Date completed: 5 July 2007

An extremely informative book about the human brain and mind. The author takes a step-by-step process by first introducing the basic components of the brain, the network arising from them, and subsequently explains the way in which such massive complicated network can give rise to what we come to know as the 'mind'.

The book also attempts to detail what the 'human mind' encompasses by taking us through the history of major discoveries in the relevant fields. Attention, emotions, learning and memory, character and personality, intelligence and creativity, and intuition are areas focused by the author. There were stories of Phineas Gage, Broca, Moniz and many others, which give us an understanding of how research in the field has emerged and evolved. And such inclusions also avoid turning a popular science book into a facts-laden, layperson-unfriendly scientific text. Nevertheless, despite incoporating evidence from several experiments to substantiate some of the points, I feel that more effort could be taken to include more interesting, simple, test-it-yourself psychological experiments such as those on the first figure plate. After all, such experiments are easy to understand, relevant to our daily life, and offer important clues to the way we behave and why we do so. Articles and books (e.g. Phantoms in the Brain) by V S Ramachandran are a good source for such exciting experimental findings.

Overall, it's a good book. Well-worth a read. I look forward to reading the author's other books (i.e. Human Instinct and Story of God).