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The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind Paperback – August 15, 2000
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At the heart of this classic, seminal book is Julian Jaynes's still-controversial thesis that human consciousness did not begin far back in animal evolution but instead is a learned process that came about only three thousand years ago and is still developing. The implications of this revolutionary scientific paradigm extend into virtually every aspect of our psychology, our history and culture, our religion -- and indeed our future.
- Print length512 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- Publication dateAugust 15, 2000
- Dimensions6 x 1.25 x 9 inches
- ISBN-100618057072
- ISBN-13978-0618057078
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From The New Yorker
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"When Julian Jaynes . . . speculates that until late in the twentieth millennium b.c. men had no consciousness but were automatically obeying the voices of the gods, we are astounded but compelled to follow this remarkable thesis." -- John Updike The New Yorker —
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- Publisher : Mariner Books; 31578th edition (August 15, 2000)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 512 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0618057072
- ISBN-13 : 978-0618057078
- Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
- Dimensions : 6 x 1.25 x 9 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #21,397 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #6 in Humanist Philosophy
- #47 in Anatomy (Books)
- #52 in Popular Culture in Social Sciences
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Jaynes was far ahead of his time, and his theory remains as relevant and influential today as when it was first published. Many consider Jaynes's book to be one of the most important of the twentieth century.
Since the publisher has only included one editorial review, I will add additional reviews below. But first, a word about some of the negative or critical reviews of Jaynes's book. I encourage you to view these with skepticism, as most reflect a very poor understanding of Jaynes's theory, and can easily be dismissed. Jaynes's book is not difficult to understand, but nonetheless many seem to only skim the book or for other reasons fail to grasp his ideas.
The most common pitfall in understanding Jaynes's theory is misunderstanding how Jaynes defines consciousness. Jaynes defines consciousness in a very precise way (and he explains why this is so important), and confusing his definition for more broad, vague definitions of consciousness will lead to failure to understand the theory as a whole.
The internet, social media, and other factors have ushered in somewhat of an epidemic of lack of humility, where many seem to feel they are qualified to weigh in on nearly everything, regardless of their background or experience with the subject matter. They are quick to offer their opinion on nearly anything, regardless of whether or not they actually know what they are talking about. Amazon also encourages this, by soliciting customer reviews. In the case of the purchase of a garden hose, a set of shelves, other household basics, and many other everyday products, this often makes sense. But for books such as Julian Jaynes's, the average person's opinion may not be all that useful, if not counterproductive.
In 2016, Julian Jaynes's theory was discussed in HBO's hit series "Westworld," potentially exposing nearly a million new people to the theory. While it is wonderful that so many new people were turned on to Jaynes's fascinating ideas, it's safe to say that many of these new readers (along with many others) have little if any background with the subject matter. Just as you wouldn't trust your accountant to repair your plumbing, or your eye doctor to handle your legal affairs, so too you should be highly skeptical of the ability of Amazon reviewers with no background in the subject matter to have a sufficient enough understanding of Jaynes's theory after perhaps skimming it once to properly evaluate and review it.
Jaynes's theory provides a fascinating reexamination of the psychology of our ancient past and also has far-reaching modern-day implications. Read it for yourself, and make up your own mind. Regardless of whether or not they agree with Jaynes on every point, many feel that Jaynes's book is one of the best books they have ever read -- including people like David Bowie, who included it on his list of favorite books.
Since the publication of Jaynes's book, Jaynes's neurological model for the bicameral mind has been confirmed by modern brain imaging studies, his theory inspired the modern interest in hearing voices among normal people (and helped inspire the founding of the worldwide "Hearing Voices Network"), children's imaginary companions have been found to often involve actual hallucinations, his theory helped re-ignite scholarly interest in the role of language in consciousness, vestiges of the bicameral mind have been documented in many pre-literate societies, the transition from bicamerality to consciousness has been documented in other cultures (such as China and Tibet), and much more.
