![]() ![]() This book expands the realm of ideas and topics that seem tractable to scientific exploration. ![]() He argues, “If every scientist were a brush-clearing, never-stray-beyond-established-fact type, science would advance at a snail’s pace and would have a hard time unpainting itself out of corners.” In an era in which shrinking availability of research funding induces greater and greater conservatism, Ramachandran’s open-minded approach provides a refreshing contrast. Writing for a general audience as well as neuroscience specialists, Ramachandran attempts to go beyond what is known and speculate about what might be. These and other neurological oddities serve as a jumping off point for the book’s examination of the human brain, how it evolved, and what mechanisms might differentiate us from “lower” animals. Ramachandran, a prominent cognitive neuroscientist and practicing neurologist at UCSD, is well known for his studies on phantom limb, in which sensations seem to arrive from amputated body parts, and synesthesia, in which sounds may seem to have tastes, letters may have colors, or there may be some other combinations of actual and illusory events. Ramachandran delivers a thought-provoking exploration of the neural basis of human cognition. ![]()
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