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4.22 AVERAGE
4.22 AVERAGE
McGilchris's book is a recent, authoritative, and generally accessible summary of the current state of neuroscience with regard to brain lateralization, supplemented by a provocative reading of the history of Western culture in light of this research. More: http://dreamflesh.com/library/iain-mcgilchrist/the-master-and-his-emissary/
TL/DR: Very interesting book; opened my eyes to the way we interact with the world but also really, really long
The book was one of the most interesting I've ever read but BOY WAS IT DENSE. I picked it up from the library and thought to myself "that book is THICK". At over 600 pages (although roughly 150 of them are notes and bibliography), this one took me quite a while to get through.
While the The Master and the Emissary is long, it is eye-opening and informative. As students, we are taught that the brain is made up to two hemispheres. Pop psychology says the right side is artsy while the left side is mathematical. However, this summary is a gross misinterpretation of what is actually happening in the mind.
It turns out the hemispheres have two completely different methods of interacting with and processing the world. The right takes a big picture view, provides a broad range of focus, and strengthens connections with elements outside of the self. This information is fed to the left hemisphere which "unfolds" the information, decontextualizes it, potentially finds something new, and focuses on how to make it relevant to the self. This information is sent back to the right side to be put back into the larger context. At least, that's how it's supposed to work.
Much of the first part of the book focuses on the scientific aspects of the brain. This includes the structure of the brain, research done on split brain patients, and those who have suffered strokes on one side of the brain. I found Part I very interesting as it gave me insight into how the different hemispheres function. It also talks about the philosophy of music, language, and consciousness. These concepts are things that I had thought about but never to the extent it was laid out in this book. It made me take a hard look at these concepts.
Part II talks about how the left hemisphere has started to dominate Western culture. The author, Iain McGilchrist, hypothesizes about how the hemispheres have influenced major cultural shifts from ancient times to modern day. I found this section riveting. It analyzes the art, poetry, and overall atmosphere of these historical periods and determines which hemisphere's worldview was prevalent. I did find myself taking all this information with a grain of salt however. While the author does use ample cultural evidence to support his claim, it's impossible to prove without going back in time.
Being that the content deals with intense scientific and philosophical concepts, the prose is often very dry and quite advanced. A major reason it took me so long to finish this book was that I had to re-read sections multiple times until I understood it. That being said, the hypothesis and subject matter were so interesting, I was still able to stay engaged throughout the book.
The hypothesis that McGilchrist posits throughout the book is that Western civilization has followed too far along using the left hemisphere process of thinking. As to whether or not I agree with this, I am not sure. While McGilchrist does bring up superb arguments, ultimately there is a lot that can never be fully proven and requires a leap of faith to arrive at those conclusions. Of course, that might just be left hemisphere talking.
What I will say is that is paradigm-shifting. After reading, I've noticed ways in which the world seems to be decontextualized, governed by layers and layers of processes all in the hopes of making things better. These are things that the left side does really well. But there has been a lack of looking at the big picture and empathy behind this process-driven approach. Maybe society is losing touch with the right hemisphere after all? McGilchrist has opened my eyes to the pros and cons of this way of thinking. I can see this tension of worldviews everywhere from global affairs to conversations with my friends. My hope is to use this information any where I can and remind myself of the lessons learned from reading this back.
This book was very dense and very long. But it's opened my eyes to the interesting ways that our mind (as well as our culture) works. If you can stick it out for the full book, you will certainly come out with a new view (or potentially two different, competing views) on life.
The book was one of the most interesting I've ever read but BOY WAS IT DENSE. I picked it up from the library and thought to myself "that book is THICK". At over 600 pages (although roughly 150 of them are notes and bibliography), this one took me quite a while to get through.
While the The Master and the Emissary is long, it is eye-opening and informative. As students, we are taught that the brain is made up to two hemispheres. Pop psychology says the right side is artsy while the left side is mathematical. However, this summary is a gross misinterpretation of what is actually happening in the mind.
