Vileyanur S. Ramachandran, MD, Ph.D., is Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition, Professor of Psychology and Neurophysiology at the University of California, San Diego, Associate Professor of Biology at the Salk Institute Ramachandran received his medical degree and subsequently a Ph.D. from Trinity College (Trinity College) of the University of Cambridge. He has many titles and awards, including the title of a member of the council of Ol Souls College (AN Soul's College) of Oxford University, an honorary doctorate from Connecticut College, Aliens Kappers Gold Medal of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences for notable contributions to neurophysiology, Gold Medal of the Australian national university and Honorary Presidential Title from the American Academy of Neurology Delivered a series of lectures on the workings of the brain at the celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary (silver jubilee) of the Society of Neurophysiologists (1995); has made introductory presentations at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Brain Conference at the Library of Congress, the Dorcas Readings at Cold Spring Harbor, the Adams Readings at Harvard Massachusetts Hospital, and the Jonas Memorial Readings Salk, at the Solkovsky Institute.
Ramachandran has published over 120 articles in scientific journals(including Scientific American). He is the author of the acclaimed book Phantoms in the Brain, which has been translated into eight languages and is the basis of a two-part film on Channel 4 on UK TV and on PBS in the US. Newsweek magazine recently named him a member of the "club of the century" - one of the hundred most prominent people of the 21st century.
Book Reviews
…Great job. Any parent would be happy to entrust their child to such a brilliant teacher. He has such strength and fiery temperament that you literally see how lightning flies from his fingers ... His research is the latest achievements in the study of complex evolutionary development brain
"Observer"
Breathtaking. Professor Ramachandran is one of the most famous neurophysiologists in the world. At the same time, his erudition is happily combined with the ability to present information in a clear, exciting and witty way, his research on the work of the brain can revolutionize science ...
Guardian
Bold, new, witty and accessible.
Larry Weiskrantz, Professor, University of Oxford
A new methodological approach to the functional connections between different brain locations allows an extraordinarily talented neurophysiologist to explain puzzling neurological and psychiatric symptoms and conclude that brain science can resolve many of the classic questions of philosophy. Great read that makes you think.
Roger Guillemin, Nobel laureate
Science is in dire need of scientists who can talk about their work to inform, enlighten, and entertain us. Ramachandran is a true master in this field.
adan caui,
professor, Oxford University
V. S. Ramachandran is one of our most gifted doctors and scientists, he clarifies all the problems he touches - whether it be phantom limbs, illusions and delusions, synesthesia and its connection with metaphor, creativity and art, the most important questions about the relationship brain and mind. His book The Birth of the Mind belongs to the rare category of scientific books - it is as intelligible as it is deeply scientific.
Oliver Sacks, MD
First of all, I want to say thank you to my parents. which have always supported my curiosity and interest in science. My father bought me a Zeiss microscope when I was 11 years old, and my mother helped set up a chemistry lab in a closet under the stairs of our house in Bangkok, Thailand. Many of the teachers at the British School in Bangkok, especially Mrs. Vanith and Mrs. Panachura, gave me reagents for "experiments" at home.
My brother V. S. Ravi played an important role in my early development: he often read Shakespeare and Oriental poetry aloud to me. Poetry and literature are much closer to science than is commonly believed, all these areas have an unusual contact with ideas and some romantic view of the world.
I am grateful to Semmangudi Sreenivaz Pyer, whose divine music has been a colossal catalyst for all my endeavors.
Jayarkrishna, Shantramini and Diana are a constant source of inspiration and admiration.
To BBC Raith Lecture Organizers Gwyneth Williams and Charles Siegler for the excellent work they did editing the lectures, and Sue Doley for organizing the event. And to Profile Books staff Andrew Franklin and Penny Daniel, who helped turn these lectures into readable book text.
Science flourishes much better in an atmosphere of complete freedom and financial independence. Therefore, it is not surprising that in ancient Greece it reached its zenith at a time of great prosperity and the patronage of learning, where it was then that logic and geometry first arose. And during the golden age of the Guptas in India, the calculus, trigonometry, and most of algebra as we know them today were created. The Victorian era is the era of learned gentlemen like Humphry Davy, the Darvias and the Cavendish.
Something similar we have in the United States today is the faculty invitation system and federal grants, for which I am especially grateful to the National Institute of Health, which has provided me with unwavering research support over the years. (However, over many years of teaching, I have become convinced that the system does not improve, unwittingly encouraging conformity and punishing free thought.) As Sherlock Holmes used to say to Dr. Watson, "mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, it needs talent to discern genius."
My choice of career as a medical student was strongly influenced by six eminent physicians: K.V. Later, when I entered Trinity College, Cambridge, I found myself in a very intellectually stimulating environment. I remember endless conversations with other students and colleagues: Sudarshan Yengar, Ranjit Nayyar, Mushirul Hassan, Hemal Jasurna, Hari Vasdudevan, Arfay Hessam, Vidaye and Prakash Virkara.