** For more information on Julian Jaynes's theory, including new evidence that supports the theory that's been discovered since it was first published, please visit the Julian Jaynes Society at julianjaynes.org. Also be sure to take a look at our follow up books on Julian Jaynes's theory: "Conversations on Consciousness and the Bicameral Mind," "Gods, Voices, and the Bicameral Mind," "The Julian Jaynes Collection," "Reflections on the Dawn of Consciousness," and "The Minds of the Bible." **
The following is a small sampling of comments by reviewers whose background and expertise puts them in a better position to offer an informed opinion on Jaynes's theory:
“[Jaynes’s] basic hypothesis is probably right.” And “The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind is one of those ... books … that readers, on finishing it, find that they think about the world quite differently.” — T.M. Luhrmann, Ph.D., Professor of Anthropology, Stanford University
“[Jaynes] has one of the clearest and most perspicuous defenses of the top-down approach [to consciousness] that I have ever come across.” .... "Something like what he proposes has to be right." — Daniel Dennett, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, Tufts University
“The weight of original thought in it is so great that it makes me uneasy for the author’s well-being: the human mind is not built to support such a burden.” — David C. Stove, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, University of Sydney
“Julian Jaynes’s theories for the nature of self-awareness, introspection, and consciousness have replaced the assumption of their almost ethereal uniqueness with explanations that could initiate the next change in paradigm for human thought.” — Michael A. Persinger, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Neuroscience, Laurentian University
“Neuroimaging techniques of today have illuminated and confirmed the importance of Jaynes’ hypothesis.”
— Robert Olin, M.D., Ph.D., Professor Emeritus in Preventive Medicine, Karolinska Institute
“The bold hypothesis of the bicameral mind is an intellectual shock to the reader, but whether or not he ultimately accepts it he is forced to entertain it as a possibility. Even if he marshals arguments against it he has to think about matters he has never thought of before, or, if he has thought of them, he must think about them in contexts and relationships that are strikingly new.” — Ernest R. Hilgard, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology, Stanford University
“Daring and brilliant … well worth reading by any person interested in theories of human learning and behavior, in theory development, and in seeing a scholarly, fertile and original thinker at work.” — Martin Levit, Ph.D., Professor of Education
“Some of Jaynes’ original ideas may be the most important of our generation . . . And I feel weak as I try to convey some slight impression of Jaynes’ fantastic vision in this short review. Not since Freud and Jung has anyone had the daring and background to pull together such a far reaching theory.” — Ernest Rossi, Ph.D., Professor of Neuroscience
“This book and this man’s ideas may be the most influential, not to say controversial, of the second half of the twentieth century. I cannot recommend the book emphatically enough. I have never reviewed a book for which I had more enthusiasm. . . . It renders whole shelves of books obsolete.” — William Harrington, in The Columbus Dispatch
“… Scientific interest in [Jaynes’s] work has been re-awakened by the consistent findings of right-sided activation patterns in the brain, as retrieved with the aid of neuroimaging studies in individuals with verbal auditory hallucinations.” — Jan Dirk Blom, M.D, Ph.D.
“… [O]ne of the most thought-provoking and debated theories about the origin of the conscious mind.” — Andrea Cavanna, M.D.
“… I sympathize with Julian Jaynes’s claim that something of great import may have happened to the human mind during the relatively brief interval of time between the events narrated in the Iliad and those that make up the Odyssey.” — Antonio Damasio, Ph.D., Professor of Neuroscience, Psychology and Neurology, University of Southern California
“[Jaynes’s] description of this new consciousness is one of the best I have come across.” − Morris Berman, Ph.D.
