"The Self Illusion" with Bruce Hood (BSP 88)

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Bruce Hood, PhD

The Self Illusion: How the Social Brain Creates Identity, by Bruce Hood, is a fascinating look at how our brains create both our experience of the world and our sense of being a single, coherent self.  As the word "illusion" in the title indicates, neither is exactly what it seems.  When I interviewed Dr. Hood (BSP 88), he explained that The Self Illusion is a broad introduction to this somewhat surprising idea. The  Self Illusion was written with a general audience in mind.  For those already familiar with the topic, he also puts a new emphasis on the role of development.  All readers should come away with a new appreciation for the critical role social interactions play through out human life.

Related Podcasts:

Additional References:

Announcements:

  • Because the Brain Science Podcast is free to everyone, it relies on listener donations.  Click here to learn how you can help.
  • Continuing educations credit is now available for selected episodes of the Brain Science Podcast.  Please send me an email if you would like to learn more.
  • I will be in Philadelphia, PA October 16-21 to attend the AAFP annual meeting.  Listeners who live in the area and physicians who are attended this meeting are invited to drop me an email if interested in getting together in person.
  • The latest episode of Books and Ideas is an interview with Jonathan Gottschall, author of The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human. This episode continues some of the same themes explored in BSP 88.
  • Upcoming episodes: Discussion of Self Comes to Mind, by Antonio Damasio, and interviews with Evan Thompson (Mind in Life) and Jaak Panksepp (The Archaeology of Mind).
  • Sign up for the Brain Science Podcast  Newsletter:  You will get the show notes automatically and never miss a new episode.
  • Don't forget to post your review of my eBook, Are Your Sure? The Unconscious Originis of Certainty, on Amazon.com, Goodreads.com or your favorite website.  (Send me your Amazon receipt to get a free PDF.)
  • Connect with other BSP fans: BSP Facebook Fan Page, Google +, Discussion Forum on Goodreads.com.
  • Follow me on Twitter: @docartemis.
  • Send me feedback (or respond to any of these announcements) at gincampbell at mac dot com.

Brain Science Podcast Turns Five Years Old (BSP 80)

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Original Logo from 2006

I launched the Brain Science Podcast in December 2006, so to celebrate I am posting my Fifth Annual Review Episode (BSP 80).  This podcast includes a review of the highlights from this year's episodes along with my reflections on what we have learned about brain health over the last few years.  I also take a look ahead to 2012 when I hope to continue to produce a Brain Science Podcast every month.

This Year's Episodes:

  • BSP 72:  Stephen L. Macknik and Susana Martinez-Conde, authors of Sleights of Mind: What the Neuroscience of Magic Reveals about Our Everyday Deceptions.
  • Extra: Books and Ideas  with Dr. Paul Offit, author of Deadly Choices: How The Anti-Vaccine Movement Threatens Us All.
  • BSP 73: Lawrence Shapiro, author of Embodied Cognition.
  • BSP 74: Olaf Sporns, author of Networks of the Brain.
  • BSP 75: David Eagleman, author of Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain.
  • BSP 76: Sian Beilock, author of Choke: What the Secrets of the Brain Reveal About Getting It Right When You Have To.
  • BSP 77: Fabrizio Benedetti, author of Placebo Effects and The Patient's Brain
  • Extra: Books and Ideas with Carol Tavris, co-author of Mistakes were Made (But Not By Me).
  • BSP 78: Review of Beyond Boundaries: The New Neuroscience of Connecting Brains with Machines---and How It Will Change Our Lives by Miguel Nicolelis.
  • BSP 79: Interview with Miguel Nicolelis.

Free transcripts are available for all episodes.  This is made possible by donations from listeners.

Announcements:

Send your feedback to Dr. Campbell at gincampbell at mac dot.com.

Premium Version of Interview with Thomas Metzinger

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The next episode of the Brain Science Podcast (BSP 67) is an interview with German philosopher Thomas Metzinger, author of The Ego Tunnel: The Science of the Mind and the Myth of the Self. The free podcast version will be released  on March 10, but the premium version is available now. Click here to learn more about premium podcasts.
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Memory: Challenging Current Theories with Randy Gallistel, PhD (BSP 66)

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Episode 66 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with Randy Gallistel, PhD, Co-Director of the Rutgers Center for Cognitive Science and co-author (with Adam Philip King) of Memory and the Computational Brain: Why Cognitive Science Will Transform Neuroscience.

