Main description:

This volume of essays examines the problem of mind, looking at how the problem has appeared to neuroscientists (in the widest sense) from classical antiquity through to contemporary times. Beginning with a look at ventricular neuropsychology in antiquity, this book goes on to look at Spinozan ideas on the links between mind and body, Thomas Willis and the foundation of Neurology, Hooke's mechanical model of the mind and Joseph Priestley's approach to the mind-body problem.

The volume offers a chapter on the 19th century Ottoman perspective on western thinking. Further chapters trace the work of nineteenth century scholars including George Henry Lewes, Herbert Spencer and Emil du Bois-Reymond. The book covers significant work from the twentieth century, including an examination of Alfred North Whitehead and the history of consciousness, and particular attention is given to the development of quantum consciousness. Chapters on slavery and the self and the development of an understanding of Dualism bring this examination up to date on the latest 21st century work in the field.

At the heart of this book is the matter of how we define the problem of consciousness itself: has there been any progress in our understanding of the working of mind and brain? This work at the interface between science and the humanities will appeal to experts from across many fields who wish to develop their understanding of the problem of consciousness, including scholars of Neuroscience, Behavioural Science and the History of Science.

Contents:

Introduction; C.U.M.Smith and H.A. Whitaker.- Chapter 1. Beginnings: ventricular neuropsychology; C.U.M.Smith.- Chapter 2. Return of the Repressed: Spinozan Ideas in the History of Mind and Brain Sciences; William Meehan.- Chapter 3. 'Struck, As It Were, With Madness:' The Phenomenology of Animal Spirits in the Neurology of Thomas Willis; Kathryn Tabb.- Chapter 4. Hooke's mechanical mind; J.J. MacIntosh.- Chapter 5. Joseph Priestley: An instructive 18th century perspective on the mind-body problem; Alan Beretta.- Chapter 6. Reflections of western thinking on 19th C Ottoman thought: A critique of the 'hard-problem' by Spyridon Mavrogenis; George Anogianakis.- Chapter 7. George Henry Lewes (1817-1878): Embodied Cognition, Vitalism, and the Evolution of Symbolic Perception; Huw Price.- Chapter 8. Herbert Spencer: brain, mind and the 'hard problem'; C.U.M.Smith.- Chapter 9. Problems of Consciousness in Nineteenth Century British and America Neurology; J Wayne Lazar.- Chapter 10. Emil du Bois-Reymond's Reflections on Consciousness ; Gabriel Finkelstein.- Chapter 11. William James and the "Theatre" of Consciousness; Stephanie L. Hawkins.- Chapter 12. The enigmatic deciphering of the neuronal code of word meaning; Andrew C. Papanicolaou.- Chapter 13. Alfred North Whitehead and the history of consciousness; Laura Hyatt Edwards.- Chapter 14. The 'hard problem' and the Cartesian strand in British neurophysiology: Huxley, Foster, Sherrington, Eccles; C.U.M.Smith.- Chapter 15. Is there a link between quantum mechanics and consciousness?; Barry K Ward.- Chapter 16. Consciousness and neuronal microtubules: the Penrose-Hameroff quantum model in retrospect; Eugenio Frixione.- Chapter 17. Zombie Dawn: Slavery and the Self in the Twenty-first Century; David Hawkes.- Chapter 18. Mind and Brain: Toward an Understanding of Dualism; Kristopher Phillips, Alan Beretta and Harry Whitaker.