Among those teachers and colleagues who have influenced me more than others, I would like to mention Jack Pettigra, Richard Gregory, Oliver Sacks, Horace Warlow, Dave Peterzell, Edi Munch, P. K. Anand Kimar, Sheshegari Rao, T. R. Vidayasagar , V. Madhusudhana Rao, Vivian Barron, Oliver Braddick, Fergus Campbell, K. K. D. Shute, Colin Blakemore, David Whitteridge, Donald Mackey, Don Macleod, David Presti, Alladi Venkatesh, Carrie Armell, Ed Hubbard, Eric Altshuler, Ingrid Olson, Pavitra Krishnan, David Hubel, Ken Nakayama, Marge Livingston, Nick Humphrey, Brian Yosefson, Pat Cavanagh, Bill Hubert and Bill Hestein
I have also maintained strong ties to Oxford over the years through Ed Rawlls, Ann Triesman, Larry Weiskrantz, John Marshall and Peter Halligan. I am grateful to All Souls College for accepting me as an honorary member of the council in 1998 - membership is unique, although it does not impose any formal obligations (of course, overburdening is frowned upon). This gave me the opportunity to think and write about neuroaesthetics, which is the topic of my third lecture. My interest in art was also supported by Julia Kindy, an art historian at the University of California. Her inspiring lectures on Rodin and Picasso made me think about the science of art.
I am grateful to the Ateneum Club, which provided me with a brilliant opportunity to use the library and a quiet haven at any time when I wanted to escape from the hustle and bustle of the big city during my visits to London.
Esmeralda Jean is the eternal muse of all restless scientists and artists.
I was also fortunate to have many uncles and cousins who became eminent scientists and engineers. I am indebted to Alladi Ramachandran who supported my interest in science from early childhood; when I was still 19 years old, he asked his secretary Ganapati to type my manuscript on stereoscopic vision for the journal Nature. To my (and his!) surprise, it was printed without corrections. physicist. P. Hariharan had a great influence on my early intellectual development, guiding me towards the study of vision. I also enjoyed talking with Alladi Prabhakar, Krishnaswami Alladi and Ishwar (Isha) Hariharan and I am happy to report that he is now a staff member of the University of California.
Vileyanur S. Ramachandran, MD, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition, Professor of Psychology and Neurophysiology at the University of California, San Diego, Associate Professor of Biology at the Salk Institute Ramachandran received a medical degree and subsequently a Ph.D. from Trinity College (Trinity College) of the University of Cambridge. Ramachandran has published over 120 articles in scientific journals (including Scientific American). He is the author of the acclaimed book Phantoms in the Brain, which has been translated into eight languages and is the basis of a two-part film on Channel 4 on UK TV and on PBS in the US. Newsweek magazine recently named him a member of the "Century Club" - one of the 100 most prominent people of the 21st century.
In my lectures, I set the goal of making neuroscience (the science of the brain) more accessible to a wider audience - "working people", as Thomas Huxley would say. In general, the strategy was to investigate the neurological damage caused by the change in small sections of the patient's brain and answer the questions: why does the patient show these strange symptoms; what they tell us about how a healthy brain works; Can careful study of such patients help us understand how the activity of billions of nerve cells in the brain gives life to the richness of our conscious experience? Due to time constraints, I decided to focus either on issues that I have been directly working on (e.g., phantom limbs, synesthesia, and visual perception) or on issues that are broadly interdisciplinary in nature, in order to bridge a large chasm that According to Charles P. Snow, he shares "two cultures" - the natural sciences and the humanities.
In neurology, there is a conflict between two approaches: 1) "single case study" or a thorough study of only one or two patients with the same syndrome; 2) analysis of a large number of patients and statistical conclusions. It is sometimes quibbled that by studying only isolated cases it is easy to go down the wrong path, but this is nonsense. Most of the neurological syndromes that have stood the test of time, such as the main types of aphasia (speech disorders), amnesias (studied by Brenda Milner, Elizabeth Warington, Larry Squire and Larry Weiskrantz), achromatopsia (cortical color blindness), "ignoring" syndrome, "blindsight" syndrome , commissurotomy (syndrome of "split brain") and so on, were originally discovered by careful study of individual cases. And I really do not know of any syndrome that would be found as a result of the average results obtained from a large sample. In fact, the best strategy is to start with individual case studies and then make sure that the observations are reliably replicated in other patients. This is true of the discoveries described in these lectures, such as phantom limbs, Capgras' syndrome, synesthesia, and "ignorance" syndrome. These findings were surprisingly confirmed in other patients and were consistent with studies from several laboratories.
My colleagues and students often ask me: when did I become interested in the workings of the brain and why? It is not easy to follow the emergence of interests, but I will try. I became interested in science at about 11 years old. I remember myself as a rather lonely and unsociable child, however, I had one very good science buddy in Bangkok, his name was Somtau Susharitkul (“Somtau” means “cookies”). However, I have always felt the responsiveness of nature, and perhaps science was my “withdrawal” from the social world with its arbitrariness and paralyzing foundations.
I spent a lot of time collecting sea shells, geological specimens and fossils. I really enjoyed doing archaeology, cryptography (Hindu manuscripts), comparative anatomy and paleontology. I was overjoyed that the tiny bones inside our ears that we mammals use to amplify sound originally evolved from the jawbones of reptiles.