It turns out the hemispheres have two completely different methods of interacting with and processing the world. The right takes a big picture view, provides a broad range of focus, and strengthens connections with elements outside of the self. This information is fed to the left hemisphere which "unfolds" the information, decontextualizes it, potentially finds something new, and focuses on how to make it relevant to the self. This information is sent back to the right side to be put back into the larger context. At least, that's how it's supposed to work.
Much of the first part of the book focuses on the scientific aspects of the brain. This includes the structure of the brain, research done on split brain patients, and those who have suffered strokes on one side of the brain. I found Part I very interesting as it gave me insight into how the different hemispheres function. It also talks about the philosophy of music, language, and consciousness. These concepts are things that I had thought about but never to the extent it was laid out in this book. It made me take a hard look at these concepts.
Part II talks about how the left hemisphere has started to dominate Western culture. The author, Iain McGilchrist, hypothesizes about how the hemispheres have influenced major cultural shifts from ancient times to modern day. I found this section riveting. It analyzes the art, poetry, and overall atmosphere of these historical periods and determines which hemisphere's worldview was prevalent. I did find myself taking all this information with a grain of salt however. While the author does use ample cultural evidence to support his claim, it's impossible to prove without going back in time.
Being that the content deals with intense scientific and philosophical concepts, the prose is often very dry and quite advanced. A major reason it took me so long to finish this book was that I had to re-read sections multiple times until I understood it. That being said, the hypothesis and subject matter were so interesting, I was still able to stay engaged throughout the book.
The hypothesis that McGilchrist posits throughout the book is that Western civilization has followed too far along using the left hemisphere process of thinking. As to whether or not I agree with this, I am not sure. While McGilchrist does bring up superb arguments, ultimately there is a lot that can never be fully proven and requires a leap of faith to arrive at those conclusions. Of course, that might just be left hemisphere talking.
What I will say is that is paradigm-shifting. After reading, I've noticed ways in which the world seems to be decontextualized, governed by layers and layers of processes all in the hopes of making things better. These are things that the left side does really well. But there has been a lack of looking at the big picture and empathy behind this process-driven approach. Maybe society is losing touch with the right hemisphere after all? McGilchrist has opened my eyes to the pros and cons of this way of thinking. I can see this tension of worldviews everywhere from global affairs to conversations with my friends. My hope is to use this information any where I can and remind myself of the lessons learned from reading this back.
This book was very dense and very long. But it's opened my eyes to the interesting ways that our mind (as well as our culture) works. If you can stick it out for the full book, you will certainly come out with a new view (or potentially two different, competing views) on life.
McGilchrist's work here is majesterial in depth and scope. I was somewhat overwhelmed by his knowledge of the classics, philosophers and poets, and his ability to synthesise them into his explanation of the how the brain's hemispheres function. There's a lot to think about, and I'll mull over it for a while. I may read this again sometime.
That said, I'll jump to the criticisms. By the end of the book I got the feeling that his hemispheres-hammer started to see hemispheres-nails everywhere. It's the theory to explain everything, and becomes somewhat unfalsifiable. I appreciate the difficulty in using the left hemisphere to explain (ie, writing an academic book) the workings of the (uncapturable world of the) right hemisphere, thus according to his theory his explanation is going to be lacking something that academic writing can never capture. I'm not sure of the solution to that. I also think his rose coloured glasses view of bygone eras is a bit myopic, and becomes a powerful narrative by which to interpret human history. Were 'humans' 'really' 'happier' 'back then'? I have to qualify every word in that sentence, because it's not straightforward - which humans? Measured by what? Starting from when?
McGilchrist mostly speaks glowingly of ancient peoples and their myths and religions, but never mentions the horrors, fears and suppression that they brought, and this is, I think, the mistake of searching for explanatory narratives. It ultimately leads to hit counting and confirmation bias.
