Neuronal Man

( Over the past thirty-five years, there has been an expl...)

Over the past thirty-five years, there has been an explosive increase in scientists' ability to explain the structure and functioning of the human brain. While psychology has advanced our understanding of human behavior, various other sciences, such as anatomy, physiology, and biology, have determined the critical importance of synapses and, through the use of advanced technology, made it possible actually to see brain cells at work within the skull's walls. Here Jean-Pierre Changeux elucidates our current knowledge of the human brain, taking an interdisciplinary approach and explaining in layman's terms the complex theories and scientific breakthroughs that have significantly improved our understanding in the twentieth century.

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Neuronal Man - The Biology of Mind. Translated by L. Garey. OUP. 1985.

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[(Neuronal Man: The Biology of Mind)] [Author: J.-P. Changeux] published on (April, 1997)

(Over the past thirty-five years, there has been an explos...)

Over the past thirty-five years, there has been an explosive increase in scientists' ability to explain the structure and functioning of the human brain. While psychology has advanced our understanding of human behavior, various other sciences, such as anatomy, physiology, and biology, have determined the critical importance of synapses and, through the use of advanced technology, made it possible actually to see brain cells at work within the skull's walls. Here Jean-Pierre Changeux elucidates our current knowledge of the human brain, taking an interdisciplinary approach and explaining in layman's terms the complex theories and scientific breakthroughs that have significantly improved our understanding in the twentieth century.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IFY6BVA/?tag=2022091-20

Conversations on Mind, Matter, and Mathematics

( Do numbers and the other objects of mathematics enjoy a...)

Do numbers and the other objects of mathematics enjoy a timeless existence independent of human minds, or are they the products of cerebral invention? Do we discover them, as Plato supposed and many others have believed since, or do we construct them? Does mathematics constitute a universal language that in principle would permit human beings to communicate with extraterrestrial civilizations elsewhere in the universe, or is it merely an earthly language that owes its accidental existence to the peculiar evolution of neuronal networks in our brains? Does the physical world actually obey mathematical laws, or does it seem to conform to them simply because physicists have increasingly been able to make mathematical sense of it? Jean-Pierre Changeux, an internationally renowned neurobiologist, and Alain Connes, one of the most eminent living mathematicians, find themselves deeply divided by these questions. The problematic status of mathematical objects leads Changeux and Connes to the organization and function of the brain, the ways in which its embryonic and post-natal development influences the unfolding of mathematical reasoning and other kinds of thinking, and whether human intelligence can be simulated, modeled,--or actually reproduced-- by mechanical means. The two men go on to pose ethical questions, inquiring into the natural foundations of morality and the possibility that it may have a neural basis underlying its social manifestations. This vivid record of profound disagreement and, at the same time, sincere search for mutual understanding, follows in the tradition of Poincaré, Hadamard, and von Neumann in probing the limits of human experience and intellectual possibility. Why order should exist in the world at all, and why it should be comprehensible to human beings, is the question that lies at the heart of these remarkable dialogues.

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Conversations on Mind, Matter, and Mathematics [PAPERBACK] [1998] [By Jean-Pierre Changeux]

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Conversations on Mind, Matter, and Mathematics by Changeux, Jean-Pierre, Connes, Alain (1995) Hardcover

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What Makes Us Think?: A Neuroscientist and a Philosopher Argue about Ethics, Human Nature, and the Brain

( Will understanding our brains help us to know our minds...)

Will understanding our brains help us to know our minds? Or is there an unbridgeable distance between the work of neuroscience and the workings of human consciousness? In a remarkable exchange between neuroscientist Jean-Pierre Changeux and philosopher Paul Ricoeur, this book explores the vexed territory between these divergent approaches--and comes to a deeper, more complex perspective on human nature. Ranging across diverse traditions, from phrenology to PET scans and from Spinoza to Charles Taylor, What Makes Us Think? revolves around a central issue: the relation between the facts (or "what is") of science and the prescriptions (or "what ought to be") of ethics. Changeux and Ricoeur ask: Will neuroscientific knowledge influence our moral conduct? Is a naturally based ethics possible? Pursuing these questions, they attack key topics at the intersection of philosophy and neuroscience: What are the relations between brain states and psychological experience? Between language and truth? Memory and culture? Behavior and action? What is a mental representation? How does a sign relate to what it signifies? How might subjective experience be constructed rather than discovered? And can biological or cultural evolution be considered progressive? Throughout, Changeux and Ricoeur provide unprecedented insight into what neuroscience can--and cannot--tell us about the nature of human experience. Changeux and Ricoeur bring an unusual depth of engagement and breadth of knowledge to each other's subject. In doing so, they make two often hostile disciplines speak to one another in surprising and instructive ways--and speak with all the subtlety and passion of conversation at its very best.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0691092850/?tag=2022091-20

What Makes Us Think? A Neuroscientist and a Philosopher Argue about Ethics, Human Nature, and the Brain

( Will understanding our brains help us to know our minds...)

