The Brain: The Story of You

This is a brilliant book. Not only does it lucidly explain a lot of complicated (but useful and relevant) aspects of the human brain, it enables the reader to co-analyse and co-imagine the future of humans, based on the kind of research that is taking place today. There is actually a plausible future reality where humans can either live forever because they have been able to fully digitise themselves, or at least where they are no longer constrained by the inevitable decay that all biological material necessarily goes through. Human biological cells cannot live beyond a few decades but artificial material can potentially be created to survive much longer. The key lies in being able replicate the trillions of neurons and their quadrillions of synaptic connections.

India is the land where practices like meditation were discovered and as Dalai lama once said 'the level of knowledge of human psychology in ancient India was much ahead of the current understanding in the west". This was based on experiments and observing the human body and human minds over hundreds and thousands of years In the 20th century, there is now beginning to be a lot of research on nuero science and some of the things that we thought of intuitively and read in ancient texts have theory and experimentation behind them. In that context, reading a book like the Brain that combines academic theory with experiments and stories about human beings in the 20th century makes for a fascinating reading. Some of the things that stood out for me were: 1. The human brain is highly plastic. This implies that things that we take for granted actually need to develop in earl childhood e.g., art of seeing. It also means that humans are flexible, they can live in a variety of environments and have the ability to adapt and grow. Downside is that proper growth requires a loving and a nurturing childhood. 2. The brain is designed to eventually tell a story. The reality can be interpreted differently based on the story. Different brains can have different interpretations of reality for the same incident. Other interesting thing to keep in view is that memory changes with time. So a trick to remembering things is to recall them periodically and often. 3. Senses help us understand our external environment. Interesting is the comment "Color is an interpretation of wavelengths that only exist internally". 4. Role of emotions in coming to decisions is very important. As the author says to land on a choice the brain and the body have to be in sync. 5. Body and brain are in constant communication. Ancient indian texts say that mind is the subtle part of the body and body is the gross part of the mind. 6. As the book points out, humans are designed to co-operate with each other socially to survivev and to thrive. Social ostracism is a way of inflicting great pain. So the author says that the way to avoid mental diseases is to be physically active to learn new things to do and to have a good social life. Author also goes onto say that we over estimate the role of free will and our lives are steered by forces much beyond our awareness and control. Yet as the author say, the human brain is very complex, difficult to simulate and still only partially understood. So artificial intelligence is till very far away from being able to replace humans. All in all, a fun book to read. I give it my highest recommendation.

Intricately knitted book on the brain. worth reading and eye opening book I would say. Fine complementary book to books on meditation.

Very good book for someone who is interested in learning basics of how brain works. The book is not technical and a common man is able to understand the concept well. The book gives you good idea about some of the research that is going on in the area of understanding brain

This is one of the excellent read , and know about how mysterious human mind is . Must read

Good

Matrix, Startrek, Limitless, Lucy, Black Mirror, all the creativity in those episodes are perhaps triggered from this book. Startrek, Matrix & Limitless can be excused as this book wasn't written then, but the ideas are all here. Very insightful, very engaging & very unusual for any professor to write such a gripping book that keeps the readers hooked.

Viewing my my brain differently and thought provoking ideas of body, consciousness and the brain. Some parts of the book is a bit technical though. New frontiers of science is within us.