An Excerpt from The User Illusion: Cutting Consciousness Down To Size
By Tor Norretranders
The fact is that every single second, millions of bits of information flood in through our senses. But our consciousness processes only perhaps forty bits a second – at most. Millions and millions of bits are condensed to a conscious experience that contains practically no information at all…
Here is an excerpt from a fascinating conversation between psychologist, Susan Blackmore and philosopher, David Chalmers, in the book Conversations On Consciousness, by Susan Blackmore:
I think someone could know all the physical facts about the world and still not know about consciousness. So if the relationship between brain processes and conscious experience isn’t one of reduction, what is it?
An Excerpt From Challenging Nature, By Lee Silver
Homeopathic medicine, or homeopathy, was the creation of a single person, Samuel Hahnemann, who graduated from a German medical school in 1779 and practiced the “healing arts” until 1843, first in Germany and then in Paris…
An Excerpt From The Selfish Gene, By Richard Dawkins
…Chemists have tried to imitate the chemical conditions of the young earth. They have put these simple substances in a flask and supplied a source of energy such as ultraviolet light or electric sparks – artificial simulation of primordial lightning. After a few weeks of this, something interesting is usually found inside the flask…
An Excerpt From The Happiness Trip, By Eduardo Punset
The most recent research has revealed that music, by acting on the central nervous system, raises levels of endorphins, the brain’s own opiates, as well as other neurotransmitters such as dopamine, acetylcholine, and oxytocin. Endorphins have been found to provide motivation and energy for life, to cause joyfulness and optimism, to decrease pain…