328 pages
English language
Published Feb. 21, 2017 by Guardian Faber.
From attention mechanisms to memory processing, the neuroscience of sleep and the psychology of superstition, neuroscientist Dean Burnett explores the surprising workings of the brain and the bemusing behaviours these cause in everyday life.
Alright read, gives an overview of the brain and nervous system in a fun and comedic way. Not really worth reading if you want a more detailed explanation for certain things.
3/5 an all round "eh, not bad" read.
It has been a while since I have read this book , however I am sure that when I read it , I did enjoy it.
I got this book from the libary. Will have to get the Ebook sometime and give it a re-read.
This brightly coloured boom about neuroscience and human psychology is a fascinating and insightful book on the peculiar workings of the brain , and also the oddities of our behavior.
The book is split into 8 chapters , each of which highlights key areas where you probably haven’t ever thought about deeply.
At the end of the book , you will be able to understand what Mr Burnett means about “Dedicated to every human with a brain. It’s not an easy thing to put up with so well done.”
Our brains are fallible and make constant errors , yet they are so unimaginably complicated that …
It has been a while since I have read this book , however I am sure that when I read it , I did enjoy it.
I got this book from the libary. Will have to get the Ebook sometime and give it a re-read.
This brightly coloured boom about neuroscience and human psychology is a fascinating and insightful book on the peculiar workings of the brain , and also the oddities of our behavior.
The book is split into 8 chapters , each of which highlights key areas where you probably haven’t ever thought about deeply.
At the end of the book , you will be able to understand what Mr Burnett means about “Dedicated to every human with a brain. It’s not an easy thing to put up with so well done.”
Our brains are fallible and make constant errors , yet they are so unimaginably complicated that we have barely scratched the surface of understanding the underlying principles of how the brain works.
Chapter 8 was my favorite chapter ‘When the brain breaks down …’
Burnett avidly describes how the dopaminergic mesolimbic pathway. “Think of if like a city hosting a major concert. Everything in the city is set up to maintain normal activity . Suddenly thousands of excitable people arrive, and activity quickly becomes chaotic . In response officials increase police and security
Written in an engaging manner for the layperson, lots of gems in here about why we think and act the way we do. Some I had encountered previously but others were new to me.
In The Idiot Brain, Dean Burnett explores how the brain makes us behave how we do, in an accessible and friendly manner. I find this stuff fascinating. Dean also makes it clear that we don't know everything and what we do know sometimes changes, but this book is a great place to start.
Basically our brains are wired to be looking for danger all the bloody time. It might have been useful to our primitive ancestors, but it can be a pain in the arse to modern humans. It's also keeping us alive without us consciously thinking about it and spending a lot of time re-writing our memories so we seem better, or more important, than we are. Because to your brain, you're the centre of the world.
It also explains briefly how our senses work, why smell is stronger than taste (you know how bacon always smells better than …
In The Idiot Brain, Dean Burnett explores how the brain makes us behave how we do, in an accessible and friendly manner. I find this stuff fascinating. Dean also makes it clear that we don't know everything and what we do know sometimes changes, but this book is a great place to start.
Basically our brains are wired to be looking for danger all the bloody time. It might have been useful to our primitive ancestors, but it can be a pain in the arse to modern humans. It's also keeping us alive without us consciously thinking about it and spending a lot of time re-writing our memories so we seem better, or more important, than we are. Because to your brain, you're the centre of the world.
It also explains briefly how our senses work, why smell is stronger than taste (you know how bacon always smells better than it actually tastes?), how the eye transmits a pretty rubbish picture for the brain to interpret and that touch and hearing are nearly the same thing.
Some of the parts on memory were familiar to me, from reading (and storing to long term memory it seems) other books, but I did marvel at how short term and long term memory must interact when we read. Short term memory doesn't last very long, so if you're not that invested or emotionally impacted by what's currently happening, it's probably not going to make it into long term storage. It's why it's so easy to lose your keys when you had them five minutes ago.
It did such a good job of explaining why anxiety happens. Part of the brain's danger detector is keeping an eye out for social dangers too, because being a social outcast isn't something the ego can handle. It's a surprise we're all functioning so well really. If you find understanding the biological side of things reassuring I'd definitely recommend Dean's perspective on it.
As he is a psychiatrist, when he talks about what happens when things go wrong, he does so with compassion and understanding. I think it's the first time someone's explained schizophrenia where what happens makes sense.
Informative, but I found it a bit tedious and wasn't a fan of the mix of corny humour and in depth descriptions of which bits of the brain were involved. Without even a map of the brain; the latter seemed a bit pointless and broke up the flow of reading.
Useful reference book though!