We discuss why read/write memory is an essential element of computation, with an emphasis on the animal experiments that support the claim that brains must possess read/write memory.  This is significant because current models, such as neural nets, DO NOT incorporate read/write memory in their assumptions about how brains work.  It is not necessary to have any background in information theory or computation to appreciate the experiments that are discussed in this episode.

Episode 3 and Episode 12 of the Brain Science Podcast  provide  background information for this episode.

Premium Version available (with extra content)

References and Links:

Announcements:

Send feedback to gincampbell at mac dot com or leave voice mail at 205-202-0663.

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Affective Neuroscience with Jaak Panksepp (BSP 65)

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Episode 65 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with Jaak Panksepp, PhD, author of Affective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions.   Dr. Panksepp has done pioneering work on the neural origins of emotions.   In this interview, we discuss how his work challenges some of the common assumptions about emotions and some of the important implications of his discoveries.  New listeners may want to go back and listen to Episode 11 for an introduction to the neuroscience of emotion.

Click here for Premium Versions

References:

  • "How to Undress the Affective Mind: An Interview with Jaak Panksepp," S. Gallagher, Journal of Consciousness Studies, Volume 15, Number 2, 2008 , pp. 89-119(31).
  • "Affective consciousness: Core emotional feelings in animals and humans,"J Panksepp,  Consciousness and Cognition 14 (2005)30-80. Elsevier. (available on-line via ScienceDirect.com)

Scientists Mentioned in this Episode:

  • John Bowlby: studied the effects of maternal deprivation, helped develop attachment theory.
  • Walter Hess: work in the 1930's showed that stimulation of the cat hypothalamus led to anger. He shared the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1949.
  • Tom Insel: Director of the National Institutes for Mental Health (NIMH).
  • William James: early pioneer of scientific psychology. The James-Lange Theory of emotion is an outdated theory that emotion result from the brain's interpretation of signals coming from the body.
  • Eric Kandel: won the Nobel Prize in 2000 for his work with memory in the Aplysia.

Announcements:

  • Reminder: sign-up for the BSP Newsletter to get show notes and other updates via email.
  • I am working on a CD version of this episode.  It will be divided into multiple track to make it easier for you to find the parts you want to listen to again, and allow you to find your place if you are interrupted. It will also have most of the announcements and music removed.
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Reviewing Year 3 of the Brain Science Podcast (BSP 64)

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Episode 64 of the Brain Science Podcast  is our Third Annual Review Episode.  It includes a review of some of the major ideas we talked about in 2009 and a look ahead to what I have planned for 2010.

Main Books Discussed in 2009:

Guests who appeared on the Brain Science Podcast in 2009:

  • David Bainbridge, PhD: University Clinical Veterinary Anatomist from Cambridge University (BSP 63).

  • Warren S. Brown, PhD: experimental psychologist from Fuller Theological Seminary (BSP 62).
  • Guy Caldwell, PhD: molecular biologist from the University of Alabama (BSP 59).
  • Patricia Churchland, PhD: neurophilosopher from University of California at San Diego (BSP 55).
  • Chris Frith, PhD: neuropsychologist from University College London (BSP 57).
  • Allan Jones, PhD: Chief Science Officer at the Allen Institute for Brain Research (BSP 61).
  • Eve Marder, PhD: neuroscientist from Brandeis University (BSP 56).
  • Michael Merzenich, PhD pioneer in neuroplasticity (BSP 54).
  • Alva Noë, Phd: philosopher from the University of California (BSP 58)

Reminders:

Coming in 2010:

  • Episodes about emotion and memory, plus many other topics.
  • Newletters.
  • Purchase Transcripts, episode CDs and get continuing education credits.
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David Bainbridge on The Teenage Brain (BSP 63)

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Episode 63 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with David Bainbridge, author of Teenagers: A Natural History.  Our focus is on how the brain changes during the teenage years.  Bainbridge teaches veterinary anatomy and reproductive biology at Cambridge University and has published several other popular science books, including Beyond the Zonules of Zinn: A Fantastic Journey Through Your Brain , which I discussed back in Episode 32.

Additional Show Notes:

Links:

  • Episode 32: Introduction to Neuroanatomy based on Beyond the Zonules of Zinn by David Bainbridge.