But back to the positives.... It was really helpful to see how the different parts of the brain worked, and I was able to recognise those different patterns in myself, and the oppositie pulls of the left and right hemispheres. McGilchrist takes a somewhat negative view of scientific reductionism, yet dividing consciousness into the activities of separate brain hemispheres seems like the ultimate in reductionist thinking. Did that thought cross his mind (minds?)?
I also thought it fascinating to think about how ancient humans may not have had an inner dialogue, and when that started to develop they had no mytho-cultural norms for interpreting that, and thus there was an explosion of 'god-whisperers' - people hearing an inner dialogue, not knowing what it was, and concluding they were hearing voices from beyond. Today we have narratives and precedents for interpreting this phenomenon ("It must be me talking to myself in my head, which is what everyone else is experiencing and is totally normal, and science backs that up"). I'm not sure how we could ever 'prove' that this is the case, but it's an interesting hypothesis that has a bit of explanatory power.
Another interesting concept was the paradoxical nature of the left hemisphere's inability to articulate the right hemisphere's activity, and all the different phenomena that are 'destroyed' by the left hemisphere's attempt to codify the uncodifiable, such as 'freedom', or 'spontenaity', or 'authenticity'. I've felt this tension my whole life, and intuitively known that there's something paradoxical and unsolvable about it, but didn't have a framework by which to explain it. Now that I have a framework I wonder if my left hemisphere will simply latch onto that at every possibility....
Related to that, his description of the American Revolution and the movement toward 'small government' explains in part my general preference for conservative politics despite my sympathies with liberal issues. I think that government is not really able to legislate true freedom, but in a left-brained way tries and tries, and ties up 'freedom' in legislation and laws which are the antithesis to freedom. That's not my only reason, but it's a significant one.
I thought it was interesting that in mentioning the sensation that language is inadequate for articulating all of one's thoughts about something, he identified the three dots '...' as a marker of the right hemisphere's resistance to closure and certainty. Those dots represent the 'inexaustability' and 'unembraceability' of articulation, and I personally use them a lot when not constrained by formal writing standards.
Hyperconsciousness is something I'm curious about. I definitely have leanings toward that, and I agree that too much consciousness is a bad thing in that it ruins an experience. It's hard to have a sense of awe and wonder while having a sense of having a sense of awe and wonder. It's hard to belly laugh while 'observing' one's own response to a funny situation, analysing it, and being aware of one's own physiological response. It seems that there's a happy balance between consciousness and ignorance. IIRC, McGilchrist suggests that ancient authors rarely describe schizotypal behaviours and perhaps it's a modern phenomenon, the ultimate ascendance of the left hemisphere. This is basically the conclusion of TMAHE. There's definitely a movement toward algorithmic driven life, and according to McGilchrist, this is the left hemisphere's attempt to control the phenomena experienced through the right hemisphere. We see this even more as AI takes over more and more aspects of human life and may, according to some critics of AI, end up taking over everything - a universe of paperclips. I don't know what the solution is, because any attempt to solve it is likely to be a left hemisphere driven solution.
Anyway, great book, with lots to ponder. Almost 5 stars, but for the romanticising of history and lack of addressing relevant academic criticisms.
EDIT 2021-05-12:
Just finished reading the second time through. My impression was similar to the first. Another thing I noticed, which is hard to explain, is that I feel like McGilchrist has a kind of elitist skepticism about knowledge etc, but at the same time he has his own unchallenged assumptions underneath his ideas. It's like he's saying that obviously the world is a certain way, so let's examine the methods we use to uncover this world because those methods are problematic. But he's not really challenging his idea that there's a real way which the world is, or at least, he's not acknowledging that he's not challenging this, which reveals to me a certain blindness. The book is excellent, and I really like his thoughts. There's just this nagging feeling that it's not just incomplete, but wrongish. Not sure if I'll get to the bottom of that......
