Neuroscience All books
Marc D. Hauser
Wild Minds: What Animals Really Think
A slender loris comes up to a zoo keeper and hugs him. A dog lowers its head and whines when its master is unhappy. Is such behaviour a sign of affection and empathy or are other mechanisms at work, to explain the animals near-human behaviour? Why do chimps and dolphins form coalitions to defend themselves? How do lions determine, from far away, the number of gazelles calmly watering by a stream? How is it that a few species can recognise their own image in a mirror? Marc D. Hauser is a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Harvard University, where he is a fellow of the Mind, Brain and Behavior Program. Besides performing laboratory research, he has done extensive fieldwork in Kenya, Uganda and Puerto Rico.
Gerald M. Edelman
Wider than the Sky
The brain is wider than the sky, For, put them side by side, The one the other will include With ease and you beside, wrote the American poet Emily Dickinson in the mid-nineteenth century. The fundamental mechanisms governing mental life are now the subject of scientific study. In this book, Gerald Edelman examines a major aspect of the mind - consciousness. How can the firing of neurons give rise to subjective sensations, thoughts and emotions? How can the disparate domains of mind and body be reconciled? A scientific explanation of consciousness must take into account the causal connections between these two domains. Such a theory must show how the neural bases of consciousness appeared during the evolutionary process and how certain animals developed consciousness. These are some of the key issues that Gerald Edelman examines here. He shows that consciousness cannot be located in a specific area of the brain, because it is a process linked to how the brain functions as a whole, to its wealth of connections and to its great complexity. The brain, he argues, is not a kind of computer. Edelman is regarded as one of the greatest theoreticians of the brain, and his notion of consciousness dominates all discussions on the subject among the international scientific community. This book offers the most accessible version of his theories that is available today. The winner of the 1972 Nobel Prize in Medicine, Gerald Edelman heads the Institute for Neurosciences, in La Jolla, California.
Laurent Cohen
Why Girls Are Not (That) Bad at Maths And 40 Other Stories About the Brain
Everything you ever wanted to know about brain power, explained with humour, precision and clarity
Michael S. Gazzaniga
Who’s in Charge? Free Will and the Science of the Brain
Are we really the masters of our actions and are we wholly responsible for what we do?
Yann Le Cun
When Machines Learn The Revolution of Artificial Neurons and Deep Learning
A fascinating, lucid, and accessible book that takes us into the heart of machines and allows us to discover a new, enthralling world – one that is already our own.
Jean-Pierre Changeux, Paul Ricœur
What Makes Us Think Nature and Rules
'The intention of this book was to put a scientist and a philosopher face to face and spark a dialogue between them on neuroscience, on their results and projects, and their ability to carry out a debate on ethics, its norms, and on peace. In France, ideas are rarely openly discussed. Serious debates are too often hindered by dogmatic statements, one-sided criticisms, incomprehensible discussions and glib mockery, with little or no thought for the solidity of the arguments, which aim only to appear plausible or worthy of being argued, rather than convincing. A totally free and open dialogue between a scientist and a philosopher is necessarily a highly unusual experience for both.' Paul Ricur and Jean-Pierre Changeux Paul Ricur is an honorary professor at the University of Paris-X and an emeritus professor at the University of Chicago. Jean-Pierre Changeux, a member of the French Academy of Science, teaches at the College of France and the Pasteur Institute.
Jean Becchio, Bruno Suarez
What is New in Hypnosis From Hypnosis to Consciousness Activation
A subject that arouses very broad interest, approached here without the usual esoteric or spiritualist connotations, backed by the most recent advances in the neurosciences, and with very illuminating clinical cases.
Alain Bentolila
We Are Not Bonobos: I Talk, Therefore I Am
The conquest of language and writing against the chaos of the world and all its forms of manipulation
Marc Jeannerod
The Volitional Brain
Volition lies at the heart of human reality. It is the manifestation of our inner self, and plays an active part in the implementation of our intentions, desires and projects...
Alain Berthoz
The Vicariance The Brain as Creator of Universes
A new concept, invented by Alain Berthoz, to explain the mechanisms governing human creativity
Barbara Demeneix
Toxic Cocktails How Endocrine Disrupters Are Poisoning Our Brains
Written for the general reader, the book is startling as it reveals the scandalous damage to our brains being caused by chemical pollution. Concrete measures, scientifically proven, to put an end to the tragic mistakes that have been committed in Western countries for over fifty years.
François Ansermet, Pierre Magistretti
To Each His Own Brain Biology of the Unconscious
This book is the result of the coming together of psychoanalysis and neuroscience around the shared observation that experience leaves a mark. Although the idea that experience produces psychic imprints - whether conscious or unconscious - has always been central to psychoanalysis, it was not until recently that findings in neurobiology demonstrated that neuronal plasticity existed and that it operated throughout a person's life. This constant remodelling in relation to experience poses certain basic questions about each individual's identity and future. How does psychic life emerge from experience and from what it imprints? What are the respective contributions of external stimuli (the reality behind experience) and of internal stimuli (the imprinted marks)? How do the mechanisms of synaptic plasticity participate in the establishment of an unconscious internal reality? What is the role of the body in this new dynamic organisation? This book provides the foundations for a better understanding of the relations between neuroscience and psychoanalysis and offers an original theory of the unconscious, by combining recent findings in neurobiology with the basic principles of psychoanalysis. Eschewing genetic determinism, it shows that each individual is different and each brain unique. Pierre Magistretti, a physician and neurobiologist, is a professor of physiology and director of the Centre for Psychiatric Neuroscience at the University of Lausanne's medical school. In addition, he is the president of the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies. François Ansermet is a psychoanalyst and professor of child and adolescent psychology at the University of Lausanne. He is the co-author, with O. Halfon and B. Pierrehumbert, of Filiations psychiques (Presses Universitaires de France, 2000).
Alain Berthoz, Fabienne Verdier
Thought in Action A Painting Session Between Art and Science
An original discussion around the artistic process, combining philosophy and history of art, brain physiology and mathematics.
Antonio R. Damasio
The Strange Order of Things Life, Feeling, and the Making of Culture
A landmark book, situated between philosophy and neuroscience, in which Damasio deals with the challenging question of the origin of civilization.
Claude Berrou, Vincent Gripon
Some Brain Mathematics A Theory of Mental Information
How the human brain processes information — an explanation between neuroscience and information technology.
Michael S. Gazzaniga
The Social Brain
This book investigates the concepts of the "right brain" and the "left brain". According to the author the brain is most certainly made up of relatively autonomous modules which react independantly to environmental pressures. At least one of the modules, situated on the left side of the brain, is responsible for the interpretation of answers which may be contradictory with others, whereas yet another module on the same side translates into words the result of this interpretation. So, instead of being a unique, monolithic system that we imagined, the brain would appear to be a collectivity of systems - a social brain. This approach enlightens us as to the functioning of the human brain, and according to Gazzaniga, affects the very roots of our belief systems and societies. Renowned American neurologist, Michael Gazzaniga is Director of the Cognitive Neuroscience Division of Cornell University and chairman of Neuropsychology.
Génération Snooze
Snooze
Written by two practitioners of Artificial Intelligence, this book is both very accessible and very concrete.
Michel Jouvet
The Sleep, Consciousness and Wakefulness
A major scientific work that offers a sweeping panorama of the state of consciousness, from Hippocrates to the latest findings in neurology.