The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons: The History of the Human Brain as Revealed by True Stories of Trauma, Madness and Recovery by Sam Kean
"The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons" is an excellent collection of stories in neuroscience. Best-selling author and gifted science writer, Sam Kean, provides readers with a real gem. Kean's great eye for captivating stories about the brain and his expertise in retelling these stories end up helping the readers gain an understanding of how the brain works. This fascinating 377-page book is broken out into the following five parts: Part I. Gross Anatomy; Part II. Cells, Senses; Circuits Part III. Body and Brain; Part IV. Beliefs and Delusions; and Part V. Consciousness.
Positives:
1. Science writing at its best. Kean is climbing the echelon of premier popular science authors.
2. Neuroscience is one of my favorite topics and thrilled that a gifted storyteller handled this book.
3. Great format and approach. Each chapter covers an intriguing story about how the brain works yet it flows beautifully as a whole.
4. Plenty of diagrams of parts of the brain and photos that complement this wonderful narrative.
5. Kean excels at keeping it real. He doesn't oversell what we know and keeps the science well grounded in reality.
6. Wonderful gift of narration that includes a well weaved story based on history and good science.
7. Once again, the impact of religion on science rears its head. "In the early 1200s, the Catholic church had declared that no proper Christians, including physicians, could shed blood; physicians therefore looked down upon surgeons as butchers."
8. Love how theories of neuroscience are introduced some are ultimately debunked and others have staying impact. "These findings led Cajal to propose the "neuron doctrine," one of the most important discoveries ever in neuroscience. In brief, Cajal's neurons were not continuous, but had tiny gaps between them. And they transmitted information in one direction only: from dendrite to cell body to axon."
9. The analysis of famous assassins' brains that lead to interesting discoveries.
10. Sometimes asking the right questions are as important as the answers. "Sorting out cause and effect is tricky with brain chemistry: does depression cause changes in brain chemicals, or do changes in brain chemicals cause depression? The street probably runs both ways. But the balance of evidence does suggest that loneliness, isolation, and a sense of helplessness can all deplete neurotransmitters--can poison the soup and sap vital ingredients."
11. Interesting look at how neurons work. "Overall, just as a wagon wheel will carve a rut into the road after repeated journeys, repeated neuron firings will carve ruts into the brain that make signals much more likely to follow some neural tracks than others."
12. How vision works. "In fact, our vision is so biased toward movement that we don't technically see stationary objects at all. To see something stationary, our brains have to scribble our eyes very subtly over its surface. Experiments have even proved that if you artificially stabilize an image on the retina with a combination of special contact lenses and microelectronics, the image will vanish."
13. A look at how the brain maps the body.
14. An interesting look at a number of interesting diseases involving the brain. "They proposed that kuru, scrapie, and Creutzfeldt-Jakob--which all cause "spongiform" brain damage and can all lie dormant for long periods before roaring awake--were caused by a new class of microbes, which they dubbed `slow viruses.'"
15. Excellent examples of specific damages to the brain and its impact. "But around age ten she began suffering from Urbach-Wiethe disease, a rare disorder that petrifies and kills amygdala cells. Within a few years she had two "black holes" where her amygdalae should have been. She hasn't felt a lick of fear since."
16. Many revelations in this book, here is one of my favorites: "Temporal lobe lesions can flip people's sexual orientations from gay to straight (or vice versa), or redirect their sexual appetites toward inappropriate things: common side effects of Klüver-Bucy include zoophilia, coprophilia, pedophilia, and -philias so idiosyncratic they don't have names."
17. A look at what happens when brain processes go awry. "Some delusions run so deep that they fray the very fabric of the victim's universe. With so-called Alice in Wonderland syndrome--a side effect of migraines or seizures--space and time get warped in unsettling ways."
18. The difference between Broca and Wernicke's area. "Generally speaking, a broken Broca's area knocks out speech production, while a wrecked Wernicke's area impairs speech comprehension."
19. By far the best retelling of the over told story of Phineas Gage (it's practically in every book of popular neuroscience). He debunks some myths pertaining to this story, which I found to be quite refreshing.
20. Works cited and so much more...
Negatives:
1. Very little not to like about this book. I would have added a timeline or a table of the greatest contributors of neuroscience as a nice additional bonus.
2. Kean stays away from controversial issues. There is very little on intelligence and as I recall nothing on gender differences. He touches upon social justice with regards to crime and punishment but I sense he holds back.
3. I loved the retelling of Phineas Gage's story but I felt Kean could have done better with the topic of consciousness.
In summary, what a fun way to learn about how the brain works; this is a beautifully written and well-researched book that is a joy to read. Fascinating stories about ordinary people who went through extraordinary circumstances and Kean retells their stories with mastery. A high recommendation! Get this book.
Further suggestions: "
The Disappearing Spoon
" and "
The Violinist's Thumb
" by the same author, "
The Mind's Eye
" and "
Hallucinations
" by Oliver Sacks", "
The Future of the Mind: The Scientific Quest to Understand, Enhance, and Empower the Mind
" by Michio Kaku, "Braintrust" by Patricia S. Churchland, "
The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature
" by Steven Pinker, "
Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of Our Time
" and "
The Believing Brain
" by Michael Shermer, "
Who's in Charge? Free Will and the Science of the Brain
" by Michael S. Gazzaniga, "
Subliminal: How Your Unconscious Mind Rules Your Behavior
" by Leonard Mlodinow, "The Tell-Tale Brain: A Neuroscientist's Quest for What Makes Us Human" by V.S. Ramachandran, "Incognito" by David Eagleman, and "Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me)" by Carol Tavris.
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Top reviews from other countries
Yitzchok Ahisar
You won’t stop reading this super interesting book!
Reviewed in Canada on January 7, 2020Amazon Customer
Muy divertido
Reviewed in Spain on July 30, 2019
Amazon Customer
Reviewed in Spain on July 30, 2019
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Amazon Customer
Plus the writing style is easily accessible, not too gimmicky
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 12, 2018