Michael S. Gazzaniga
Our notion of the mind is a single “me” that consciously acts and reacts on/to stimuli. But a more accurate description would be several modules that work in tandem to define and dictate what we could call the mind/consciousness. A lot of this mind’s activities is dictated by factors that have been built into us by evolution and environment. I had just about been converted to biological determinism and started disbelieving the notion of free will! I think I’ll have to change my mind again!
While the blurb might seem like a case for determinism, (and thus against ‘free will’) I thought the actual content of the book, especially towards the last third, swing more towards a “we don’t know yet”. The idea of it, though, starts earlier in the book – “Just as traffic emerges from cars, traffic does ultimately constrain cars, so doesn’t the mind constrain the brain that generated it?” (more…)