In school, I was fascinated with chemistry, and I often mixed reagents just to see what would happen (a burning piece of magnesium tape immersed in water continued to burn under water, releasing oxygen from H20). Biology was my other passion. I once tried to put sugar, fatty acids, and an amino acid in Dione's "mouth" to see what caused it to close and secrete digestive enzymes. I've done experiments to see if ants will hide and eat saccharin with the same enthusiasm they would with sugar. Can saccharin molecules fool ants' taste buds like ours do? ...
Vileyanur S. Ramachandran, MD, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition, Professor of Psychology and Neurophysiology at the University of California, San Diego, Associate Professor of Biology at the Salk Institute Ramachandran received his medical degree and subsequently a PhD from Trinity College (Trinity College) of the University of Cambridge. He has received numerous titles and awards, including the title of Member of the Council of College Ol - Souls (AN Soul's College) Oxford University, an honorary doctorate degree from Connecticut College, Aliens Kappers gold medal of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences for notable contributions to neurophysiology, gold medal of the Australian National University and honorary Presidential title of the American Academy of Neurology Delivered a series of lectures on the workings of the brain at the celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary (silver jubilee) of the Society of Neurophysiologists (1995); has made introductory presentations at the National Institute of Mental Health (N1MH) Brain Conference at the Library of Congress, the Dorcas Readings at Cold Spring Harbor, the Adams Readings at Harvard Massachusetts Hospital, and the Jonas Memorial Readings Salk, at the Solkovsky Institute.
Ramachandran has published over 120 articles in scientific journals (including Scientific American). He is the author of the acclaimed book Phantoms in the Brain, which has been translated into eight languages and is the basis of a two-part film on Channel 4 on UK TV and on PBS in the US. Newsweek magazine recently named him a member of the "club of the century" - one of the hundred most prominent people of the 21st century.
Book Reviews
…Great job. Any parent would be happy to entrust their child to such a brilliant teacher. He has such strength and fiery temperament that you literally see lightning flying from his fingers ... His research is the latest in the field of studying the complex evolutionary development of the brain
"Observer"
Breathtaking. Professor Ramachandran is one of the most famous neurophysiologists in the world. At the same time, his erudition is happily combined with the ability to present information in a clear, exciting and witty way, his research on the work of the brain can revolutionize science ...
Guardian
Bold, new, witty and accessible.
Larry Weiskrantz, Professor, University of Oxford
A new methodological approach to the functional connections between different brain locations allows an extraordinarily talented neurophysiologist to explain puzzling neurological and psychiatric symptoms and conclude that brain science can resolve many of the classic questions of philosophy. Great read that makes you think.
Roger Guillemin, Nobel laureate
Science is in dire need of scientists who can talk about their work to inform, enlighten, and entertain us. Ramachandran is a true master in this field.
adan caui,
professor, Oxford University
V. S. Ramachandran is one of our most gifted doctors and scientists, he clarifies all the problems he touches - whether it be phantom limbs, illusions and delusions, synesthesia and its connection with metaphor, creativity and art, the most important questions about the relationship brain and mind. His book The Birth of the Mind belongs to the rare category of scientific books - it is as intelligible as it is deeply scientific.
Oliver Sacks, MD
First of all, I want to say thank you to my parents. which have always supported my curiosity and interest in science. My father bought me a Zeiss microscope when I was 11 years old, and my mother helped set up a chemistry lab in a closet under the stairs of our house in Bangkok, Thailand. Many of the teachers at the British School in Bangkok, especially Mrs. Vanith and Mrs. Panachura, gave me reagents for "experiments" at home.
My brother V. S. Ravi played an important role in my early development: he often read Shakespeare and Oriental poetry aloud to me. Poetry and literature are much closer to science than is commonly believed, all these areas have an unusual contact with ideas and some romantic view of the world.
Vileyanur S. Ramachandran, MD, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition, Professor of Psychology and Neurophysiology at the University of California, San Diego, Associate Professor of Biology at the Salk Institute Ramachandran received his medical degree and subsequently a PhD from Trinity College (Trinity College) of the University of Cambridge. He has received numerous titles and awards, including being a Council Member of Oxford University's Soul's College, an honorary doctorate from Connecticut College, the Aliens Kappers gold medal from the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences for outstanding contributions to neurophysiology, the Australian National University gold medal, and an honorary Presidential title of the American Academy of Neurology Delivered a series of lectures on the workings of the brain at the celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary (silver jubilee) of the Society of Neurophysiologists (1995); has made introductory presentations at the National Institute of Mental Health (N1MH) Brain Conference at the Library of Congress, the Dorcas Readings at Cold Spring Harbor, the Adams Readings at Harvard Massachusetts Hospital, and the Jonas Memorial Readings Salk, at the Solkovsky Institute.
Ramachandran has published over 120 articles in scientific journals (including Scientific American). He is the author of the acclaimed book Phantoms in the Brain, which has been translated into eight languages and is the basis of a two-part film on Channel 4 on UK TV and on PBS in the US. Newsweek magazine recently named him a member of the "club of the century" - one of the hundred most prominent people of the 21st century.