That said, I'll jump to the criticisms. By the end of the book I got the feeling that his hemispheres-hammer started to see hemispheres-nails everywhere. It's the theory to explain everything, and becomes somewhat unfalsifiable. I appreciate the difficulty in using the left hemisphere to explain (ie, writing an academic book) the workings of the (uncapturable world of the) right hemisphere, thus according to his theory his explanation is going to be lacking something that academic writing can never capture. I'm not sure of the solution to that. I also think his rose coloured glasses view of bygone eras is a bit myopic, and becomes a powerful narrative by which to interpret human history. Were 'humans' 'really' 'happier' 'back then'? I have to qualify every word in that sentence, because it's not straightforward - which humans? Measured by what? Starting from when?
McGilchrist mostly speaks glowingly of ancient peoples and their myths and religions, but never mentions the horrors, fears and suppression that they brought, and this is, I think, the mistake of searching for explanatory narratives. It ultimately leads to hit counting and confirmation bias.
But back to the positives.... It was really helpful to see how the different parts of the brain worked, and I was able to recognise those different patterns in myself, and the oppositie pulls of the left and right hemispheres. McGilchrist takes a somewhat negative view of scientific reductionism, yet dividing consciousness into the activities of separate brain hemispheres seems like the ultimate in reductionist thinking. Did that thought cross his mind (minds?)?
I also thought it fascinating to think about how ancient humans may not have had an inner dialogue, and when that started to develop they had no mytho-cultural norms for interpreting that, and thus there was an explosion of 'god-whisperers' - people hearing an inner dialogue, not knowing what it was, and concluding they were hearing voices from beyond. Today we have narratives and precedents for interpreting this phenomenon ("It must be me talking to myself in my head, which is what everyone else is experiencing and is totally normal, and science backs that up"). I'm not sure how we could ever 'prove' that this is the case, but it's an interesting hypothesis that has a bit of explanatory power.
Another interesting concept was the paradoxical nature of the left hemisphere's inability to articulate the right hemisphere's activity, and all the different phenomena that are 'destroyed' by the left hemisphere's attempt to codify the uncodifiable, such as 'freedom', or 'spontenaity', or 'authenticity'. I've felt this tension my whole life, and intuitively known that there's something paradoxical and unsolvable about it, but didn't have a framework by which to explain it. Now that I have a framework I wonder if my left hemisphere will simply latch onto that at every possibility....
Related to that, his description of the American Revolution and the movement toward 'small government' explains in part my general preference for conservative politics despite my sympathies with liberal issues. I think that government is not really able to legislate true freedom, but in a left-brained way tries and tries, and ties up 'freedom' in legislation and laws which are the antithesis to freedom. That's not my only reason, but it's a significant one.
I thought it was interesting that in mentioning the sensation that language is inadequate for articulating all of one's thoughts about something, he identified the three dots '...' as a marker of the right hemisphere's resistance to closure and certainty. Those dots represent the 'inexaustability' and 'unembraceability' of articulation, and I personally use them a lot when not constrained by formal writing standards.
Hyperconsciousness is something I'm curious about. I definitely have leanings toward that, and I agree that too much consciousness is a bad thing in that it ruins an experience. It's hard to have a sense of awe and wonder while having a sense of having a sense of awe and wonder. It's hard to belly laugh while 'observing' one's own response to a funny situation, analysing it, and being aware of one's own physiological response. It seems that there's a happy balance between consciousness and ignorance. IIRC, McGilchrist suggests that ancient authors rarely describe schizotypal behaviours and perhaps it's a modern phenomenon, the ultimate ascendance of the left hemisphere. This is basically the conclusion of TMAHE. There's definitely a movement toward algorithmic driven life, and according to McGilchrist, this is the left hemisphere's attempt to control the phenomena experienced through the right hemisphere. We see this even more as AI takes over more and more aspects of human life and may, according to some critics of AI, end up taking over everything - a universe of paperclips. I don't know what the solution is, because any attempt to solve it is likely to be a left hemisphere driven solution.
Anyway, great book, with lots to ponder. Almost 5 stars, but for the romanticising of history and lack of addressing relevant academic criticisms.
