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ALPHABETICAL BRAIN® VOCABULARY
HUMANIST GALAXY
OF SECULAR SCIENCE STARS
ERIC KANDEL
May 7, 2022
DISORDERED MIND:
What Unusual Brains
Tell Us About Ourselves
by Eric R. Kandel.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux,
2018 (285 pages)
quote = "In his seminal new book, Eric Kandel draws on a lifetime of pathbreaking research and the work of many other leading neuroscientists to take us on an unusual tour of the brain. He confronts one of the most difficult questions we face: How does our mind, our individual sense of self, emerge from the physical matter of the brain? The brain's 86 billion plus neurons communicate with one another through very precise connections."
"Kandel explains how those connections are disrupted. The brain processes that give rise to our mind can become disordered, resulting in diseases such as autism, depression, schizophrenia, Parkinson's, addiction, and post-traumatic stress disorder. While these disruptions bring great suffering, they can also reveal the mysteries of how the brain produces our most fundamental experiences and capabilities — the very nature of what it means to be human." (Slightly paraphrased by webmaster from publisher's blurb)
Quote = "The mind is like an iceberg, it floats with only one-seventh of its bulk above water." (By Sigmund Freud, unpaged at beginning of book)
note = Key Ideas in Book = (page 93 diagram, 96, 107;
memory 117; Alzheimer's disease 71, 122-123, 124-125, 126-127, 128-12, 148-149, 150-151, 156-157, 162-163; dopamine produced in substantia nigra and sent to the basal ganglia 165, 168; protein folding diseases 177-179; biology of emotion 178-181, 180; Diagram of Four structures of emotions: 181-182, 182-184; classic conditioning of fear 184-186; and human anxiety disorders.
BOOK OUTLINE
Note = Numbers in parentheses relate to pages
INTRODUCTION (1-6)
1) WHAT BRAIN DISORDERS CAN TELL US ABOUT OURSELVES (7-31)
2) OUR INTENSELY SOCIAL NATURE — The autism spectrum (32-55)
3) EMOTIONS AND THE INTEGRITY OF THE SELF — Depression and bipolar disorder (56-83)
4) THE ABILITY TO THINK AND TO MAKE AND CARRY OUT DECISIONS — Schizophrenia (84-106)
5) MEMORY, THE STOREHOUSE OF THE SELF — Dementia (107-129)
6) OUR INNATE CREATIVE CAPABILITY — Brain disorders and art (130-157)
7) MOVEMENT — Parkinson's and Huntington's diseases (158-175)
8) THE INTERPLAY OF CONSCIOUS AND UNCONSCIOUS EMOTION — Anxiety, post-traumatic stress, andfaulty decision-making (176-197)
9) THE PLEASURE PRINCIPLE AND FREEDOM OF CHOICE — Addictions (198-211)
10) SEXUAL DIFFERENTIATION OF THE BRAIN AND GENDER IDENTITY (212-226)
CONSCIOUSNESS — The great remaining mystery of the brain (227-249)
[1] Freud's view of the mind (228-231)
[2] The cognitive psychological view of consciousness (231-234)
[3] The Biology of Consciousness (234-236)
[4] The global workspace (236-239)
[5] Correlation or causation (239-240)
[6] An overall perspective on the biology of consciousenss (240-241)
[7] Decision making (241-246)
[8] Psychoanalsis and the new biology of mind (246-240)
[9] Looking ahead (249)
CONCLUSION — Coming full circle (251-254)
NOTES (255-265)
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS (267)
INDEX (269-285)
Addictions
Adolescence
Aggression
Art
Axons
Brain
Brain disorders
Broca’s area
Cerebellum
Cerebral cortex
Cerebrum [note = missing from index]
Cognitive behavior therapy
Coma
Concussion
Conditioned stimulus
Conditioning
Consciousness
Corpus callosum
Cravings
Creativity
Death
Decision making
Delusions
Dementia
Depression
Dopamine
Emotion
Exercise
Explicit memory
Fear
Fighting an mating, link between
Food
Fight, flight, or freeze response
Functional magnetic resonance imaging
Gene pathways
Gender
Gender identity
Genetics
Genome
Habits [missing from index]
Happiness
Hormones
Hypothalamus
Ion channels
Ions
Language
Learning
Love
Memory
Mirror neuron system
Mood disorders
Movement
Muscles
Nucleus accumbens
Perception
Personality
Pleasure
Preconscious unconscious
Prefrontal cortex
Problems
Proteins
Reticular activating system
Reward
Science [missing from index]
Self
Senses
Sex
Social brain
Stress
Synapses
Synaptic pruning
System 1 mode of thinking
System 2 mode of thinking
Unconscious
Visual cortex
Wernicke’s area
Working memory
AUTHOR NOTES, SUMMARY,
AND BOOK DESCRIPTION
AUTHOR NOTES = Eric R. Kandel is a University Professor and Fred Kavli Professor at Columbia University and a Senior Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. The recipient of the 2000 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his studies of learning and memory, he is the author of In Search of Memory, a memoir that won a Los Angeles Times Book Prize; The Age of Insight: The Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain, from Vienna 1900 to the Present, which won the Bruno Kreisky Award in Literature, Austria's highest literary award; and Reductionism in Art and Brain Science: Bridging the Two Cultures, a book about the New York School of abstract art. He is also the coauthor of Principles of Neural Science, the standard textbook in the field.
