Customer Reviews

The Right Mind: Making Sense of the Hemispheres

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Ornstein's early writings on right brain/left brain differences led to a veritable explosion of research and writing on the subject. In this book he's written an excellent summary of the current state of our understanding: although it's clear that the halves of the brain have different areas of specialization, he emphasizes strongly that they need to work together to enable us to function fully as human beings. He's bemused (and sometimes annoyed) at the popular tendency to romanticize the right brain as the seat of creativity and denigrate the left brain as an unimaginative literalist; the facts show that both halves are involved in such complex human activities as listening to music and understanding jokes. His summary of the 19th-century debates on brain functioning was very useful and informative. And his conclusion that psychology needs to pay more attention to the various ways human beings have pursued spiritual development over the millennia is, I think, a very timely reminder: psychology has tended to dismiss this behavior as "superstition," but, as other writers have pointed out (e.g., Epstein's "Thoughts Without a Thinker"), it has as much to do with developing the full power of your mind as with addressing something "out there." Ornstein writes clearly and humorously, and the book packs an amazing amount of knowledge into its rather brief length.

This book is not simply a sterile collection of ideas about the right and left hemispheres of the brain. It is a superbly-paced, well thought out text, one that leads the reader not only to an understanding of how the halves of the brain may work, but to an idea of how the skills possessed within these parts of the brain might work together to produce the 'right' mind for a given situation. I loved the last sentence of this book-it puts it all together in a way that is just right. I strongly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the subject.

Partly as a result of Ornstein's earlier book on the divided brain 25 years ago, the terms left and right brain have become part of of daily vocabularly. Even adverts talk about developing the right brain. Not surprisingly there are a lot of confusions on the topic as well. That's why Ornstein's return to the topic should be welcomed by anyone with an interest in the brain and how the mind works. He shows how the simple idea that people are either left or right brained is simply wrong but that the two work together in fascinating ways that we are only just beginning to understand. For a fine example of entertaining yet easy to understand science writing, turn to his section describing what is involved in understanding a joke and the different way patients who have lost the use of parts of their left or right brain respond to jokes. Other topics like dreams and schizophrenia also can be seen in a new light when seen from this interaction between the hemispheres. This is a lot shorter than Steve Pinker's latest work on the Mind and a lot more entertaininly written and contains many more fresh insights Jerome Burne, (London-based journalist specializing in psychology)

One of Robert Ornstein's great gifts is his ability to presentcomplicated historical and scientific material in a concise, lucid andentertaining fashion that lay readers like myself can understand and enjoy. THE RIGHT MIND embodies a daring shift in his paradigm for brain function from the 1970's, regarding the two hemispheres as complementary rather than dichotomous,the right providing the scaffolding and the left the building blocks. I was as startled and amazed when I read this book as I was when I read Ornstein's THE PSYCHOLOGY OF CONSCIOUSNESS.

This book nicely summarizes the current state of neuroscience research into the compelling question of the roles played in human consciousness by the two hemispheres of the brain. The author presents his view that, to summarize, the Left hemisphere is concerned more or less with the details of living and everyday affairs, while the Right hemisphere is more involved with the big picture. Toward this end he compares the duties of the left side with the processing of high-frequency, or rapidly changing information and that of the right side with low-frequency, or gradually changing information. It may be of interest to note that scientists developing machine-oriented visual systems have adopted the practice of breaking images into low-frequency, which presents the overall or general picture, and high-frequency, which provides detail, information.

It is rare for a researcher to admit he has changed his mind. This makes "The Right Mind" of unusual interest. Robert Ornstein, known since the '60s for his pioneering research on the two hemispheres of the brain, comes up with some great new ideas, beginning with his meditation (in Chapter 10) on his eyeglasses, that I found very stimulating. I read the book all the way through (rare for me). I recommend it unreservedly. - Dick Bolles, Author, What Color Is Your Parachute?

In the 1970's knowledge of the different functioning of the two sides of the cerebral cortex spurred considerable new reasearch, as well as an industry of "how to" books, seminars, and a new "language" for talking about the function of the mind. In "Right Mind" Dr. Ornstein summarizes events of the last 20 years relating to the expansion and exploitation of this knowledge and examines what remains of the promise and the deception arising from the beliefs that the differentiation in the cortex would lead to a new understanding of man. The concept of educating the respective sides of the brain is discussed in some detail, and Dr. Ornstein's conclusions are not always in accord with those who have made certain assumptions about what that training needs to be, (or even if it is training at all!).

Readers with previous experience with Ornstein's books may find The Right Mind the most interesting he's written. The view of brain through psychology offers a different approach about brain functions. For Beginners, this book may be quite useful. Though I read other book from Ornestein, I was expecting to find deep research on brain assymetry, which this book is poor, there's nothing you can't find over Internet on related sites. For intermeddiate readers on brain issue, this book may offer some interesting approaches, but too hard to get them between 200 pages. Instead, I would reccomend Carl Sagan's "Dragons of Eden", a marvelous and interesting book about brain development. Advanced readers won't like Ornstein for explaing brain lateralization, and a more appropriate book would be "Left brain, Right Brain", the only serious book written on this subject. Conclusion: Ornstein book is not that bad at all. If you like Oliver Sacks and psychological views of brain, this is indeed a good choice. Wrong Title though, coz it doesn't have much about brain lateralization itself (by the way, the book enphasizes the importance of both hemispheres working together - which is quite obvious when you want a scientific approach - but many people forget on daily life).

All of Robert Ornstein's very readable books help us to understand how our minds work. In The Right Mind, Ornstein uses clear ordinary language to describe the past, present, and future of world thinking about the roles of the brain hemispheres. If the right hemisphere specializes in contextual understanding, then this book could very well be subtitled: A Context for Context.

Readers with previous experience with Ornstein's books may find The Right Mind the most interesting he's written. The view of brain through psychology offers a different approach about brain functions. For Beginners, this book may be quite useful. Though I read other book from Ornestein, I was expecting to find deep research on brain assymetry, which this book is poor, there's nothing you can't find over Internet on related sites. For intermeddiate readers on brain issue, this book may offer some interesting approaches, but too hard to get them between 200 pages. Instead, I would reccomend Carl Sagan's "Broca's Brain", a marvelous and interesting book about brain development. Advanced readers won't like Ornstein for explaing brain lateralization, and a more appropriate book would be "Left brain, Right Brain", the only serious book written on this subject. Conclusion: Ornstein book is not that bad at all. If you like Oliver Sacks and psychological views of brain, this is indeed a good choice. Wrong Title though, coz it doesn't have much about brain lateralization itself (by the way, the book enphasizes the importance of both hemispheres working together - which is quite obvious when you want a scientific approach - but many people forget on daily life).