EDIT 2021-05-12:
Just finished reading the second time through. My impression was similar to the first. Another thing I noticed, which is hard to explain, is that I feel like McGilchrist has a kind of elitist skepticism about knowledge etc, but at the same time he has his own unchallenged assumptions underneath his ideas. It's like he's saying that obviously the world is a certain way, so let's examine the methods we use to uncover this world because those methods are problematic. But he's not really challenging his idea that there's a real way which the world is, or at least, he's not acknowledging that he's not challenging this, which reveals to me a certain blindness. The book is excellent, and I really like his thoughts. There's just this nagging feeling that it's not just incomplete, but wrongish. Not sure if I'll get to the bottom of that......
Who am I kidding? I had to give up on this. Couldn't make it through the dense first third description of brain function and the existence of brain asymmetry. So I never even made it to his ground breaking idea about the world we've made and how one half of our brain is being a bully. Or whatever. May try again when I am old and unplagued by children and working and other interests. May not.
Wow, this was a mission and a half to read, so it is frightening to think what went into the creation of it!
The first half of this weighty tome is quite an in-depth view of the differences with between the left and right hemispheres of the brain. This is to introduce a nuanced view of how the two halves affect each other and produce different views on the world. As one would expect, the evidence for a particular point usually comes from case studies where damage to a particular part of the brain in a patient changes behaviour or world view. This really does turn what could be a very dry subject into something quite fascinating.
The second half is a much more personal discussion of the consequence of such a division in the brain. This is not my area of expertise, so I will refrain from making value judgements on the quality of the evidence or the conclusions drawn from it. However, I will say that I feel McGilchrist introduces the subject matter in a way that feels as though I can follow the thread of his argument, despite my knowing that I would need to read through a few more times to fully follow the arguments.
Well worth the time to read. It certainly left me with a lot of interesting ideas to ponder and in it’s final conclusions reminds me not a little of Schrodinger’s What is Life?
The first half of this weighty tome is quite an in-depth view of the differences with between the left and right hemispheres of the brain. This is to introduce a nuanced view of how the two halves affect each other and produce different views on the world. As one would expect, the evidence for a particular point usually comes from case studies where damage to a particular part of the brain in a patient changes behaviour or world view. This really does turn what could be a very dry subject into something quite fascinating.
The second half is a much more personal discussion of the consequence of such a division in the brain. This is not my area of expertise, so I will refrain from making value judgements on the quality of the evidence or the conclusions drawn from it. However, I will say that I feel McGilchrist introduces the subject matter in a way that feels as though I can follow the thread of his argument, despite my knowing that I would need to read through a few more times to fully follow the arguments.
Well worth the time to read. It certainly left me with a lot of interesting ideas to ponder and in it’s final conclusions reminds me not a little of Schrodinger’s What is Life?
I like how he combines neuroscience and split-brain research (first half) with history, philosophy, art and literature (second half) to make a more comprehensive analysis about the hemisphere differences and their effects on thinking. His main thesis is a call that the right hemisphere is more useful than we historically have given credit for and that we live in a culture that currently favors and leans into our more 'analytical' left hemisphere to the detriment of the holistic right hemisphere. I found it more compelling and better researched than the Bicameral Mind (which he references) but again was annoyed with the preoccupation with the Schizophrenics vs Depressives argument. Overall I thought it was a great read and one of the better psychology books I've read
I read it and it was horrendously difficult for me. There was a ton of information, much that seemed repetitive to me. The findings on the real differences between hemispheres and the importance of both resonated with my own experience of knowing/not-knowing and having that feel right to me. There was a lot of philosophy, art, literature, poetry splashed through the book that was unfamiliar to me and left me foundering trying to understand what was being said. This was especially true when it was in a foreign (to me) language. I can't recommend this book or even rate it. I promised myself I'd read it, so I did with a bit of skimming in the last two chapters. I don't think the book was written for the likes of me.
I didn't want this book to end. It changed the way I see the world.
Transformative. Brilliant.
Transformative. Brilliant.