“He is as startling as Freud was in The Interpretation of Dreams, and Jaynes is equally adept at forcing a new view of known human behavior.” — Raymond Headlee, M.D. in American Journal of Psychiatry
“Julian Jaynes is a scholar in the broad original sense of that term. A man of huge creative vitality, Julian Jaynes is my academic man for all seasons.” — Hubert Dolezal, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology
“Having just finished The Origin of Consciousness, I myself feel something like Keats’ Cortez staring at the Pacific, or at least like the early reviewers of Darwin or Freud. I’m not quite sure what to make of this new territory; but its expanse lies before me and I am startled by its power.” — Edward Profitt, in Commonweal
“… [Jaynes’s] proposal is too interesting to ignore.” — David Eagleman, Ph.D., neuroscientist, Baylor College of Medicine, in Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain
“… Read the book and make up your own mind. I can guarantee that you will be enormously interested if not entirely persuaded, as I am myself.” — Charles Van Doren
“… [The] more I thought about Jaynes’s thesis, the more reasonable it sounded, and the more I read in anthropology, in history, and above all, in poetry, the more evidence I found to support the idea that hallucinated voices still give socially useful commands.” — Judith Weissman, Ph.D., author and Professor of English, Syracuse University
“One’s first inclination is to reject all of it out of hand as science fiction, imaginative speculation with no hard evidence; but, curiously, if one is patient and hears out the story (Jaynes’s style is irresistible) the arguments are not only entertaining but persuasive.” — George Adelman, Department of Brain & Cognitive Sciences, MIT, in Library Journal
“The most significant book of our time . . .” — D. N. Campbell, in Kappan Magazine
“It seems likely that the concept of the ‘bicameral mind’ advanced by Julian Jaynes will prove to be an insight of considerable significance.” — T. Buchan, M.D., Department of Psychiatry, University of Zimbabwe, in Zambezia
“A wonderfully intriguing and evocative book…” — J. Harold Ellens, Ph.D., in Understanding Relgious Experience
Reviewed in the United States on November 11, 2020
Jaynes was far ahead of his time, and his theory remains as relevant and influential today as when it was first published. Many consider Jaynes's book to be one of the most important of the twentieth century.
Since the publisher has only included one editorial review, I will add additional reviews below. But first, a word about some of the negative or critical reviews of Jaynes's book. I encourage you to view these with skepticism, as most reflect a very poor understanding of Jaynes's theory, and can easily be dismissed. Jaynes's book is not difficult to understand, but nonetheless many seem to only skim the book or for other reasons fail to grasp his ideas.
The most common pitfall in understanding Jaynes's theory is misunderstanding how Jaynes defines consciousness. Jaynes defines consciousness in a very precise way (and he explains why this is so important), and confusing his definition for more broad, vague definitions of consciousness will lead to failure to understand the theory as a whole.
The internet, social media, and other factors have ushered in somewhat of an epidemic of lack of humility, where many seem to feel they are qualified to weigh in on nearly everything, regardless of their background or experience with the subject matter. They are quick to offer their opinion on nearly anything, regardless of whether or not they actually know what they are talking about. Amazon also encourages this, by soliciting customer reviews. In the case of the purchase of a garden hose, a set of shelves, other household basics, and many other everyday products, this often makes sense. But for books such as Julian Jaynes's, the average person's opinion may not be all that useful, if not counterproductive.
In 2016, Julian Jaynes's theory was discussed in HBO's hit series "Westworld," potentially exposing nearly a million new people to the theory. While it is wonderful that so many new people were turned on to Jaynes's fascinating ideas, it's safe to say that many of these new readers (along with many others) have little if any background with the subject matter. Just as you wouldn't trust your accountant to repair your plumbing, or your eye doctor to handle your legal affairs, so too you should be highly skeptical of the ability of Amazon reviewers with no background in the subject matter to have a sufficient enough understanding of Jaynes's theory after perhaps skimming it once to properly evaluate and review it.
Jaynes's theory provides a fascinating reexamination of the psychology of our ancient past and also has far-reaching modern-day implications. Read it for yourself, and make up your own mind. Regardless of whether or not they agree with Jaynes on every point, many feel that Jaynes's book is one of the best books they have ever read -- including people like David Bowie, who included it on his list of favorite books.
