ElaineColliar - World Mind Mapping Champion

Amongst the best in the genre   October 26, 2001

Other books recommended in this general 'neuroscience' genre include "the Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat"-a readable short paperback of anecdotes, "Why God Won't Go Away-Brain Science and the Biology of Belief"-neuroscience-obviously focussing on religious predispositions, and "States of Mind"-focussing on altered brain states such as schizophrenia and depression.


Excellent way to "catch up" on brain research   August 15, 2001
  10 out of 11 found this review helpful

Rita Carter and Christopher Firth have put their heads together and come up with a very comprehensive yet accessible review of brain research. Carter's style, backed up with Firth's broad and deep knowledge of the field has yielded a most enjoyable and useful book.

Having followed many of the individual areas of research in the popular scientific press as they unfolded, I had a patchwork understanding of what has been done in the past ten or so years, especially since MRI and PET scans became common, but I did not have a complete and lucid picture.

Carter, with the support of Firth and many distinguished researchers in the field providing Cameo vignettes throughout, succeed in offering the layperson having little more than an interest in the field, an excellent read and a good high level reference source.

The overall design and illustrations in the large format softcover edition is very attractive and encourages reading.

I highly recommend this to anyone vaguely interested in how the mind works from a neuroelectrochemical perspective as well as from an anecdotal, human perspective. This is not a psychology book nor what I think of as a traditional cognitive science book and is much the better for it.


Fascinating   August 2, 2001
  4 out of 4 found this review helpful

When I bought this book I knew the reviews were positive, but I still wasn't convinced I'd get through the whole book. I picked it up with some uncertainty--and I was hooked. It reads like fantasy and I guess in a way the brain is like a fantasy. Who could have dreamed up anything so complex? As a psychotherapist, I especially liked the emphasis the author gives on how the brain controls and impacts the emotions. If you are looking for a stimulating way to become introduced to the complexity of the brain, this is the book for you. If you're a brain surgeon, the book is probably too elementary for you, but you would still find it very well written reading.


An excellent addition to your library.   July 7, 2001
  2 out of 2 found this review helpful

This book is excellent value. No matter what your views on the brain, psychology or evolution, this book gets the non-specialist up-to-date on the latest findings with a wealth of data and beautiful illustrations. For the information it provides, plus keeping you abreast of some cutting edge research, you cannot go wrong with this one.


Brillant overview   May 13, 2001
  23 out of 24 found this review helpful

Rita Carter?s work makes it abundantly clear what a good journalist has to offer the scientific and technical worlds. Normally I have my doubts about writers delving in areas in which they have little or no expertise; however, I also have great difficulty plowing through the sometimes arcane and ponderous prose of professionals. Ms Carter?s careful work and her collaboration with respected researchers in the field of neurophysiology and neuropsychology make her work a very reliable and useful overview of the current knowledge in those fields.

When I first purchased Mapping the Mind for a class on mind and the brain, I looked at some of the illustrations and thought "..., this is going to be dull as dust!" Since it was on the "suggested reading" list, I ignored it until the class was completed and didn?t manage to get back to it again until just recently.

Wow! Was I wrong. Instead of a boring recitation of anatomy-phys and a collection of totally unmemorable biochemical detail, the book is a fascinating compendium of what is known of brain anatomy and it?s function and how these combine to create what we consider to be the "I" of me. Most of the information has been compiled over years of research on the unfortunates of this world, individuals who have suffered accidents, malignancies, occlusive strokes or cerebral bleeds in or to clearly defined areas of their brains. By studying what nature and happenstance have put in their path, neuroscientists have been able to produced a map of the brain and of the mental or physical deficits that arise from the malfunction of any given region of it.

More recently both normal and aberrant psychological states and even the facility for language have been studied using PET scans which illuminate the portions of the brain active during specific tasks. The patterns associated with musical ability, abstract thought, memory and other mental skills have also been subject to study in a way that was not possible before the invention of noninvasive medical technology. While nowhere near the point of a "complete" understanding of brain function--let alone how it works together to create consciousness and what we consider the individual mind--scientists have managed to make great strides in that direction. If they continue to make as many discoveries as they have over the past decade, they may even get to a point where some severely disabling psychological states, like clinical depression or schizophrenia, could be treatable. As a nurse I have had experience with patients just recently who have had electrical devices implanted in their brains. Much like pacemakers and internal defibrillators for heart disease, this equipment stimulates certain areas of the brain associated with depression in an effort to prevent it. This was made possible only by virtue of some of the research covered so expertly and readably by Carter in her book Mapping the Mind.