Here are 23 books that Idiot Brain fans have personally recommended if you like
Idiot Brain.
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For thirty-five years I’ve studied and written about consciousness, the evolution of the mind, and the development of human social and cultural forms. I think we’re all fascinated by who we are and why we have minds. In my case, that fundamental question, which we must all answer in some way during our lives, has become a drive to bridge our theory of consciousness with a full description of the human condition. I believe we cannot progress ethically without such a bridge. Although in my novels I don’t usually write explicitly on such themes, they’re always present, providing the framework in which my characters live their lives.
Nicholas Humphrey is our Darwin of the human mind. I first came across him in the mid-1980s when his television seriesThe Inner Eye was broadcast. It was a revelation to me that such an elegant, comprehensive, and beautiful theory as his existed, explaining the evolution and nature of human consciousness. I bought the accompanying book at once, and it remains for me the best explanation of consciousness—a constant source of inspiration, including for my novels. Humphrey’s social intelligence theory remains, after forty years, the most widely accepted explanation of the evolution of consciousness.
Where does consciousness come from? What is it? Where is it taking us? In 1971 Nicholas Humphrey spent three months at Dian Fossey's gorilla research centre in Rwanda. It was there, among the mountain gorillas that he began to focus on the philosphical and scientific puzzle that has fascinated him ever since: the problem of how a human being or animal can know what it is like to be itself. The Inner Eye describes where these original speculations led: to Humphrey's now celebrated theories of the 'social function of intellect' and of human beings as natural born 'mind-readers'. Easy to…
Sleep. Memory. Pleasure. Fear. Language. We experience these things every day, but how do our brains create them? Your Brain, Explained is a personal tour around your gray matter. Neuroscientist Marc Dingman gives you a crash course in how your brain works and explains the latest research on the brain…
I became fascinated by the highest achievements of human intelligence while a graduate student in philosophy working on the discovery and justification of scientific theories. Shortly after I got my PhD, I started working with cognitive psychologists who gave me an appreciation for empirical studies of intelligent thinking. Psychology led me to computational modeling of intelligence and I learned to build my own models. Much later a graduate student got me interested in questions about intelligence in non-human animals. After teaching a course on intelligence in machines, humans, and other animals, I decided to write a book that provides a systematic comparison: Bots and Beasts.
This collection of essays gives a good overview of current psychological research on human intelligence, ranging from traditional IQ research to criticisms of it by Robert Sternberg and Howard Gardner. It also includes overviews of research on cultural and brain aspects of intelligence. One startling observation is how little psychologists agree on a definition of intelligence.
The study of human intelligence features many points of consensus, but there are also many different perspectives. In this unique book Robert J. Sternberg invites the nineteen most highly cited psychological scientists in the leading textbooks on human intelligence to share their research programs and findings. Each chapter answers a standardized set of questions on the measurement, investigation, and development of intelligence - and the outcome represents a wide range of substantive and methodological emphases including psychometric, cognitive, expertise-based, developmental, neuropsychological, genetic, cultural, systems, and group-difference approaches. This is an exciting and valuable course book for upper-level students to learn…
I’ve spent my career exploring how people think, learn, and respond to challenges. I was raised as a Humanist, but my journey into behavioral psychology began in college while training dolphins in Hawaii. I learned firsthand how behavior is shaped through reinforcement and response. It’s easy to see how my humanism combined with behavioral psychology has fed a lifelong passion for understanding how to master our minds so we can navigate life with clarity and purpose. As an author, speaker, and behavioral science expert, I teach people how to manage change, deal with difficult people, and lead with integrity. I’m excited to share these books to help you live life fully.
I love this book because it is the first brain theory book I’ve read that specifically explains what the neocortex is and does and how it creates consciousness. Understanding the brain is a pattern recognition organ explains so much about what we know in behavioral psychology and how humans learn and adapt to change.
Understanding how our brains function and learn and how they can get hijacked is essential for both personal growth and professional leadership. This knowledge is so important to who we are as human beings that I believe it should be standard education for every thinking person on earth.
For all we hear of neuroscience's great advances, the field has generated more questions than answers. We know that the brain combines sensory input from all over your body into a single perception, but not how. We think brains "compute" in some sense, but we can't say what those computations are. We believe that the brain is organized as a hierarchy, with different pieces all working collaboratively to make a single model of the world. But we can explain neither how those pieces are differentiated, nor how they collaborate.
Neuroscientist and computer engineer Jeff Hawkins argues that it's so hard…
The brain: brilliant, powerful... and utterly bizarre. Why would someone be terrified they might slip down a shower drain? Or insist they've turned into a cat? What can rare brain disorders—and surprisingly common mental quirks—teach us about how we think, feel, and behave?