Since the publication of Jaynes's book, Jaynes's neurological model for the bicameral mind has been confirmed by modern brain imaging studies, his theory inspired the modern interest in hearing voices among normal people (and helped inspire the founding of the worldwide "Hearing Voices Network"), children's imaginary companions have been found to often involve actual hallucinations, his theory helped re-ignite scholarly interest in the role of language in consciousness, vestiges of the bicameral mind have been documented in many pre-literate societies, the transition from bicamerality to consciousness has been documented in other cultures (such as China and Tibet), and much more.
** For more information on Julian Jaynes's theory, including new evidence that supports the theory that's been discovered since it was first published, please visit the Julian Jaynes Society at julianjaynes.org. Also be sure to take a look at our follow up books on Julian Jaynes's theory: "Conversations on Consciousness and the Bicameral Mind," "Gods, Voices, and the Bicameral Mind," "The Julian Jaynes Collection," "Reflections on the Dawn of Consciousness," and "The Minds of the Bible." **
The following is a small sampling of comments by reviewers whose background and expertise puts them in a better position to offer an informed opinion on Jaynes's theory:
“[Jaynes’s] basic hypothesis is probably right.” And “The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind is one of those ... books … that readers, on finishing it, find that they think about the world quite differently.” — T.M. Luhrmann, Ph.D., Professor of Anthropology, Stanford University
“[Jaynes] has one of the clearest and most perspicuous defenses of the top-down approach [to consciousness] that I have ever come across.” .... "Something like what he proposes has to be right." — Daniel Dennett, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, Tufts University
“The weight of original thought in it is so great that it makes me uneasy for the author’s well-being: the human mind is not built to support such a burden.” — David C. Stove, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, University of Sydney
“Julian Jaynes’s theories for the nature of self-awareness, introspection, and consciousness have replaced the assumption of their almost ethereal uniqueness with explanations that could initiate the next change in paradigm for human thought.” — Michael A. Persinger, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Neuroscience, Laurentian University
“Neuroimaging techniques of today have illuminated and confirmed the importance of Jaynes’ hypothesis.”
— Robert Olin, M.D., Ph.D., Professor Emeritus in Preventive Medicine, Karolinska Institute
“The bold hypothesis of the bicameral mind is an intellectual shock to the reader, but whether or not he ultimately accepts it he is forced to entertain it as a possibility. Even if he marshals arguments against it he has to think about matters he has never thought of before, or, if he has thought of them, he must think about them in contexts and relationships that are strikingly new.” — Ernest R. Hilgard, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology, Stanford University
“Daring and brilliant … well worth reading by any person interested in theories of human learning and behavior, in theory development, and in seeing a scholarly, fertile and original thinker at work.” — Martin Levit, Ph.D., Professor of Education
“Some of Jaynes’ original ideas may be the most important of our generation . . . And I feel weak as I try to convey some slight impression of Jaynes’ fantastic vision in this short review. Not since Freud and Jung has anyone had the daring and background to pull together such a far reaching theory.” — Ernest Rossi, Ph.D., Professor of Neuroscience
“This book and this man’s ideas may be the most influential, not to say controversial, of the second half of the twentieth century. I cannot recommend the book emphatically enough. I have never reviewed a book for which I had more enthusiasm. . . . It renders whole shelves of books obsolete.” — William Harrington, in The Columbus Dispatch
“… Scientific interest in [Jaynes’s] work has been re-awakened by the consistent findings of right-sided activation patterns in the brain, as retrieved with the aid of neuroimaging studies in individuals with verbal auditory hallucinations.” — Jan Dirk Blom, M.D, Ph.D.
“… [O]ne of the most thought-provoking and debated theories about the origin of the conscious mind.” — Andrea Cavanna, M.D.
