by Norman Doidge
"Mind-bending, miracle-making, reality-busting stuff with implications for all human beings."
"A remarkable and hopeful portrait of the endless adaptability of the human brain."
"The power of positive thinking finally gains scientific credibility."
"A remarkable and hopeful portrait of the endless adaptability of the human brain."
"The power of positive thinking finally gains scientific credibility."
The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science Overview
For years the doctrine of neuroscientists has been that the brain is a machine: break a part and you lose that function permanently. But more and more evidence is turning up to show that the brain can rewire itself, even in the face of catastrophic trauma: essentially, the functions of the brain can be strengthened just like a weak muscle. Scientists have taught a woman with damaged inner ears, who for five years had had "a sense of perpetual falling," to regain her sense of balance with a sensor on her tongue, and a stroke victim to recover the ability to walk although 97% of the nerves from the cerebral cortex to the spine were destroyed. With detailed case studies reminiscent of Oliver Sachs, combined with extensive interviews with lead researchers, Doidge, a research psychiatrist and psychoanalyst at Columbia and the University of Toronto, slowly turns everything we thought we knew about the brain upside down. He is, perhaps, overenthusiastic about the possibilities, believing that this new science can fix every neurological problem, from learning disabilities to blindness. But Doidge writes interestingly and engagingly about some of the least understood marvels of the brain.
The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science Review
This is a very good book, though perhaps not written as a page turner.
This information is very valuable for two reasons.
First, it could potentially change the way we look at diseases of the mind, and what are the options for treating them. Like so many other good works of medicine, this book clearly shows that not all treatments need to be drugs and surgery. The brain has a built-in flexibility never before imagined. But up to now we have not guessed this, and have not known what kind of stimulus is required to activate the brain's own inherent abilities to change and heal itself. He points towards what some of the new therapies might be.
Second, one can ponder, how and why the brain has the kind of flexibility it does. In one example, people blind from birth learn to see through their tongues. A video camera is strapped to the subject's head. The camera image is converted into electrical signals, those signals sent to a small disc, and the disc placed on the subject's tongue. In a matter of days the blind person's visual cortex is interpreting the signals from the tongue, and the people can "see". This all touches on a much larger topic, that our brains have far more complexity and ability than is necessary for our survival in the life we lead. If our brains only evolved to give us better abilities to find mates and increase territory, then why would we have staggeringly complex neural abilities that do not relate to finding mates and increasing territory?
This information is very valuable for two reasons.
First, it could potentially change the way we look at diseases of the mind, and what are the options for treating them. Like so many other good works of medicine, this book clearly shows that not all treatments need to be drugs and surgery. The brain has a built-in flexibility never before imagined. But up to now we have not guessed this, and have not known what kind of stimulus is required to activate the brain's own inherent abilities to change and heal itself. He points towards what some of the new therapies might be.
Second, one can ponder, how and why the brain has the kind of flexibility it does. In one example, people blind from birth learn to see through their tongues. A video camera is strapped to the subject's head. The camera image is converted into electrical signals, those signals sent to a small disc, and the disc placed on the subject's tongue. In a matter of days the blind person's visual cortex is interpreting the signals from the tongue, and the people can "see". This all touches on a much larger topic, that our brains have far more complexity and ability than is necessary for our survival in the life we lead. If our brains only evolved to give us better abilities to find mates and increase territory, then why would we have staggeringly complex neural abilities that do not relate to finding mates and increasing territory?
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The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science