The Man Who Tasted Shapes (Bradford Books) (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Space constraints prevent me from giving more than a mere flavour of the richness of Cytowic's thinking. With broad sweeps, he outlines a new landscape. . . . Read this book—and the more objective you think you are, the more open-minded you will need to be to appreciate it."
—The New Scientist

Product Description

"Space constraints prevent me from giving more than a mere flavour of the richness of Cytowic's thinking. With broad sweeps, he outlines a new landscape. . . . Read this book--and the more objective you think you are, the more open-minded you will need to be to appreciate it." -- The New Scientist In 1980, Richard Cytowic was having dinner at a friend's house, when his host exclaimed, "Oh, dear, there aren't enough points on the chicken." With that casual comment began Cytowic's journey into the condition known as synesthesia. The ten people in one million who are synesthetes are born into a world where one sensation (such as sound) conjures up one or more others (such as taste or color). Although scientists have known about synesthesia for two hundred years, until now the condition has remained a mystery. Extensive experiments with more than forty synesthetes led Richard Cytowic to an explanation of synesthesia--and to a new conception of the organization of the mind, one that emphasized the primacy of emotion over reason. Because there were not enough points on chicken served at a dinner almost two decades ago, Cytowic came to explore a deeper reality that he believes exists in all individuals, but usually below the surface of awareness. In this medical detective adventure, he reveals the brain to be an active explorer, not just a passive receiver, and offers a new view of what it means to be human--a view that turns upside down conventional ideas about reason, emotion, and who we are. * Not for sale in the United Kingdom and Eire

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Product Details

• Paperback: 276 pages
• Publisher: The MIT Press (April 10, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0262531526
• ISBN-13: 978-0262531528
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #926,819 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting But, December 8, 1999

By	Willem Vandenbroek (Ann Arbor, MI) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

An entertaining and easy read on an interesting subject by a neurologist who is an expert on it. If you are interested in synesthesia primarily as a "bizarre" or sensationalistic manifestation of human talents, Luria's amazing The Mind of a Mnemonist is your best bet; if you want a light account of how a modern scientist goes about understanding this phenomenon and locating it in the emotional brain, read this book too. The author discusses synesthesia in a wider contect of the centrality of emotions (for an excellent recent book on this topic, see Why We Feel by Victor S. Johnson), but he seems to go overboard: the divigations and essays thereon that make up at least a third of the book, concerning subjects like the anthropic principle, altered states of consciousness, and spirituality, strike me as largely sophomoric verging on too painful to read. If you can stomach arguments like the one that "all life forms, but particularly brains, play a large role in slowing down the rate of entropy increase and the degradation of energy in the universe. Such profound possibilities suggest that we should direct our efforts not toward controlling our emotions but toward gaining better insight into them..." you will have no problem. Perhaps we should applaud the author for being willing to expose himself by taking such risks; he does, after all, modestly label his formal essays as mere "trials" or "attempts." Cytowic likewise very openly includes a lot of biographical material, reconstructed conversations, randomn personal observations and opinions, etc., and narrator who emerges may or may not appeal to you. It's hard not to like a guy who criticizes the dehumanizing aspects of the typical medical education and the kind of doctors who emerge from it.

31 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Buy This Book, December 16, 2000

By	R. Williams (Austin, Texas USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The Man Who Tasted Shapes is an extraordinary work of research into the human mind that was, to me, only superficially about synesthesia. The information and perspective shared are much bigger than the title would imply. I believe that you'll find it to be fabulously interesting, even if you have zero interest in synesthesia.

Most doctors are afraid to write what they truly believe in their hearts lest it be challenged and scorned by their peers. Rarely do scientists allow you to "see the man behind the curtain," preferring to hide instead behind that mysterious veil we called "objective data." In this, Dr. Cytowic is far braver than most, and certainly more honest.

Here is just such an example from the book: "My innate analytic personality had been reinforced by twenty years of training in science and medicine. I reflexively analyzed whatever passed my way and firmly believed that the intellect could conquer everything through reason. 'You need an antidote to your incessant intellectualizing,' Clark suggested, 'something to put you in touch with the irrational side of your mind.'... I had never considered that there might be more to the human mind than the rational part that I was familiar with. It had never once occurred to me that a force to balance rationality existed, let alone that it might be a normal part of the human psyche."

In another chapter, Cytowic asserts, "Not everything we are capable of knowing and doing is accessible to or expressible in language. This means that some of our personal knowledge is off limits even to our own inner thoughts. Perhaps this is why humans are so often at odds with themselves, because there is more going on in our minds than we can ever consciously know."

If you read a lot of medical texts, as I do, you will find Dr. Cytowic to be far more broadminded and much less linear in his thinking than his peers. This makes Cytowic interesting, instead of boring like the others.

One final quote: "Neuroscientists have just lately come to realize how important emotion is. Placing reason and the (intellectual) cortex first and foremost is like the Wizard of Oz shouting, "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain." Reason, and an accomplice called self-awareness have deluded us into believing that they have been pulling the strings, but emotion and mentation not normally accessible to self-awareness have been in charge all along."

The Man Who Tasted Shapes is a delightful bridge between the hard science of neurology and the mystery that is man.

Buy the book. You won't regret it.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not for the "Close-minded"!, February 1, 2000

By	Health Enhancement Enter (Texas) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

While Dr. Cytowic's book mainly deals with his investigation of the rare neurological phenomena called "synesthesia", his resulting insights on emotions, reasoning and consciousness are really what make this book worth reading. He presents "The New View of How the Brain Works". A view that helps us understand the critical interaction of emotions and reasoning. If you are open-minded and ready to give an alternate point of view a chance, you will find this book to be truly enlightening, absorbing, thought provoking and enjoyable. If you are close-minded and think that science already has all the right answers - don't waste your time - try science fiction instead!