SUMMARY = Eric R. Kandel, the winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his foundational research into memory storage in the brain, is one of the pioneers of modern brain science. His work continues to shape our understanding of how learning and memory work and to break down age-old barriers between the sciences and the arts.
BOOK DESCRIPTION = In his seminal new book, Kandel draws on a lifetime of pathbreaking research and the work of many other leading neuroscientists to take us on an unusual tour of the brain. He confronts one of the most difficult questions we face: How does our mind, our individual sense of self, emerge from the physical matter of the brain? The brain's 86 billion neurons communicate with one another through very precise connections. But sometimes those connections are disrupted. The brain processes that give rise to our mind can become disordered, resulting in diseases such as autism, depression, schizophrenia, Parkinson's, addiction, and post-traumatic stress disorder. While these disruptions bring great suffering, they can also reveal the mysteries of how the brain produces our most fundamental experiences and capabilities — the very nature of what it means to be human. Studies of autism illuminate the neurological foundations of our social instincts; research into depression offers important insights on emotions and the integrity of the self; and paradigm-shifting work on addiction has led to a new understanding of the relationship between pleasure and willpower. By studying disruptions to typical brain functioning and exploring their potential treatments, we will deepen our understanding of thought, feeling, behavior, memory, and creativity. Only then can we grapple with the big question of how billions of neurons generate consciousness itself.
EDITORIAL BOOK REVIEWS
LIBRARY JOURNAL REVIEW = Nobel Prize winner Kandel (biochemistry & biophysics, Columbia Univ.; The Age of Insight) explores topics such as autism, depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, dementia, post-traumatic stress disorder, and addiction as they relate to brain function. Our understanding of how the brain works has advanced to such a degree that the divide between neurological and psychiatric diseases is narrowing and will in the future lead to better diagnosis, individualized treatment, and prevention. Particularly interesting is the chapter on addiction in which Kandel effectively argues that addiction is a brain disorder, not a moral failing, and should be treated as such. Having a firm grasp on the biology of the brain, especially as it relates to genes and the environment, improves our sense of both individuality and shared humanity. VERDICT Kandel's clear and straightforward writing makes this informative scientific exploration accessible and compelling to both medical practitioners, researchers, and general readers interested in how the mysteries of human nature arise from the physical matter of the brain.-Ragan O'Malley, Saint Ann's Sch., Brooklyn
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY REVIEW = Nobel Prize-winning-neuroscientist Kandel (Reduction in Art and Brain Science) delves optimistically into the current state of the "new biology of mind," a sophisticated framework deriving from "the marriage of modern cognitive psychology and neuroscience." Kandel consolidates data and ideas from core advances, including genetic research that proves some biological basis for various psychiatric disorders, and imaging techniques that indicate the function of specific brain structures. Emphasizing that brain disorders can yield insights into normal cognitive functioning, he looks to autism for understanding the social brain, depression and bipolar disorders for understanding the emotional brain, schizophrenia for understanding decision making, dementia for understanding memory, and Parkinson's and Huntington's disease for understanding movement.
His background as coauthor of the flagship textbook Principles of Neural Science is clear throughout, thanks to the highly accessible presentation, heavy on reader-friendly graphics and explanations of basics. Kandel's deep compassion for people is also evident, as when he discusses how understanding the biological basis for mental disorders might take them out of the realm of legal culpability. The result of his work is an easily comprehended, meticulous synthesis of current research into the biological grounding of the human mind. 77 color and b&w illus.
REMEMBER ALWAYS:
You Are Your Adaptable Memory!
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