“… I sympathize with Julian Jaynes’s claim that something of great import may have happened to the human mind during the relatively brief interval of time between the events narrated in the Iliad and those that make up the Odyssey.” — Antonio Damasio, Ph.D., Professor of Neuroscience, Psychology and Neurology, University of Southern California
“[Jaynes’s] description of this new consciousness is one of the best I have come across.” − Morris Berman, Ph.D.
“He is as startling as Freud was in The Interpretation of Dreams, and Jaynes is equally adept at forcing a new view of known human behavior.” — Raymond Headlee, M.D. in American Journal of Psychiatry
“Julian Jaynes is a scholar in the broad original sense of that term. A man of huge creative vitality, Julian Jaynes is my academic man for all seasons.” — Hubert Dolezal, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology
“Having just finished The Origin of Consciousness, I myself feel something like Keats’ Cortez staring at the Pacific, or at least like the early reviewers of Darwin or Freud. I’m not quite sure what to make of this new territory; but its expanse lies before me and I am startled by its power.” — Edward Profitt, in Commonweal
“… [Jaynes’s] proposal is too interesting to ignore.” — David Eagleman, Ph.D., neuroscientist, Baylor College of Medicine, in Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain
“… Read the book and make up your own mind. I can guarantee that you will be enormously interested if not entirely persuaded, as I am myself.” — Charles Van Doren
“… [The] more I thought about Jaynes’s thesis, the more reasonable it sounded, and the more I read in anthropology, in history, and above all, in poetry, the more evidence I found to support the idea that hallucinated voices still give socially useful commands.” — Judith Weissman, Ph.D., author and Professor of English, Syracuse University
“One’s first inclination is to reject all of it out of hand as science fiction, imaginative speculation with no hard evidence; but, curiously, if one is patient and hears out the story (Jaynes’s style is irresistible) the arguments are not only entertaining but persuasive.” — George Adelman, Department of Brain & Cognitive Sciences, MIT, in Library Journal
“The most significant book of our time . . .” — D. N. Campbell, in Kappan Magazine
“It seems likely that the concept of the ‘bicameral mind’ advanced by Julian Jaynes will prove to be an insight of considerable significance.” — T. Buchan, M.D., Department of Psychiatry, University of Zimbabwe, in Zambezia
“A wonderfully intriguing and evocative book…” — J. Harold Ellens, Ph.D., in Understanding Relgious Experience
Julian Jaynes claims that human consciousness as we know it only began about 3,000 years ago. Before that, humans had a “bicameral mind”. Essentially the right hemisphere of the brain interpreted sensory data, judged, decided and formed language: many of the functions that we consider the basis of consciousness. Useful information was communicated to the left hemisphere of the brain, which spoke, acted and moved, all without being “aware” of what it was doing.
Jaynes provides dozens of metaphors to describe such an alien mind, but the one I found was most useful was a comparison to driving. If I’m driving a car, I might “zone out”. (The operation of the left hemisphere, according to Jaynes, is a little like being permanently zoned out, although he doesn’t use those words.)
If it’s a simple trip, I can still get where I’m going and operate the car flawlessly without paying attentIon, or remembering the trip afterwards. But if it’s a slightly more complicated trip, I might want a friend in the passenger’s seat who will keep close watch on the road and call out “turn right up ahead” or “watch out for that deer!” when necessary. Acting automatically, I can follow his instructions without ever snapping to. Likewise, early man, including people who lived in quite large (although simply structured, as Jaynes says) societies, didn’t need both halves of their brain to march in lockstep. Sumerians, Mycenaeans, Mayans and Incas lived their whole lives “zoned out”, listening to the voices in their heads (whom they naturally regarded as gods).
The key, Jaynes says, is that as the trip gets still more complicated, it’s no longer enough to rely on your friend to backseat drive. If you’re driving on the Cross-Bronx Expressway, it is not practical to listen to somebody say “you’re in that tractor trailer’s blind spot now merge left two lanes look out that guy is driving erratically”
You have to internalize the function of your friend, merge both halves of your brain as it were, and start paying attention *yourself*. Likewise, as human civilization became more complex, it was no longer enough to rely on signals from our right brains. The voices of the gods fade away, and instead we learn to “talk” to ourselves in our own brains.
