The Neuro Revolution: How Brain Science Is Changing Our World (Hardcover)

~ (Author), Byron Laursen (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Neuroscience entrepreneur Laursen, founder of a global trade association and a market research firm, is a futurologist with his feet on the ground. After an eight-year struggle to diagnose a painful back injury, Lynch's condition was pinpointed by a full-body MRI scan; the experience convinced him that emerging tools will improve our "control over the mental environment" in the same way we've managed the physical environment. Examining emerging tech, Lynch reports on lie detectors like a portable system for rapidly scanning and detecting involuntary facial tics, and a developing method called "brain fingerprinting." Emerging marketing techniques include functional MRI scanners for focus groups, allowing researchers to look directly at the brain of the subject, rather than depend on verbal responses. Lynch predicts that brain scan information will improve performance, and may become vital to professionals like stock brokers and specialized military forces; he also sees mental face-lifts attaining the popularity of cosmetic surgery. The exciting news is tampered by warnings that such devices could also be used for "cultural or economic bondage." Lynch is passionate, knowledgeable and fully engaged with the world of neurotechnology, and his overview makes absorbing material.
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Review

“In The Neuro Revolution, Zack Lynch takes you on an exciting and often unsettling tour of the frontier of neuroscience. Brace for impact; the future is much closer than you think.”

-- Jane Pauley, former co-host of NBC's Dateline and Today Show and author of Skywriting: A Life Out of the Blue

 

"Zack Lynch's Neuro Revolution is a fascinating, informative and astounding forecast of how neurotechnology will shape every aspect of our future. If you want to know what the next big thing is and how it will transform your life, work and world, read this book.”--Dr. James Canton, CEO & Chairman, Institute for Global Futures

 

“When I started reading this book, I thought Lynch's observations were rather hyperbolic. By the time I finished the book, I was stunned to realize that his points are not only rational but of urgent importance. Avoid reading this book at your peril.” -- Vint Cerf, Chief Internet Evangelist, Google Inc., also known as the "Father of the Internet"

 

“A book of remarkable scope and synthesis, Zack Lynch's perspective on the revolutionary changes that neuroscience will bring to art, entertainment, finance, religion, warfare and the law is unmatched. There is nothing like a radically new view on where humanity is headed at a time when so much is in question.”-- Steve Jurvetson, Managing Director, Draper Fisher Jurvetson

 

“We’re on the threshold of understanding how the human brain works.  These discoveries will allow us to dramatically improve every aspect in human life from curing mental illness and brain disease to helping humans learn more quickly and communicate more effectively.  The Neuro Revolution insightfully forecasts the enormous consequences of these breakthroughs.”--Patrick J. McGovern, Founder and Chairman of International Data Group, and Board Chairman of the McGovern Institute for Brain Research

 

"A remarkably accessible and engaging guide to the neurosociety to come."--Jonathan Moreno, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress, and author of Mind Wars

 

“The Neuro Revolution is a guide into a land both mysterious and familiar: our own minds. Zack Lynch describes the technology and discoveries that are illuminating this neural territory, and rightly points out that delving into the secrets of the brain can be both enlightening and frightening.”

--David Ewing Duncan, author of Experimental Man, and Chief Correspondent for NPR’s “Biotech Nation”

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press; 1 edition (July 21, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312378629
• ISBN-13: 978-0312378622
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #151,025 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars "The Neuro Revolution or Hyperbole??", September 27, 2009

By	Christa Caesar (ATL, US) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

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Zach Lynch's "The Neuro Revolution: How brain science is changing our world" is a painfully detailed book on the myriad ways neuroscience impacts our lives today and its possible effects on our future. Despite Lynch's thorough explanation on cutting-edge neuroscience research and his first hand insights from leading neuro-experts, his words seem to lose their fizz as the book progresses from one chapter to the next. Even though "The Neuro Revolution" is well-organized and thoroughly researched, it is clearly over-sensationalized.

A brief synopsis:
The book is divided into ten chapters, each devoted to an aspect that it is closely intertwined to our daily existence such as law, politics, marketing, finance, art, religion, trust, and war. According to Lynch, neuroscience will radically transform each of these arenas in ways we have not fathomed before. He gives detailed explanations on his each of his predictions and evidence for each claim.

Style and structure:
Combine the writing powers of a research scientist and a tabloid journalist, and you get the prose of Zack Lynch. Overall, the book has great structure. Lynch has clearly put in some deliberate thought into every chapter title and a sincere effort in tying together their underlying themes. However, every prediction of Lynch sounds more hyperbole than possibility. There are a lot of repetitious claims and concepts that plague the book. One concept that Lynch keeps harping about in the book is brain imaging (fMRI in specific). Lynch makes it sound like everything we do in the future - right from applying for a job, how we choose our partners, to purchasing designer shoes - will be based on how our brains light up on an fMRI which seemed absurd to me.

