Journey of the Mind: How Thinking Emerged from Chaos
- Downloads：1215
- Type：Epub+TxT+PDF+Mobi
- Create Date：2022-03-26 09:21:33
- Update Date：2025-09-06
- Status：finish
- Author：Ogi Ogas
- ISBN：B098TZHZRR
- Environment：PC/Android/iPhone/iPad/Kindle
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Summary
Why do minds exist？ How did mud and stone develop into beings that can experience longing， regret， love， and compassion—beings that are aware of their own experience？ Until recently， science offered few answers to these existential questions。 Journey of the Mind is the first book to offer a unified account of the mind that explains how consciousness， language， the Self， and civilization emerged incrementally out of chaos。
The journey begins three billion years ago with the emergence of the simplest possible mind， a nanoscopic archeon， then ascends through amoebas， worms， frogs， birds， monkeys， and AI， examining successively smarter ways of thinking。 The authors explain the mathematical principles generating conscious experience and show， through vivid illustrations and accessible prose， how these principles led cities and democratic nations to develop new forms of consciousness—the self-aware “superminds。” Journey of the Mind concludes by contemplating a higher stage of consciousness already emerging—and the ultimate fate of all minds in the universe。
The journey begins three billion years ago with the emergence of the simplest possible mind， a nanoscopic archeon， then ascends through amoebas， worms， frogs， birds， monkeys， and AI， examining successively smarter ways of thinking。 The authors explain the mathematical principles generating conscious experience and show， through vivid illustrations and accessible prose， how these principles led cities and democratic nations to develop new forms of consciousness—the self-aware “superminds。” Journey of the Mind concludes by contemplating a higher stage of consciousness already emerging—and the ultimate fate of all minds in the universe。
Reviews
Michael Reilly
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This book traces the development of the mind from a one cell archaea to the modern human brain。 The authors work up the story through 14 animals of increasing complexity。 Their approach is based on the work of Stephen Grossberg。 He is a scientific prodigy。 He designed a model for how minds work。 It is based on the idea of different modules making discrete tiny decisions。 The modules hierarchically combine into immensely complicated minds。 The authors explained that he created new mathematical te This book traces the development of the mind from a one cell archaea to the modern human brain。 The authors work up the story through 14 animals of increasing complexity。 Their approach is based on the work of Stephen Grossberg。 He is a scientific prodigy。 He designed a model for how minds work。 It is based on the idea of different modules making discrete tiny decisions。 The modules hierarchically combine into immensely complicated minds。 The authors explained that he created new mathematical techniques to prove his theories。 Luckily， they stay out of the mathematical weeds。 They make two big points。 A mind is a process for sensing and reacting。 It is a verb more than a noun。 If you use that definition then it is sensible to talk about a bacterium having a mind， even though it has no central brain。 Secondly， consciousness is a result of increasingly complex brain structure。 It becomes necessary to evolve a sense of consciousness so that very complex brains can do what they are capable of。 There is no difference in kind between human consciousness and animal consciousness。 Human consciousness is just more complicated and developed because the brain producing it is more complicated。 They have a wonderful footnote on P。 344 where they list all of the various magic in the box theories that brilliant scientists have come up with to explain where the specialness of human consciousness comes from。 They dismiss those theories as unnecessary。 The explanations of how， as a practical matter， organisms make decisions are fascinating。 They have diagrams of "modules"， which work like decision trees。 They develop that theory up to the point of fairly complicated decisions。 How does a monkey decide what to eat？ How does a rat recognize a sunflower seed？ They are careful to make it clear that a computer is not a good model for the mind。 The mind is not based on binary logic。 It doesn't process information sequentially。 It's hardware develops and improves with age。 There is a bunch of interesting stuff。 They explain why you remember our first kiss so well。 They make this obvious point which never occurred to me。 The head is well designed。 The input devices， eyes， ears， mouth， and nose are located right next to the data processing systems。 You can only do so much in a popular science book。 I was disappointed however because the authors don't really tell us whether their explanation of complex brain functioning is theory or whether they are describing an actual physical process that has been observed。 We get explanations later in the book like this; " The Where module shares the attentional shroud with the How module， which uses it for targeting the object。"。 It was not clear to me whether this is a theoretical way of describing what happens or whether we have discovered actual physical systems that we have observed to act like that。 I did like the Boston shout outs from these two Boston University professors。 We get Bill Belichick and Copley Square references。 。。。more
Annarella
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It's not easy to review this book because it's complex and full of food for thought。 it's more complex than the average informative science book and I was fascinated by what I read。Great style of writing， well researched。Highly recommended。Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC， all opinions are mine It's not easy to review this book because it's complex and full of food for thought。 it's more complex than the average informative science book and I was fascinated by what I read。Great style of writing， well researched。Highly recommended。Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC， all opinions are mine 。。。more
Chantal Lyons
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