The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness

The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness

by Mark Solms
The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness

The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness

by Mark Solms

Hardcover

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Overview

A revelatory new theory of consciousness that returns emotions to the center of mental life.

For Mark Solms, one of the boldest thinkers in contemporary neuroscience, discovering how consciousness comes about has been a lifetime’s quest. Scientists consider it the "hard problem" because it seems an impossible task to understand why we feel a subjective sense of self and how it arises in the brain.

Venturing into the elementary physics of life, Solms has now arrived at an astonishing answer. In The Hidden Spring, he brings forward his discovery in accessible language and graspable analogies.

Solms is a frank and fearless guide on an extraordinary voyage from the dawn of neuropsychology and psychoanalysis to the cutting edge of contemporary neuroscience, adhering to the medically provable. But he goes beyond other neuroscientists by paying close attention to the subjective experiences of hundreds of neurological patients, many of whom he treated, whose uncanny conversations expose much about the brain’s obscure reaches.

Most importantly, you will be able to recognize the workings of your own mind for what they really are, including every stray thought, pulse of emotion, and shift of attention. The Hidden Spring will profoundly alter your understanding of your own subjective experience.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780393542011
Publisher: Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date: 02/16/2021
Pages: 432
Sales rank: 1,125,899
Product dimensions: 8.90(w) x 6.10(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

Mark Solms discovered the forebrain mechanisms of dreaming. He is director of neuropsychology of the Neuroscience Institute at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, where he lives. He is also honorary lecturer in neurosurgery at the Royal London Hospital School and honorary Fellow at the American College of Psychiatrists.

Table of Contents

List of Figures xi

Introduction 1

1 The Stuff of Dreams 6

2 Before and After Freud 30

3 The Cortical Fallacy 51

4 What Is Experienced? 78

5 Feelings 92

6 The Source 122

7 The Free Energy Principle 148

8 A Predictive Hierarchy 178

9 Why and How Consciousness Arises 190

10 Back to the Cortex 213

11 The Hard Problem 238

12 Making a Mind 270

Postscript 300

Appendix: Arousal and Information 306

Acknowledgements 312

Notes 313

References 365

Index 391

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