A look in-depth:

Chapter 1 - Time's Telescope:
Lynch spends a great deal of time setting up his case in this chapter. He starts off with a review of the past talking about the three revolutions that have changed the course of human history - (a) the agricultural, (b) industrial, and (c) information revolutions. He finally introduces, with much pomp, the neuro-revolution as the fourth wave whose threshold we are currently standing upon.

Chapters 2-5:
These chapters are devoted to describing the emerging areas of neurolaw, neuromarketing, neurofinancing, and the dynamic concept of trust respectively. I must confess that Lynch does give us some food for thought when he poses questions such as "How does someone turn out to be a criminal?" and "Is there a biological basis [for crime]?". Lynch's underlying claim is that "neurotechnology will be extensively used in the courtroom . . . [for] determining bias, compelling the truth, and showing whether someone poses a risk of future criminality"(46). The third and fourth chapters are devoted to exploring how neuroscience will impact marketing and finance. As dry as these concepts may sound, Lynch does justice in capturing the impact of neuroscience and opening our eyes to how our brain reacts to advertisements and makes financial decisions. The fifth chapter is solely devoted to the precarious topic of trust. The central focus of this chapter was the hormone "oxytocin" that is known to increase feelings of trust, love, and sexual gratification.

Chapters 6-9:
The major chunk of the second half of this book is a weak attempt in explaining how neuroscience will potentially impact the more abstract - art, our perception of God, and cosmetic neuro-enablement (a concept introduced by Lynch). Lynch's arguments seem to become weaker with the onset of these chapters - it seems because of the inevitable abstractness of the topics he attempts to explain. One of his weak predictions in chapter six on neuroesthetics states "As neurotechnology advances, we will have the ability to work backward to reverse-engineer the experiences generated by art and use some future variant of fMRI to tell us how to construct great songs, plays, and paintings. A day will arrive when, for some, becoming a great artist will mean learning the fundamentals of neuroesthetics"(130). He uses similar arguments while trying to predict how neuroscience will impact our perceptions of God, war, and our morale.

Chapter 10 - Our Emerging Neurosociety:
Finally, Lynch ties his entire book together in a mere 2-3 pages. As the book progressed I hoped at least that he would spend a considerable amount of time tying his ideas together. However he does not do so in his terribly short and abrupt conclusion. He leaves the reader with a highly optimistic, utopian vision of the future - which to me, an engineer, seems way too unrealistic.


Memorable Quotes:
* "Marketing isn't an invention of capitalism, or any other economic system. Marketing comes straight out of nature"
* "Just as our buildings are shaped by the available resources of construction technology, artworks are shaped by the functional abilities of our brain"
* "One way or another artists have been stirring up cultural, personal, and political change in our brains for as long as they've been mixing pigments, twanging tones, clacking dry bones, pounding drums, snapping pics, rapping or writing rhymes"
* "What's the difference between the mind and the brain? The mind is what the brain does for a living"
* "Using our brains to study our brains means that we are kind of boxed in"

Final words:

It is extremely difficult to write about the future and not be criticized for one's claims. Zack Lynch chose to do just that - predict the future - and unfortunately I found it extremely difficult to swallow his every claim. The book is definitely worth a read, but one must be cautious of every claim that the author makes. It makes a fabulous read for the thirsty futurist, but a tiresome one for the practical realist.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thoughtful and engaging, September 22, 2009

By	Janice Gibson (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews

A very enjoyable and informative read. I found myself engrossed in all the fascinating issues on our doorstep in different areas of society from finance to law, marketing to warfare and even art and theology. The information is interwoven in a very entertaining way. Advances are presented from several angles to show both the potential and challenges, benefits and perils of new technologies. I also really enjoyed the historical context provided about previous waves (agricultural, industrial, information) that gave a lens through which to view the coming neuro wave. Definitely worth a read.

5 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I have been waiting for this book!, July 31, 2009

By	J. Quirk "bookfan" (USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Finally! Zack Lynch has blow me away at several of his lectures I attended. In a field of glorious hyperbole and reactionary panic, we need a clear-headed analysis of the pros and cons of possibly inevitable neuro-technologies. Zach Lynch is the man: astounding, terrifying, exciting-- he's thought through all the promise and peril on many levels-- including social and moral-- and rigorously researched it. The book breaks it all down and walks us through all the important stuff. A primer for the mainstream reader. Here is where the conversation should start.