Will understanding our brains help us to know our minds? Or is there an unbridgeable distance between the work of neuroscience and the workings of human consciousness? In a remarkable exchange between neuroscientist Jean-Pierre Changeux and philosopher Paul Ricoeur, this book explores the vexed territory between these divergent approaches--and comes to a deeper, more complex perspective on human nature. Ranging across diverse traditions, from phrenology to PET scans and from Spinoza to Charles Taylor, What Makes Us Think? revolves around a central issue: the relation between the facts (or "what is") of science and the prescriptions (or "what ought to be") of ethics. Changeux and Ricoeur ask: Will neuroscientific knowledge influence our moral conduct? Is a naturally based ethics possible? Pursuing these questions, they attack key topics at the intersection of philosophy and neuroscience: What are the relations between brain states and psychological experience? Between language and truth? Memory and culture? Behavior and action? What is a mental representation? How does a sign relate to what it signifies? How might subjective experience be constructed rather than discovered? And can biological or cultural evolution be considered progressive? Throughout, Changeux and Ricoeur provide unprecedented insight into what neuroscience can--and cannot--tell us about the nature of human experience. Changeux and Ricoeur bring an unusual depth of engagement and breadth of knowledge to each other's subject. In doing so, they make two often hostile disciplines speak to one another in surprising and instructive ways--and speak with all the subtlety and passion of conversation at its very best.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0691009406/?tag=2022091-20

What Makes Us Think?: A Neuroscientist and a Philosopher Argue about Ethics, Human Nature, and the Brain by Changeux, Jean-Pierre, Ricoeur, Paul (2002) Paperback

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What Makes Us Think?: A Neuroscientist and a Philosopher Argue about Ethics, Human Nature, and the Brain by Jean-Pierre Changeux (17-Sep-2000) Hardcover

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The Physiology of Truth: Neuroscience and Human Knowledge (Mind/Brain/Behavior Initiative)

( In this wide-ranging book, one of the boldest thinkers...)

In this wide-ranging book, one of the boldest thinkers in modern neuroscience confronts an ancient philosophical problem: can we know the world as it really is? Drawing on provocative new findings about the psychophysiology of perception and judgment in both human and nonhuman primates, and also on the cultural history of science, Jean-Pierre Changeux makes a powerful case for the reality of scientific progress and argues that it forms the basis for a coherent and universal theory of human rights. On this view, belief in objective knowledge is not a mere ideological slogan or a naïve confusion; it is a characteristic feature of human cognition throughout evolution, and the scientific method its most sophisticated embodiment. Seeking to reconcile science and humanism, Changeux holds that the capacity to recognize truths that are independent of subjective personal experience constitutes the foundation of a human civil society.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0674012836/?tag=2022091-20

The Physiology of Truth: Neuroscience and Human Knowledge (Mind/Brain/Behavior Initiative) by Changeux, Jean-Pierre (2004) Hardcover

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[(The Physiology of Truth: Neuroscience and Human Knowledge)] [Author: Jean-Pierre Changeux] published on (March, 2009)

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Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors: From Molecular Biology to Cognition (Odile Jacob)

( The acetylcholine nicotinic receptor is among the most ...)

The acetylcholine nicotinic receptor is among the most studied receptors in neuroscience. Involved in muscle contraction and a wide variety of other neurological functions, including the processing of nicotine, it was the first receptor to be isolated and observed at the molecular level, providing a major research pathway for scientists working in neuroscience, biochemistry, pharmacology, and behavioral science. This book describes four decades of scientific research that inform our current understanding of this receptor. Jean-Pierre Changeux and Stuart J. Edelstein played important roles in pioneering research on the acetylcholine nicotinic receptor and on allosteric proteins, and here they reveal the complete scientific trajectory of that research. They begin with a historical perspective, describing how several fields converged around a single receptor and then explain the initial receptor purification and characterization. Subsequent chapters trace the investigations into various aspects of receptor structure and function, including the chemical structure of the binding site, the identity and properties of the ion channel, and the mechanism of signal transmission. In the final portion of the book, Changeux and Edelstein discuss recent studies on the three-dimensional structure of the receptor molecule and share their novel understanding of inherited diseases such as congenital myasthenia and epilepsy. They also address the integration of the receptor into its synaptic membrane environment and its distribution, physiology, and regulation in brain functions and cognition. Richly illustrated and lucidly written, this book provides an exceptional opportunity for scientists and students to follow a historic advance in our knowledge of molecular mechanisms and the workings of the brain.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0976890801/?tag=2022091-20

Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors: From Molecular Biology to Cognition (Odile Jacob) 1st edition by Changeux, Jean-Pierre, Edelstein, Stuart J. (2005) Hardcover

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