[tt] NS: Review: Human, by Michael Gazzaniga

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Review: Human, by Michael Gazzaniga
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg19926692.100&print=true
13 August 2008
Ivan Semeniuk
[This is important!]

WHY do religious fundamentalists oppose the theory of evolution,
despite the weight of evidence supporting it? The answer may lie
with a deep-seated intuition that humans are qualitatively different
from other animals - a difference so great that, for some, descent
from a common ancestor is harder to imagine than the alternative.

As director of the University of California's SAGE Center for the
Study of Mind in Santa Barbara, Michael Gazzaniga is no creationist.
His confidence in our biological ties with the great apes is
resolute. Yet, unlike many of his peers, Gazzaniga is not shy about
trumpeting our special status in the animal kingdom. "We are a big
deal and we are a little scared about it," he writes at the outset
of Human. What follows is a detailed excursion into Gazzaniga's
lifelong passion - the human brain - and his attempts to figure out
exactly what makes it human.

Gazzaniga's studies of split-brain patients - people with the
connections between their left and right cerebral hemispheres
severed to alleviate the symptoms of severe epilepsy - have helped
to show that the hemispheres of human brains tend to be more
specialised than those of other primates, and also that the left
hemisphere of a typical right-handed person is where the inner
narrative of subjective experience is generated. Human revisits
these findings and explores recent research that shows that human
brain structure, from gross anatomy down to the molecular scale, is
significantly different from that of other species. Structural
differences, in turn, reflect different cognitive functions,
Gazzaniga says, often related to the demands of interacting with
larger and more complex social groups.

These differences have led to our ability to construct alternate
realities which can be played out as simulations in the mind's eye.
This is a useful cognitive tool for forward planning, and it may
also underlie the uniquely human impulses to create art and engage
in scientific inquiry.

Readers interested in an overview of current research will find much
of it conveniently packaged here. Those looking for answers will
instead find ample reminders of how far brain science has to go
before speculation and metaphor can be replaced with concrete
models. Gazzaniga does not offer any grand conclusions. Despite all
we have learned about the brain, we cannot yet explain how it makes
us who we are. What Human resembles most is a voyage through
Gazzaniga's own left hemisphere, which has amassed a wealth of
information to be digested and pondered. Finding yourself in such a
rich setting, you may well agree with Gazzaniga's closing sentiment:
"Am I ever glad I am not a chimp!"

The Human Brain - With one hundred billion nerve cells, the
complexity is mind-boggling. Learn more in our cutting edge special
report.

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So you think humans are unique?
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21 May 2008
Neuroscience: What's on your mind?
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Mind tricks: Six ways to explore your brain
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03 July 1999

Weblinks

Michael Gazzaniga's home page
http://www.psych.ucsb.edu/~gazzanig/
Video: "Split-brain behavioural experiments", YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMLzP1VCANo
SAGE Center for the Study of Mind
http://www.sagecenter.ucsb.edu/intro.htm