Book Reviews
…Great job. Any parent would be happy to entrust their child to such a brilliant teacher. He has such strength and fiery temperament that you literally see lightning flying from his fingers ... His research is the latest in the field of studying the complex evolutionary development of the brain
"Observer"
Breathtaking. Professor Ramachandran is one of the most famous neurophysiologists in the world. At the same time, his erudition is happily combined with the ability to present information in a clear, exciting and witty way, his research on the work of the brain can revolutionize science ...
Guardian
Bold, new, witty and accessible.
Larry Weiskrantz, Professor, University of Oxford
A new methodological approach to the functional connections between different brain locations allows an extraordinarily talented neurophysiologist to explain puzzling neurological and psychiatric symptoms and conclude that brain science can resolve many of the classic questions of philosophy. Great read that makes you think.
Roger Guillemin, Nobel laureate
Science is in dire need of scientists who can talk about their work to inform, enlighten, and entertain us. Ramachandran is a true master in this field.
Adan Kaui, Professor, University of Oxford
V. S. Ramachandran is one of our most gifted doctors and scientists, he clarifies all the problems he touches - whether it be phantom limbs, illusions and delusions, synesthesia and its connection with metaphor, creativity and art, the most important questions about the relationship brain and mind. His book The Birth of the Mind belongs to the rare category of scientific books - it is as intelligible as it is deeply scientific.
Oliver Sacks, MD
First of all, I want to say thank you to my parents, who have always supported my curiosity and interest in science. My father bought me a Zeiss microscope when I was 11 years old, and my mother helped set up a chemistry lab in a closet under the stairs of our house in Bangkok, Thailand. Many of the teachers at the British School in Bangkok, especially Mrs. Vanith and Mrs. Panachura, gave me reagents for "experiments" at home.
My brother V. S. Ravi played an important role in my early development: he often read Shakespeare and Oriental poetry aloud to me. Poetry and literature are much closer to science than is commonly believed, all these areas have an unusual contact with ideas and some romantic view of the world.
I am grateful to Semmangudi Sreenivaz Pyer, whose divine music has been a colossal catalyst for all my endeavors.
Jayarkrishna, Shantramini and Diana are a constant source of inspiration and admiration.
To BBC Rate Lecture Organizers Gwyneth Williams and Charles Siegler for the excellent work they did editing the lectures, and Sue Doley for organizing the event. And to Profile Books staff Andrew Franklin and Penny Daniel, who helped turn these lectures into readable book text.
Science flourishes much better in an atmosphere of complete freedom and financial independence. Therefore, it is not surprising that in ancient Greece it reached its zenith at a time of great prosperity and the patronage of learning, where it was then that logic and geometry first arose. And during the golden age of the Guptas in India, the calculus, trigonometry, and most of algebra as we know them today were created. The Victorian era is the era of learned gentlemen like Humphry Davy, Darwin and Cavendish.
Something similar we have in the United States today is the faculty invitation system and federal grants, for which I am especially grateful to the National Institute of Health, which has provided me with unwavering research support over the years. (However, over many years of teaching, I have become convinced that the system does not improve, unwittingly encouraging conformity and punishing free thought.) As Sherlock Holmes used to say to Dr. Watson, "mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, it needs talent to discern genius."
My choice of career as a medical student was strongly influenced by six eminent physicians: K.V. Later, when I entered Trinity College, Cambridge, I found myself in a very intellectually stimulating environment. I remember endless conversations with other students and colleagues: Sudarshan Yengar, Ranjit Nayyar, Mushirul Hassan, Hemal Jasurna, Hari Vasdudevan, Arfay Hessam, Vidaye and Prakash Virkara.
Among those teachers and colleagues who have influenced me more than others, I would like to mention Jack Pettigra, Richard Gregory, Oliver Sacks, Horace Warlow, Dave Peterzell, Edi Munch, P. K. Anand Kimar, Sheshegari Rao, T. R. Vidayasagar , V. Madhusudhana Rao, Vivian Barron, Oliver Braddick, Fergus Campbell, K. K. D. Shute, Colin Blakemore, David Whitteridge, Donald Mackey, Don Macleod, David Presti, Alladi Venkatesh, Carrie Armell, Ed Hubbard, Eric Altshuler, Ingrid Olson, Pavitra Krishnan, David Hubel, Ken Nakayama, Marge Livingston, Nick Humphrey, Brian Yosefson, Pat Kavanagh, Bill Hubert and Bill Hestein.
I have also maintained strong ties to Oxford over the years through Ed Rawlls, Ann Triesman, Larry Weiskrantz, John Marshall and Peter Halligan. I am grateful to All Souls College for accepting me as an honorary member of the council in 1998 - membership is unique, although it does not impose any formal obligations (of course, overwork is frowned upon). This gave me the opportunity to think and write about neuroaesthetics, which is the topic of my third lecture. My interest in art was also supported by Julia Kindy, an art historian at the University of California. Her inspiring lectures on Rodin and Picasso got me thinking about the science of art.
I am grateful to the Ateneum Club for providing me with a brilliant opportunity to use the library and a quiet haven at any time when I wanted to escape from the hustle and bustle of the big city during my visits to London.
Esmeralda Jean is the eternal muse of all restless scientists and artists.