I was stimulated by Norbert Wiener’s “Cybernetics” to study circuits in the brain that control behavior. For my graduate studies, I chose the olfactory bulb for its experimental advantages, which led to constructing the first computer models of brain neurons and microcircuits. Then I got interested in how the smell patterns are activated when we eat food, which led to a new field called Neurogastronomy, which is the neuroscience of the circuits that create the perception of food flavor. Finally, because all animals use their brains to find and eat food, the olfactory system has provided new insights into the evolution of the mammalian brain and the basic organization of the cerebral cortex.
If flavorful food has been a critical element in the evolution of our large brains, how did large brains give rise to our high intelligence? This is to be found in the circuits of our cerebral cortex and the regions to which it is connected. Daeyeol Lee is one of the leaders in research on how the cerebral cortex generates behavior in monkeys, for its insights into how this occurs in humans. This is providing new ways to define the neural basis of intelligence based on the application of new single-cell recording techniques in primates and brain scanning techniques in humans.
With his approach based on a deep understanding of how primates gave rise to humans, Lee asks the critical questions: What is intelligence? How did it evolve from monkeys to humans? Can computers and artificial intelligence ever equal human biological intelligence in all its complexity? Based on Lee’s research…
What is intelligence? How did it begin and evolve to human intelligence? Does a high level of biological intelligence require a complex brain? Can man-made machines be truly intelligent? Is AI fundamentally different from human intelligence? In Birth of Intelligence, distinguished neuroscientist Daeyeol Lee tackles these pressing fundamental issues. To better prepare for future society and its technology, including how the use of AI will impact our lives, it is essential to understand the biological root and limits of human intelligence. After systematically reviewing biological and computational underpinnings of decision making and intelligent behaviors, Birth of Intelligence proposes that true…
I began studying philosophy, both western and Asian, as a college freshman, and I never stopped. Much of my career in philosophy was devoted to building bridges between western and Buddhist traditions. The best philosophers try to make their ideas as clear as possible. But standards of clarity can differ across traditions, and this sometimes makes it difficult to present the theories and arguments of one philosophical tradition to those who think in terms of another. I have struggled with this in my own efforts at bridge-building, and I am always appreciative when I see other scholars of Buddhism achieve the sort of clarity I aim for.
Buddhist philosophers try to construct rational defenses of those claims about the nature of ourselves and the world that are central to the Buddhist project. So clarity about how we obtain knowledge is important to Buddhist thinkers. In this book Stoltz presents some of the fruits of their efforts, the epistemological theories of the tradition. What I most like about this book is the clarity with which Stoltz connects Buddhist theorizing about knowledge with trends in more recent western epistemology, bringing out both important overlaps and significant discontinuities.
Illuminating the Mind puts the field of Buddhist epistemology in conversation with contemporary debates in philosophy. Jonathan Stoltz provides readers with an introduction to epistemology within the Buddhist intellectual tradition in a manner that is accessible to those whose primary background is in the "Western" tradition of philosophy. The book examines many of the most important topics in the field of epistemology, topics that are central both to contemporary discussions of epistemology and to the classical Buddhist tradition of epistemology in India and Tibet. Among the topics discussed are Buddhist accounts of the nature of knowledge episodes, the defining conditions…
Dianna Booher is the bestselling author of 49 books (Penguin Random House, HarperCollins, McGraw-Hill), in 62 foreign editions, with nearly 4 million copies sold. More than two dozen of her books focus on communication, and she’s facilitated workshops on the topic for 4 decades. She helps leaders shape their own message in book form at Booher Book Camps.
For more than three decades now, we’ve seen corporations, nonprofits, and governments go under because one or more of their executive leaders proved emotionally unstable. Those leaders were either narcissistic, paranoid, bipolar, impulsive, or immature (temper tantrums, poor coping skills, crying, withdrawing, pouting).
Without self-awareness—and the awareness to identify emotional instability in others—leaders cannot hope to connect genuinely and build personal influence and loyalty among colleagues and staffers.
I love this book because of its research and real-life case studies. With almost every chapter, you’ll say, “Oh, I know that guy or gal!”
Better: You learn how to cope with them (or maybe more importantly, you learn if it will be impossible to ever cope with them).
Emotional Intelligence was an international phenomenon, appearing on the New York Times bestseller list for over a year and selling more than 5 million copies worldwide. Now, once again, Daniel Goleman has written a groundbreaking synthesis of the latest findings in biology and brain science, revealing that we are 'wired to connect' and the surprisingly deep impact of our relationships on every aspect our lives.
Far more than we are consciously aware, our daily encounters with parents, spouses, bosses, and even strangers, shape our brains and affect cells throughout our bodies, down to the level of our genes - for…
Currently a Professor of Leadership and Strategy at Hult, I’ve been on the faculties of other top business schools, and an executive officer of a NASDAQ company. I’ve led “new to the world” technology projects and advised CXOs of global companies. These experiences convinced me that poor leadership is the biggest reason organizational initiatives fail. Two decades ago, I switched from being a technology scholar; I began researching leadership and writing for practitioners, not academics. My first book was on a 2009 “best business books” list. This one is in Sloan Management Review’s Management on the Cutting Edge series—books that its editors believe will influence executive behavior.