A corollary of this theory is that when the gods stop talking to us, it’s stressful! It’s hard to take responsibility for our own thoughts and choices. We want the gods back. We want to find some way to communicate with those gods again. And in this way, Jaynes has also explained the basis of all religion. He goes on to explain poetry, hypnotism and schizophrenia. What a smart guy!
So does this theory hold water? I have no idea. Jaynes was a psychologist at Princeton, but his arguments also cite ancient literature and archaeology, neurology, linguistics and philosophy. I don’t have the background to judge any of the evidence he presents, although the frequency with which he says (boasts?) that he is going against the scholarly consensus, cheerfully retranslating ancient texts, is a bad sign. “Works and Days” seems too much like the work of a conscious person for something written in the 9th century BC? If you read between the lines, it was probably written by the author *to the other half of his brain* Ha ha!
Moreover, some of it is purely speculative. His explanation of how we developed from non-verbal apes into archaic civilizations is one big just-so story. It sounds plausible, I guess, but there isn’t and never will be any evidence backing it up.
The writing style might be called grandiose. It reminds me of The Decline of the West by Oswald Spengler, another “theory of everything” tome by a polymath academic. A sample:
“… The Old Testament, even as it is hedged with great historical problems of accuracy, still remains our richest source for knowledge of what the transition period was like. It is essentially the story of the loss of the bicameral mind, the slow retreat into silence of the remaining elohim, the confusion and tragic violence which ensue, and the search for them in vain among its prophets until a substitute is found in right action.
“But the mind is still haunted with its old unconscious ways; it broods on lost authorities; and the yearning, the deep and hollowing yearning for divine volition and service is with us still.”
He then proceeds to rewrite the 42nd Psalm to fit his theory.
I haven’t looked, but I’m sure this book hasn’t taken academia by storm. I don’t think there are Jaynesian schools of thought. Although he was an Ivy League professor, he’s probably just another crank. But I don’t care. I don’t even need to know if it’s really true. A book like this is too good to check.
Top reviews from other countries
Being conscious turns out to be new. Ancient Man was not. He had no self-narrative giving
Em resumo, o autor propõe que pensamentos e as decisões no passado se davam por alucinações no hemisfério direito do cérebro. Tais alucinações se tornaram a base das civilizações antigas e, por consequência, o que chamamos hoje de religião. No entanto, Julian Jaynes diz que houve uma ruptura nesse modo de pensamento e as alucinações, visões e possessões se tornaram privilégio de um grupo seleto de pessoas como profetas, oráculos e videntes.
Com a diminuição das alucinações, a sociedade desenvolveu a escrita e os primeiros códigos legais. A narrativa interna se torna a função essencial no lugar de comando vindos dos deuses.
Julian Jaynes preenche o livro com exemplos e uma didática que torna leigos no assunto, assim como eu, em mais conhecedores do tema.
Le recensioni dietro il libro sembrano esagerate, ma più lo si legge e più vi ci si trova d'accordo. Tiene sicuramente la mente occupata con nuove idee.
Vale la pena leggerlo almeno una volta nella vita.
Reviewed in Italy on April 3, 2021
Le recensioni dietro il libro sembrano esagerate, ma più lo si legge e più vi ci si trova d'accordo. Tiene sicuramente la mente occupata con nuove idee.
Vale la pena leggerlo almeno una volta nella vita.
If you rather think of consciousness along the lines of Thomas Nagel ~ that there is something it is like to be you ~ then keep in mind that this book is addressing consciousness from a completely different angle, if not speaking about different phenomenons overall.
It is a long book, but I can 100% recommend it. If you want a short version, just read the afterword.









