How the Self Controls Its Brain [Hardcover]

John Eccles (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1994 | ISBN-10: 0387562907 | ISBN-13: 978-0387562902 | Edition: 1

Psychological research on the nature of consciousness and mind-brain interaction. For psychologists and neuropsychologists. Illustrated.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 197 pages
• Publisher: Springer-Verlag Telos; 1 edition (January 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0387562907
• ISBN-13: 978-0387562902
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,931,707 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The soul found by a neurologist, January 4, 2003

By 

Patricio Artiagoitia (Santiago Chile) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: How the Self Controls Its Brain (Hardcover)

This book is a unique example of a scientific trying to go further of the materialistic approach that prevails in the scientific community.
After the book he wrote with Karl Popper (The brain and its mind) sir John Eccles, Nobel Prize in the 60's, wrote this one, described by him as "the book he had been trying to write during his entire life". Actually, he passed away soon after writing it.
This book is about the search of way to allow the mind to control the brain, and so allowing the very reality of the free will. The main adversary here is the energy conservation law. That law expresses that the total energy in the universe is constant. The problem with free will is that it needs the possibility of a movement (Finally energy) triggered by the mind. He finally found that way, bases in very small cells in the brain whose response to electrical stimulus falls under the laws of quantum mechanics.
The book is in many occasions difficult to follow if you are not a neurologist, but is so well written that you can assess the quality of the arguments even when you can't catch all the technicalities.
This book is a must for everyone interested in the relationship between mind and brain, and is the perfect gun, in the battle against a materialistic reductionism of the mind, for those who still believe in the free will and the real existence of the soul.