I was also fortunate to have many uncles and cousins who became eminent scientists and engineers. I am indebted to Alladi Ramachandran who supported my interest in science from early childhood; when I was still 19 years old, he asked his secretary Ganapati to type my manuscript on stereoscopic vision for the journal Nature. To my (and his!) surprise, it was printed without corrections. The physicist P. Hariharan had a great influence on my early intellectual development, guiding me towards the study of vision. I also enjoyed talking with Alladi Prabhakar, Krishnaswami Alladi and Ishwar (Isha) Hariharan and I am happy to report that he is now a staff member of the University of California.
My Friends, Relatives and Colleagues: Shai Azoulai, Vivian Barron, Liz Bates, Roger Bingham, Jeremy Brookes, Steve Cobb, Nikki de St. Bela Julets, Dorothy Klefner, S. Lakshmanan, Steve Link, Kumpati Narendra, Malini Papatasarati, Hal Pashler, Dan Plummer, R. K. Raghavan, K. Ramesh, Hindu Ravi, Bill Rosar, Krish Satian, Spencer Sitaram, Terry Sejnowski, Chetan Shaw, Gordon Shaw, Lindsay Schenk, Alan Snyder, A. V. Sreenivasan, Subramanian Sriram, K. Sriram, Claude Valenti, Ajit Varki, Alladi Venkatesh, Nairobi Venkatraman, and Ben Williams, many of whom hosted me during my visits to Madras.
Special thanks to Francis Crick, who at 86 years of age continues to invest more energy and passion in science than most of my younger colleagues. And also to Stuart Anstis, an eminent vision researcher who has been a friend and collaborator of mine for over 20 years. And also Pat and Paul Churchland, Leah Levy and Lance Stone, my colleagues at the University of California. I have also been very fortunate to have educated leaders such as Paul Drake, Jim Kalik, John Wickstead, Jeff Ellman, Robert Deine, and Marsha Chandler.
Funding for research comes primarily through generous grants from the National Institutes of Health and from Richard Geckler and Charlie Robins, who have taken a relentless interest in our center's work for many years.
Foreword
To my parents Vileyshur Subramanian and Vileyanur Meenakshi Ramachandran
Diana, Mani and Jaya
Semyangudi Sreenwasa Yyer
To President Abdul Kalam - for the entry of our young country into the new millennium
Shiva Dakshinamurthy, the king of Gnosis, music, knowledge and wisdom
It was a great honor for me to receive an invitation to participate in the Reith Lectures: I was the first visiting medical practitioner and psychologist since they were founded by Bertrand Russell in 1948. Over the past 50 years, these lectures have taken an important place in the intellectual and cultural life Britain, and I was happy to accept the invitation, knowing that I was joining a long list of lecturers whose work inspired me in my early youth - Peter Medawar, Arnold Toynbee, Robert Oppenheimer, John Galbraith and Bertrand Russell.
However, I realized how difficult it would be to lecture after them, given their high level and the role they played in defining the intellectual ethos of our age. Even more frightening was the requirement to make the lectures not only interesting to specialists, but also accessible to "ordinary people" and thereby correspond to the original mission that Lord Wraith had defined for the BBC. Due to the fact that I have done a huge amount of research on the brain, the best I could do was to create general idea rather than trying to cover everything. True, in this case there was a danger of oversimplifying many problems, which might irritate some of my colleagues. Nevertheless, as Lord Wraith himself once said: "There are people whose duty it is to annoy others!"
I have had great pleasure traveling all over the UK with my lectures. The first lecture I gave at the Royal Institution in London was especially joyful and memorable for me, not only because I saw so many familiar faces of my former teachers, colleagues and students in the audience, but also and because it took place in the very room where Michael Faraday first demonstrated the connection between electricity and magnetism. Faraday was one of the heroes of my adolescence, and I could almost feel his presence in the audience and the possible disapproval of my attempts to show the connection between the brain and the mind.
In my lectures, I set the task of making neuroscience (the science of the brain) more accessible to a wider audience - "working people", as Thomas Huxley would say. In general, the strategy was to investigate the neurological damage caused by the change in small sections of the patient's brain and answer the questions: why does the patient show these strange symptoms; what they tell us about how a healthy brain works; Can careful study of such patients help us understand how the activity of billions of nerve cells in the brain gives life to the richness of our conscious experience? Due to time constraints, I decided to focus either on issues that I have been directly working on (e.g., phantom limbs, synesthesia, and visual perception) or on issues that are broadly interdisciplinary in nature, in order to bridge a large chasm that According to Charles P. Snow, he shares "two cultures" - the natural sciences and the humanities.
The third lecture is devoted to a particularly controversial issue in the neurology of artistic perception - "neuroaesthetics", which is usually considered to be beyond the scope of science. I decided to take up this question just for my own pleasure, to find out how neuroscientists we could approach this problem. I don't apologize for being just a theory, since everyone knows to whom "the law is not written." As Peter Medawar says, "science is basically an imaginary digression into what Maybe be true." Assumptions are good if they can be checked, but on condition - the author makes it clear when he only builds versions, sliding along thin ice, but when it relies on a solid foundation of objective data. I have made an effort to keep this in mind in my work, adding separate remarks collected at the end of the book.
