Minding the Brain: Models of the Mind, Information, and Empirical Science

“The mind-body problem lives! A stimulating collection of contemporary perspectives on a perennial conundrum.”

“Materialism about the mind is a deeply entrenched assumption, so much so that alternative viewpoints are shrugged aside as inconsequential. Minding the Brain challenges that mind-set, but not by giving a single, knock-down refutation of materialism or a single, obviously superior alternative. Instead, it presents a kaleidoscopic array involving multiple objections and multiple alternatives, authored by highly competent thinkers from neuroscience, consciousness studies, computer science, information theory, and philosophy. Both materialists and anti-materialists who want to understand the mind should not miss this book.”

“Minding the Brain is an imposing assemblage of cutting-edge criticisms of materialist views of the mind while advancing compelling alternative accounts of consciousness. The chapters on information, computation, and quantum theory are groundbreaking, advancing serious unacknowledged problems for materialism that must be contended with.”

“Written by renowned experts in different fields of science and philosophy, Minding the Brain provides a thorough, multifaceted, and insightful analysis of the age-old mind-body problem. It is well known that even an apparently simple inanimate entity like a sandpile may present a complex, non-linear, and chaotic dynamic which cannot be predicted by the individual properties of its constituting elements. With a unique common thread, the essays in this anthology elegantly expose reductionism for what it truly is, a simplistic endeavor grounded on the scientific materialism creed which, on the topic of the mind-body problem, tries to explain all the complexity of higher-order cognitive phenomena exclusively through reference to the most basic physico-chemical interactions within its underlying biological strata. Such a myopic and simplistic naturalistic approach is not only intellectually disappointing but also inherently flawed, ultimately falling short of the awe-inspiring grandeur of the life of the mind as we all know and experience it. Try explaining the totality of the delightful experience of reading this academic masterpiece through a mathematical equation!”

“Minding the Brain is an important book on substance dualism that comes with breadth, depth, and insight. It incorporates a number of fields of study and academic disciplines; it is up-to-date and rigorous in its presentation and argument; and it is fresh, thoughtful, and thought-provoking. I am pleased to see this robust defense of substance dualism that pushes back against the dominant view of naturalism in the academy as well as alternative views that likewise attempt to avoid the explanatory power of substance dualism and its important implications.”