To the best of my recollection, the word ‘leadership’ doesn’t appear in this book.
Yet, since I first encountered it in a Harvard Business School doctoral seminar on leadership—and ignored numerous assignments because I couldn’t put it down—I have recommended it to countless professionals.
Too often, leadership is presented as a disembodied (cap)ability, unmoored from its organizational context.
Philosopher Hofstadter and computer scientist Dennett’s remarkable collection of articles includes both fairy tales (yes!) and Alan Turing’s essay defining artificial intelligence. Collectively, they explore not just the “self and soul” in the sub-title but also how humans interact with organizations and technology.
This book taught me leadership isn’t about being a puppeteer. Each of the newest developments in artificial intelligence has reminded me that I must re-read this book.
With contributions from Jorge Luis Borges, Richard Dawkins, John Searle, and Robert Nozick, The Mind's I explores the meaning of self and consciousness through the perspectives of literature, artificial intelligence, psychology, and other disciplines. In selections that range from fiction to scientific speculations about thinking machines, artificial intelligence, and the nature of the brain, Hofstadter and Dennett present a variety of conflicting visions of the self and the soul as explored through the writings of some of the twentieth century's most renowned thinkers.
I am a chess Grandmaster and former British and European gold medal winner. I have won tournaments in the UK, Australia, South Africa, Spain, Holland, Germany, and Cuba, where I met Fidel Castro. I have always been fascinated by the potential power of the human mind and how to activate it. Memory, Speed Reading, Mind Mapping, and Critical Thinking, all form a part of this intriguing matrix.
Tony Buzan was a genius who discovered the secret of bringing out the innate genius in others. This all-round manual illustrates all aspects of Tony’s teachings which can transform your mental power in every aspect of your life. At university Tony realised that there was no handbook or operations manual for the human brain, so he decided to write it himself. This is it.
The chances are that we are only using about 1% of the power of our brain. Just imagine the amazing results if we could unlock just a fraction of the power of the remaining 99%. With this definitive, classic operations manual for the brain, you can discover how to revolutionise the way you think and learn, wake up your senses and unleash the hidden power of your mind.
With this book, you will learn how to:
Improve your problem-solving capabilities. Become more creative in your approach to work and life. Understand, retain and more readily recall information. Improve your…
I became fascinated by the highest achievements of human intelligence while a graduate student in philosophy working on the discovery and justification of scientific theories. Shortly after I got my PhD, I started working with cognitive psychologists who gave me an appreciation for empirical studies of intelligent thinking. Psychology led me to computational modeling of intelligence and I learned to build my own models. Much later a graduate student got me interested in questions about intelligence in non-human animals. After teaching a course on intelligence in machines, humans, and other animals, I decided to write a book that provides a systematic comparison: Bots and Beasts.
Richard Nisbett is one of the most influential social psychologists in the world, and we collaborated on the 1987 book Induction. His book on intelligence gives a good introduction to the psychology of intelligence and an incisive critique of attempts to use dubious research on a genetic basis for intelligence to explain racial inequality.
Who are smarter, Asians or Westerners? Are there genetic explanations for group differences in test scores? From the damning research of The Bell Curve to the more recent controversy surrounding geneticist James Watson's statements, one factor has been consistently left out of the equation: culture. In the tradition of Stephen Jay Gould's The Mismeasure of Man, world-class social psychologist Richard E. Nisbett takes on the idea of intelligence as biologically determined and impervious to culture with vast implications for the role of education as it relates to social and economic development. Intelligence and How to Get It asserts that intellect…
I have always been interested in the overview, the joined-up, the patterns, trends, and directions rather than the details of things. As a biologist, this led me to study animal behaviour rather than molecules. Great things come from the cross-overs between disciplines. Bridges are there to be made between islands of knowledge. Both my books (Wild Health and Another Self) are books that bridge a huge divide between knowledge acquired from reductionist research and that gained by experience. We humans use both.
I loved the way Guy Claxton joined the dots between so many separate scientific disciplines.
He is (I believe) a professor of linguistics, yet he dove into human biology with clarity and gusto, presenting an accessible description of an extremely complex concept—that intelligence incorporates our whole body, not just our brain.
An enthralling exploration that upends the prevailing view of consciousness and demonstrates how intelligence is literally embedded in the palms of our hands
If you think that intelligence emanates from the mind and that reasoning necessitates the suppression of emotion, you'd better think again-or rather not "think" at all. In his provocative new book, Guy Claxton draws on the latest findings in neuroscience and psychology to reveal how our bodies-long dismissed as mere conveyances-actually constitute the core of our intelligent life. From the endocrinal means by which our organs communicate to the instantaneous decision-making prompted by external phenomena, our bodies…