In addition, in neurology there is a conflict between two approaches: 1) "single case study" or a thorough study of only one or two patients with the same syndrome; 2) analysis of a large number of patients and statistical conclusions. It is sometimes quibbled that by studying only isolated cases it is easy to go down the wrong path, but this is nonsense. Most of the neurological syndromes that have stood the test of time, such as the main types of aphasia (speech disorders), amnesia (studied by Brenda Milner, Elizabeth Warington, Larry Squire and Larry Weiskrantz), achromatopsia (cortical color blindness), "ignoring" syndrome, "blindsight" syndrome , commissurotomy (split brain syndrome) and so on, were originally discovered by careful study of individual cases. And I really do not know of any syndrome that would be found as a result of the average results obtained from a large sample. Actually the best strategy is begin from studying individual cases, and then making sure that the observations are reliably repeated in other patients. This is true of the discoveries described in these lectures, such as phantom limbs, Capgras syndrome, synesthesia, and "ignoring" syndrome. These findings were surprisingly confirmed in other patients and were consistent with studies from several laboratories.
My colleagues and students often ask me: when did I become interested in the workings of the brain and why? It is not easy to follow the emergence of interests, but I will try. I became interested in science at about 11 years old. I remember myself as a rather lonely and unsociable child, however, I had one very good science buddy in Bangkok, his name was Somtau Susharitkul (“Somtau” means “cookies”). However, I have always felt the responsiveness of nature, and perhaps science was my “withdrawal” from the social world with its arbitrariness and paralyzing foundations.
I spent a lot of time collecting sea shells, geological specimens and fossils. I really enjoyed doing archaeology, cryptography (Hindu manuscripts), comparative anatomy and paleontology. I was overjoyed that the tiny bones inside our ears that we mammals use to amplify sound originally evolved from the jawbones of reptiles.
In school, I was fascinated with chemistry, and I often mixed reagents just to see what would happen (a burning piece of magnesium ribbon immersed in water continued to burn under water, releasing oxygen from H 2 O). Biology was my other passion. I once tried to put sugar, fatty acids, and an amino acid in Dione's "mouth" to see what caused it to close and secrete digestive enzymes. I've done experiments to see if ants will hide and eat saccharin with the same enthusiasm they would with sugar. Can saccharin molecules fool ants' taste buds like ours do?
All these searches, "Victorian" in spirit, were far from what I do today - from neurology and psychophysiology. Nevertheless, these childhood passions could not help but leave an indelible mark on me and deeply influenced my “adult” personality and style of doing science. In devoting myself to these intimate pursuits, I felt that I was in parallel world where Darwin and Cuvier, Huxley and Owen, William Jones and Champollion live. These people were much more alive and real to me than everything around me. Perhaps this escape into my own world allowed me to feel more special than unsociable, "weird" It allowed me to rise above the boredom and monotony - an ordinary existence that most people call "normal life" - and get there, where, in Russell's words, "at least one of our noble impulses is able to escape from the gloomy exile into the real world."
Such an "escape" is especially encouraged at the University of California at San Diego - a place venerable and at the same time surprisingly modern. His neuroscience program is considered the best in the country by the US National Academy of Sciences. If you add the Salk Institute and the Gerry Edelmans Neurosciences Institute to this, then the concentration of neurologists in the "neuron valley" of La Jolla will be the highest in the world. I can't imagine a more stimulating environment for someone interested in how the brain works.
Science is especially attractive when it is in its infancy, when researchers are still driven by curiosity until it becomes a nine-to-five chore. Unfortunately, this is no longer the case for most successful fields of science such as particle physics or molecular biology. Today you can often find an article in the journals Science or Nature, written by 30 authors. This does not please me (I guess that the authors do too). This is one of two reasons why I am instinctively drawn to traditional neuroscience, where you can ask naive questions, starting with first principles - very simple questions that even a schoolboy can think of, but which can confuse an expert. This is an area where it is still possible to do Faraday-style "craft" research and come up with amazing results. Certainly, many of my colleagues, along with me, see this as a chance to revive the golden age of neuroscience - the age of Charcot, John Hulingea Jackson, Henry Head, Luria and Goldstein.
The second reason I chose neuroscience seems to be more trivial - the same reason you bought this book. We as human beings are more interested in ourselves than in anything else, and these studies lead to the core of the question of who we are. Neurology fascinated me after examining my very first patient in medical school. This was a man with pseudobulbar palsy (a type of stroke) who alternated between crying and laughing uncontrollably every few seconds. I was struck by such a rapid change in the state of a person. I wondered if it was a mirthless laugh, "crocodile tears", or did he really feel joy and sadness alternately, like a manic-depressive patient, only in a compressed form?
Later in this book, we will ask such questions more than once: what causes phantom pains; How do we form body image? whether there are universal artistic laws; what is a metaphor; why some people "see" musical sounds in color; what is hysteria, etc. I answer some of these questions, but I can give an extremely evasive answer to the rest, such as, for example, to such a big question: “What is consciousness?”.
And yet, whether I find answers or not, if the lectures make you want to learn more about this exciting field of knowledge, they will more than justify their task. The detailed footnotes and bibliography at the end of the book should help anyone who wants to delve deeper into this topic. As my colleague Oliver Sachs wrote in one of his books, "the real book is the footnotes."
