Customer Reviews

Human Brain Function, Second Edition

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This output of a single laboratory group puts together neuroscientific topics across a span of fields from epistemology and mathematics through psychology and clinical psychiatry. The first half is a series of discussions on what brain systems do; the second half discusses methods by which functional magnetic imaging adduces intelligible information. The text departs from the authors' experimental observations, interpretations and interests to organize a massive amount of knowledge about the shapes and functions of brain systems as well as how we think about and image them. The text is profusely amplified by graphed data, brain images, concept-illustrating cartoons and bibliographic references. The congenial, personal style keeps this reader riveted to the text. The 2nd edition, which appeared a decade after the first, adds highly salient issues that are hard to succinctly discuss, such as consciousness, personal identity and free will. This will probably be the last essay to put so much into a single volume. Despite the authors' ritual apology that textbooks in fast-developing fields are obsolete on their publishing date, this key reference book will be cherished by future readers excited by brain science and its implications.