Announcements:

  • New voice mail number: 206-984-0358.
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"Did My Neurons Make Me Do It?" with Warren Brown (BSP 62)

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Warren Brown and Nancey Murphy

Warren Brown and Nancey Murphy

Episode 62 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with Warren Brown, PhD, co-author (with Nancey Murphy) of Did My Neurons Make Me Do It?: Philosophical and Neurobiological Perspectives on Moral Responsibility and Free Will.  This book was discussed in detail back in Episode 53, but this interview gave me a chance to discuss some of the book's key ideas with Dr. Brown.  We focused on why a non-reductive approach is needed in order to formulate ideas about moral responsibility that are consistent with our current neurobiological understanding of the mind.

Additional Links and References:

  • Episode 53 of the Brain Science Podcast: a detailed discussion of Did My Neurons Make Me Do It?
  • Episode 30 of Books and Ideas: Dr. Campbell interviews Tom Clark about Naturalism and Did My Neurons Make Me Do It?
  • "Neuroscience and the Soul," letter in Science 2/27/09 Vol. 323, page 1168 (available on-line to AAAS members)
  • Additional References are included in the episode transcript.
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Why Play is Essential to Brain Health with Dr. Stuart Brown (BSP 60)

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In Episode 60 of the Brain Science Podcast, Ginger Campbell, MD, interviews Dr. Stuart Brown, author of Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul.  Our focus is on the importance of play for normal mental development and psychological health. We also explore the importance of play in adults.

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Send email to Dr. Campbell at gincampbell at mac.com.

Scientists mentioned in the podcast:

  • John Ratey, MD (Harvard Medical School): author of Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain.
  • Sergio Pellis, PhD (Canadian Centre for Behavioral Neuroscience): has studied rough and tumble play in mice and rats for many years.
  • Roger Guillimen, PhD (The Salk Institute): won the 1977 Nobel Prize in Medicine for "discoveries concerning the peptide hormone production of the brain."

Books about Play and Related Topics:

Useful Links:

Send email to Dr. Campbell at gincampbell at mac.com.

Join our new Brain Science Podcast Fan Page on Facebook

Interview with Philosopher Alva Noë (BSP 58)

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Episode 58 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with philosopher, Alva Noë, whose book, Out of Our Heads: Why You Are Not Your Brain, and Other Lessons from the Biology of Consciousness, argues persuasively that our minds are MORE than just our brains.  He says that "the brain is necessary but not sufficient" to create the mind.     

Show Notes and Links:

  • Alva Noe (University of California, Berkeley).

Important scientists mentioned in the interview:

  • Paul Bach-y-Rita: pioneering studies in sensory substitution using tactile stimuli to substitute for vision.
  • Held and Hein: experiments with cats showing that development of normal vision requires motor-sensory feedback.

References:

  • Brain Mechanisms in Sensory Substitution by Paul Bach-y-Rita, 1972.
  • Bach-y-Rita, P "Tactile-Vision Substitution: past and future", International Journal of  Neuroscience 19, nos. 1-4,  29-36, 1983.
  • Held, R and Hein, "Movement-produced stimulation in the development of visually guided behavior." Journal of Comparative and Physiological Psychology. 56(5), 872-876, 1963.
  • Held, R.  "Plasticity in sensory-motor systems." Scientific American. 213(5) 84-91, 1965.

Announcements:

  • Special thanks to Diane Jacobs, Jenine John and Lori Wolfson for transcribing all the episodes of the Brain Science Podcast.
  • Don't forget to post your reviews in iTunes®. Your word of mouth helps us find new listeners.
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How our Brain Creates Our World with Chris Frith, PhD (BSP 57)

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Episode 57 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with neuropsychologist, Dr. Chris Frith, author of Making up the Mind: How the Brain Creates Our Mental World.   Our brain processes information about the world outside us (via our senses) in the same way that it processes information from within our bodies and from our own mental world.  In this interview.  Dr. Frith and I explore the implications from recent discoveries about how our brain generates our mental world.

Useful Links:

  • Necker cube: a visual illusion that shows that some visual processing can not be changed by top-down feedback.

Selected References:*

Bayes, T (1763). An essay toward solving a problem in the doctrine of chance. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 53, 470-418.

Blakemore, SJ, Wolpert DM, and Frith, CD (1990) Central Cancellation of self produced tickle sensation. Nature Neuroscience, 1(7), 635-640.

Botvinick, M and Cohen, J (1998)  Rubber hands "feel" touch that the eyes see. Nature, 391(6669), 756.