I would like to dedicate these lectures to my patients who patiently endured many hours of examinations in our center. From talking to them, despite their “damaged” brains, I always learned more new things than from my enlightened colleagues at conferences.
Chapter 1. Phantoms of the brain
The history of mankind over the past 300 years has been marked by major shifts in the thinking of the people we call scientific revolutions. These shifts have had a profound effect on our vision of ourselves and our place in space. First there was the revolution of Copernicus - he gave us the idea that our planet is not at all the center of the universe, but only revolves around the sun. Then there was the Darwinian revolution, culminating in the idea that we are not angels, but only hairless primates, as Thomas Henry Huxley once stated in this very room. And the third revolution is Freud's discovery of the "unconscious" - the idea that, despite our claims of responsibility for our own destiny, people's behavior is mainly driven by a multitude of motives and emotions that they are hardly aware of. In a word, our conscious life is nothing but an arbitrary rationalization of actions that we actually do for other reasons.
But now we come to the greatest revolution - the understanding of the human brain. This will no doubt be a turning point in history. human race, which, unlike those previous revolutions in science, does not concern the external world - cosmology, biology or physics, but is related to ourselves, to the body that allowed all previous discoveries to happen. And I would like to note that these insights into the workings of the human brain will have a huge impact not only on scientists, but on all of humanity. They will undoubtedly help us bridge that huge gulf, according to Charles P. Snow, which separates "two cultures": on the one hand, science, on the other, art, philosophy, and the humanities. With so much research on the brain, all I can do in this case is to give you just a small overview and not try to take it all in. The lectures cover a wide range of topics, but two of them remain cross-cutting. The first broad topic: neurological syndromes, which are mostly ignored, qualifying as oddity or anomaly. However, sometimes when we study them, we get new ideas about the functions of a normal brain - about how the brain works. The second theme concerns the fact that many brain functions are easier to understand from an evolutionary perspective.
I must say that the human brain is the most complex structure in nature, and to appreciate this, you just need to look at its quantitative indicators. The brain is made up of hundreds of billions of nerve cells, or neurons, that form the basic structure and functional elements of the nervous system (see Figure 1.1). Each neuron makes from 1 to 10 thousand contacts, the connection points of which are called synapses. This is where the exchange of information takes place. Thus, it can be calculated that the number of possible permutations and combinations of brain activity, or, in other words, the number of brain states, exceeds the number of elementary particles in the universe. And although these are well-known facts, it never ceases to amaze me that all the richness of our mental life - our moods, emotions, thoughts, precious lives, religious feelings, and even what each of us considers our own "I" - is all just activity. little jelly-like grains in our heads, in our brains. And nothing else. Such overwhelming complexity - where does it originate?
Figure 1.1
Image of a neuron with dendrites that receive information from other neurons and one long axon that sends information to other neurons
So, let's start with the basics of anatomy. In the 21st century, most people have a vague idea of what the brain looks like. It has two mirrored parts called cerebral hemispheres, similar to a walnut, which is located on top of a trunk called the brain stem. Each hemisphere is divided into four lobes: frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal (see Figure 1.2). The occipital lobe, located behind, is associated with vision. Damage to it can lead to blindness. The temporal lobes are associated with hearing, emotions, and certain aspects of visual perception. The parietal lobe of the brain - at the edge of the head - has to do with creating a three-dimensional spatial perception of the outside world, as well as your own body in three-dimensional representation. And finally, the frontal lobes, perhaps the most mysterious of all, are associated with such extremely mysterious aspects. human mind like morality, wisdom, ambition, and other aspects of the mind that we understand so little.
Figure 1.2
Rough anatomy of the human brain
A. shown left-hand side left hemisphere. Four lobes are marked: frontal, parietal, temporal and occipital. The frontal lobe is separated from the parietal by a central sulcus or gyrus (rolandic sulcus), and the temporal lobe is separated from the parietal by a transverse or Sylvian sulcus.
b. The inner surface of the left hemisphere is shown. Noted: corpus callosum (conspicuous corpus callosum) (black) and thalamus (white) in the middle. The corpus callosum connects the two hemispheres.
V. The two hemispheres of the brain are shown, top view.
Vileyanur S. Ramachandran, MD, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition, Professor of Psychology and Neurophysiology at the University of California, San Diego, Associate Professor of Biology at the Salk Institute Ramachandran received his medical degree and subsequently a PhD from Trinity College (Trinity College) of the University of Cambridge. He has received numerous titles and awards, including being a Council Member of Oxford University's Soul's College, an honorary doctorate from Connecticut College, the Aliens Kappers gold medal from the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences for outstanding contributions to neurophysiology, the Australian National University gold medal, and an honorary Presidential title of the American Academy of Neurology Delivered a series of lectures on the workings of the brain at the celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary (silver jubilee) of the Society of Neurophysiologists (1995); has made introductory presentations at the National Institute of Mental Health (N1MH) Brain Conference at the Library of Congress, the Dorcas Readings at Cold Spring Harbor, the Adams Readings at Harvard Massachusetts Hospital, and the Jonas Memorial Readings Salk, at the Solkovsky Institute.
