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The Body Has a Mind of Its Own: How Body Maps in Your Brain Help You Do (Almost) Everything Better
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Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 150
EAN: 9781400064694
Edition: 1
ISBN: 1400064694
Label: Random House
Manufacturer: Random House
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 240
Publication Date: September 11, 2007
Publisher: Random House
Release Date: September 11, 2007
Studio: Random House
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Editorial Review:
In this compelling, cutting-edge book, two generations of science writers explore the exciting science of “body maps” in the brain–and how startling new discoveries about the mind-body connection can change and improve our lives. Why do you still feel fat after losing weight? What makes video games so addictive? How can “practicing” your favorite sport in your imagination improve your game? The answers can be found in body maps.Just as road maps represent interconnections across the landscape, your many body maps represent all aspects of your bodily self, inside and out. In concert, they create your physical and emotional awareness and your sense of being a whole, feeling self in a larger social world.Moreover, your body maps are profoundly elastic. Your self doesn’t begin and end with your physical body but extends into the space around you. This space morphs every time you put on or take off clothes, ride a bike, or wield a tool. When you drive a car, your personal body space grows to envelop it. When you play a video game, your body maps automatically track and emulate the actions of your character onscreen. When you watch a scary movie, your body maps put dread in your stomach and send chills down your spine. If your body maps fall out of sync, you may have an out-of-body experience or see auras around other people.
The Body Has a Mind of Its Own explains how you can tap into the power of body maps to do almost anything better–whether it is playing tennis, strumming a guitar, riding a horse, dancing a waltz, empathizing with a friend, raising children, or coping with stress. The story of body maps goes even further, providing a fresh look at the causes of anorexia, bulimia, obsessive plastic surgery, and the notorious golfer’s curse “the yips.” It lends insights into culture, language, music, parenting, emotions, chronic pain, and more. Filled with illustrations, wonderful anecdotes, and even parlor tricks that you can use to reconfigure your body sense, The Body Has a Mind of Its Own will change the way you think–about the way you think.“The Blakeslees have taken the latest and most exciting finds from brain research and have made them accessible. This is how science writing should always be.”
–Michael S. Gazzaniga, Ph.D., author of The Ethical Brain“Through a stream of fascinating and entertaining examples, Sandra Blakeslee and Matthew Blakeslee illustrate how our perception of ourselves, and indeed the world, is not fixed but is surprisingly fluid and easily modified. They have created the best book ever written about how our sense of ‘self’ emerges from the motley collection of neurons we call the brain.”
–Jeff Hawkins, co-author of On Intelligence “The Blakeslees have taken the latest and most exciting finds from brain research and have made them accessible. This is how science writing should always be.”
–Michael S. Gazzaniga, Ph.D., author of The Ethical Brain“A marvelous book. In the last ten years there has been a paradigm shift in understanding the brain and how its various specialized regions respond to environmental challenges. In addition to providing a brilliant overview of recent revolutionary discoveries on body image and brain plasticity, the book is sprinkled with numerous insights.”
–V. S. Ramachandran, M.D., director, Center for Brain and Cognition, University of California, San Diego
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - current neuroscience
This well organized and clearly written book presents complex information on the brain and nervous system in an articulate and clear fashion that is comprehensible for the laymen but not in any way "dumbed down". The authors use many fascinating anecdotes to illustrate the incredible neural systems of primates, and how indeed the body does have its own mind. This is accessible and intriguing neuroscience.
Rating:  - The mandala of the mind
Research on the brain has come far since the 1930s when Wilder Penfield of the University of Montreal was compelled to cut open the skulls of epileptic patients. The process meant the epileptic victim remained awake. It was the only way Penfield could learn from the subject who would describe their reactions to his gentle probing. The information, however, often led to relief resulting from Penfield's later precise surgery based on his mappings. In this comprehensive account, the authors - a ... Read More
Rating: - Excellent Book
Innovative ways of understanding how the brain/body works in an easy to read presentation
Rating: - Understanding Us
I heard this author interviewed on a local NPR station and knew I had to get the book when she started talking about the anatomy and neurophysiology of "out of body" experiences. The information is scientifically sound and the presentation superb. There were many "Ah! So that's why..." moments. I still think about this book when I see a yawn or a smile, experience cold, itch, or pain, or when I load a mapquest map into my cerebral cortex and "know" exactly where I am going.
Rating:  - Fascinating, well-researched & written, but ultimately disappointing
I heard the authors interviewed on NPR, and bought the book with a specific goal in mind. I hoped to use the information in the book to become better at my hobby, which involves the use of an apparatus (tool-like), has a body-mind connection, and improves with practice. The authors explain both the anatomy and the pathology of the brain, and how various parts of the brain control and are the centers of body maps. A simple example is the extension of the 'hand' body map when one uses a wrench. ... Read More
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