Kilner, JM, Paulignan, Y,  and Blakemore, SJ, (2003) An interference effect of observed biological movement on action.Current Biology, 13(6), 522-525.

Rizzolatti, G and Craighero, L (2004). The mirror-neuron system. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 27, 169-192.

Wicker, B, Keysers, C, Plaily,J, Royet, JP, Galese, V, and Rizzolatti, G (2003).  Both of us disgusted in My insula: The common neural basis of seeing and feeling disgust.Neuron. 40(3), 655-664.

Wegner, D (2003). The Illusion of Conscious Will, MIT Press.

Wegner, DM, Fuller, VA and Sparrow, B. (2003)  Clever hands: Uncontrolled intelligence in facilitated communication. Journal of Personal Social Psychology, 85(1), 5-19.

*These references are from Making up the Mind: How the Brain Creates Our Mental World by Chris Frith.

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Interview with Neuroscience Pioneer Eve Marder, PhD (BSP 56)

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Episode 56 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with neuroscientist, Eve Marder, PhD.  Dr. Marder has spent 35 years studying the somatogastric ganglion of the lobster.  In this interview we talk about how she got into neuroscience during its early days, her recent tenure as president of the Society for Neuroscience, and how some of her key discoveries have implications for studying more complex nervous systems.

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Links:

Announcements:

  • If you are interested in earning continuing education credits for listening to the Brain Science Podcast, contact me at gincampbell at mac.com to find out how you can become a Beta tester.

Neurophilosophy with Patricia Churchland (BSP 55)

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Episode 55 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with highly respected philosopher Patricia Churchland.  Churchland is the author of Neurophilosophy and Brain-Wise.  She is currently on the faculty of the University of California at San Diego, and she was a featured speaker at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in 2008.

In this interview, we talked about neurophilosophy, which is an approach to philosophy of mind that gives high priority to incorporating the empiric findings of neuroscience.   We also talk about the evolving relationship between philosophy and neuroscience.   Churchland shares her enthusiasm for how the discoveries of neuroscience are changing the way we see ourselves as human beings.  We also talked a little about the issues of reductionism that I first brought up in Episode 53.

SHOW NOTES

Recommended Reading:

Related Episodes of the Brain Science Podcast

  • Episode 5: Introduction to philosophy of mind and the question of consciousnes.
  • Episode 22: Interview with Christof Koch about consciousness.
  • Episode 53: Discussion of Did My Neurons Make Me Do It? a defense of free will.

Here Is a Working Link to the Enhanced Version of Episode 32

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I want to apologize to anyone who got the "enhanced version" of episode 32 in their feed, but found that it had no graphics. The Brain Science Podcast is currently part of an ad campaign on Wizzard Media (Libsyn). They failed to tell us that the technology they use to insert ads will not work with enhanced files, so they just converted it back to a stripped down mp3.

Since I can't put the episode into the normal feed, but you can get it here. It should play in Quicktime™ on your computer. To save the file on to your computer, right click on the link and choose "save as." All iPods can handle this format, but many other players, such as the Zune™ will not. Sorry about the inconvenience. (Note: If you are using Windows make sure you have the latest version of Quicktime™.)

If you just want to look at the illustrations on your computer click here.

Brain Anatomy: Illustrations for BSP 32

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I have posted the illustrations I promised last week when I released Episode 32 of the Brain Science Podcast.  Except for the colored diagram of the lobes of the brain, these illustrations come from Beyond the Zonules of Zinn: A Fantastic Journey Through Your Brain, and have been used with the permission of the author, David Bainbridge.

Click here to see thumbnails of all the illustrations, along with the approximate time they were discussed during the episode.  (Note: because of the automatic ad insertion process the times may be off by up to 67 seconds.) http://brainsciencpodcast.wordpress.com/episodes/figures-for-episode-32-a-whirlwind-tour-of-brain-anatomy/

Here is a link to the enhanced version of the podcast, which includes the illustrations but not the captions.  Unfortunately, due to some technical issues with Libsyn's ad-server software, I am currently unable to put the enhanced version into the regular feed.

Brain Science Podcast #32: A Brief Introduction to Brain Anatomy

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Episode 32 of the Brain Science Podcast is a whirlwind (55 minute) tour of brain anatomy.  It is based on David Bainbridge's new book: Beyond the Zonules of Zinn: A Fantastic Journey Through Your Brain (2008).  Click here for some of the key illustrations from the book.  I want to thank David for sharing these images and I encourage everyone to read the book.

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