Ramachandran has published over 120 articles in scientific journals (including Scientific American). He is the author of the acclaimed book Phantoms in the Brain, which has been translated into eight languages and is the basis of a two-part film on Channel 4 on UK TV and on PBS in the US. Newsweek magazine recently named him a member of the "club of the century" - one of the hundred most prominent people of the 21st century.
Book Reviews
…Great job. Any parent would be happy to entrust their child to such a brilliant teacher. He has such strength and fiery temperament that you literally see lightning flying from his fingers ... His research is the latest in the field of studying the complex evolutionary development of the brain
"Observer"
Breathtaking. Professor Ramachandran is one of the most famous neurophysiologists in the world. At the same time, his erudition is happily combined with the ability to present information in a clear, exciting and witty way, his research on the work of the brain can revolutionize science ...
Guardian
Bold, new, witty and accessible.
Larry Weiskrantz, Professor, University of Oxford
A new methodological approach to the functional connections between different brain locations allows an extraordinarily talented neurophysiologist to explain puzzling neurological and psychiatric symptoms and conclude that brain science can resolve many of the classic questions of philosophy. Great read that makes you think.
Roger Guillemin, Nobel laureate
Science is in dire need of scientists who can talk about their work to inform, enlighten, and entertain us. Ramachandran is a true master in this field.
Adan Kaui, Professor, University of Oxford
V. S. Ramachandran is one of our most gifted doctors and scientists, he clarifies all the problems he touches - whether it be phantom limbs, illusions and delusions, synesthesia and its connection with metaphor, creativity and art, the most important questions about the relationship brain and mind. His book The Birth of the Mind belongs to the rare category of scientific books - it is as intelligible as it is deeply scientific.
Oliver Sacks, MD
First of all, I want to say thank you to my parents, who have always supported my curiosity and interest in science. My father bought me a Zeiss microscope when I was 11 years old, and my mother helped set up a chemistry lab in a closet under the stairs of our house in Bangkok, Thailand. Many of the teachers at the British School in Bangkok, especially Mrs. Vanith and Mrs. Panachura, gave me reagents for "experiments" at home.
My brother V. S. Ravi played an important role in my early development: he often read Shakespeare and Oriental poetry aloud to me. Poetry and literature are much closer to science than is commonly believed, all these areas have an unusual contact with ideas and some romantic view of the world.
I am grateful to Semmangudi Sreenivaz Pyer, whose divine music has been a colossal catalyst for all my endeavors.
Jayarkrishna, Shantramini and Diana are a constant source of inspiration and admiration.
To BBC Rate Lecture Organizers Gwyneth Williams and Charles Siegler for the excellent work they did editing the lectures, and Sue Doley for organizing the event. And to Profile Books staff Andrew Franklin and Penny Daniel, who helped turn these lectures into readable book text.
Science flourishes much better in an atmosphere of complete freedom and financial independence. Therefore, it is not surprising that in ancient Greece it reached its zenith at a time of great prosperity and the patronage of learning, where it was then that logic and geometry first arose. And during the golden age of the Guptas in India, the calculus, trigonometry, and most of algebra as we know them today were created. The Victorian era is the era of learned gentlemen like Humphry Davy, Darwin and Cavendish.
Something similar we have in the United States today is the faculty invitation system and federal grants, for which I am especially grateful to the National Institute of Health, which has provided me with unwavering research support over the years. (However, over many years of teaching, I have become convinced that the system does not improve, unwittingly encouraging conformity and punishing free thought.) As Sherlock Holmes used to say to Dr. Watson, "mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, it needs talent to discern genius."
My choice of career as a medical student was strongly influenced by six eminent physicians: K.V. Later, when I entered Trinity College, Cambridge, I found myself in a very intellectually stimulating environment. I remember endless conversations with other students and colleagues: Sudarshan Yengar, Ranjit Nayyar, Mushirul Hassan, Hemal Jasurna, Hari Vasdudevan, Arfay Hessam, Vidaye and Prakash Virkara.
Among those teachers and colleagues who have influenced me more than others, I would like to mention Jack Pettigra, Richard Gregory, Oliver Sacks, Horace Warlow, Dave Peterzell, Edi Munch, P. K. Anand Kimar, Sheshegari Rao, T. R. Vidayasagar , V. Madhusudhana Rao, Vivian Barron, Oliver Braddick, Fergus Campbell, K. K. D. Shute, Colin Blakemore, David Whitteridge, Donald Mackey, Don Macleod, David Presti, Alladi Venkatesh, Carrie Armell, Ed Hubbard, Eric Altshuler, Ingrid Olson, Pavitra Krishnan, David Hubel, Ken Nakayama, Marge Livingston, Nick Humphrey, Brian Yosefson, Pat Kavanagh, Bill Hubert and Bill Hestein.
I have also maintained strong ties to Oxford over the years through Ed Rawlls, Ann Triesman, Larry Weiskrantz, John Marshall and Peter Halligan. I am grateful to All Souls College for accepting me as an honorary member of the council in 1998 - membership is unique, although it does not impose any formal obligations (of course, overwork is frowned upon). This gave me the opportunity to think and write about neuroaesthetics, which is the topic of my third lecture. My interest in art was also supported by Julia Kindy, an art historian at the University of California. Her inspiring lectures on Rodin and Picasso got me thinking about the science of art.
