Consciousness – How matter becomes imagination.

Title :-Consciousness – How matter becomes imagination.

By :- Gerald M. Edelman & Giulio Tononi

Published :- Penguin, United States & other countries (2001) Paperback (250 pages)

Outline;- Looks at the neural dynamics and identifies “reentry” as “the ongoing recursive interchange of parallel signals between reciprocally connected areas of the brain, an interchange that continually coordinates these activities of these areas maps to each other in space and time”. The human brain has more of this reentry activity that all other brains. Such development of conscious is thought to have made a significant advance during the period of evolution during the transition between reptiles and birds, and between reptiles and mammals. “Consciousness is neither a thing nor a simple property.”

Overall a “scientific” read with some difficult terms. I feel the author may go a little too far in some aspects, particularly assigning language such prominence, and the author may well read more of Darwin to modify his tone a bit.

An intriguing subject, and if mankind can ever put intelligence in a pill (like one movie), then we are all in for a changed future.