence; Reasoning; Problem Solving; Decision Making; Creative Intelligence
Epilogue on Consciousness

The book flows well, and is illumined by a great many diagrams - some in color - and concise references. I know only too well how much work must have gone into its production.

The book is a highly worthwhile contribution to the literature on the brain and the mind, and I recommend it highly, not just to fellow scientists, but to anyone interested in examining a new approach to the relationships between the brain and cognition.

I'm just an amateur, apparently Dr Fuster is a leading expert on the cortex and especially the pre-frontal cortex. This book is excellent and really helped me understand how the cortex operates. Highly recommended.