{"title":"Consciousness","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"consciousness-book-christof-koch-9780262017497","title":"Consciousness","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eIn which a scientist searches for an empirical explanation for phenomenal experience, spurred by his instinctual belief that life is meaningful.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat links conscious experience of pain, joy, color, and smell to bioelectrical activity in the brain? How can anything physical give rise to nonphysical, subjective, conscious states? Christof Koch has devoted much of his career to bridging the seemingly unbridgeable gap between the physics of the brain and phenomenal experience. This engaging book--part scientific overview, part memoir, part futurist speculation--describes Koch's search for an empirical explanation for consciousness. Koch recounts not only the birth of the modern science of consciousness but also the subterranean motivation for his quest--his instinctual (if romantic) belief that life is meaningful.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eKoch describes his own groundbreaking work with Francis Crick in the 1990s and 2000s and the gradual emergence of consciousness (once considered a fringy subject) as a legitimate topic for scientific investigation. Present at this paradigm shift were Koch and a handful of colleagues, including Ned Block, David Chalmers, Stanislas Dehaene, Giulio Tononi, Wolf Singer, and others. Aiding and abetting it were new techniques to listen in on the activity of individual nerve cells, clinical studies, and brain-imaging technologies that allowed safe and noninvasive study of the human brain in action. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eKoch gives us stories from the front lines of modern research into the neurobiology of consciousness as well as his own reflections on a variety of topics, including the distinction between attention and awareness, the unconscious, how neurons respond to Homer Simpson, the physics and biology of free will, dogs, \u003ci\u003eDer Ring des Nibelungen\u003c\/i\u003e, sentient machines, the loss of his belief in a personal God, and sadness. All of them are signposts in the pursuit of his life's work--to uncover the roots of consciousness.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49543309492497,"sku":"GOR005151932","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50025074262289,"sku":"CIN0262017490G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51127125737745,"sku":"CIN0262017490VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52109497598225,"sku":"GOR012229159","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52109503168785,"sku":"GOR013046807","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":53623392502033,"sku":"CIN0262017490A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0262017490.jpg?v=1751440967"},{"product_id":"consciousness-book-william-g-lycan-9780262620963","title":"Consciousness","description":"\u003cb\u003eIn this book, William Lycan defends an original theory of mind that he calls homuncular functionalism. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat is consciousness? The answer to this question has been pondered upon, grappled with, and argued about since time immemorial. There has never been an answer that achieved consensus; certainly philosophers have never agreed.In this book, William Lycan defends an original theory of mind that he calls homuncular functionalism. He argues that human beings are functionally organized information-processing systems who have no non-physical parts or properties. However, Lycan also recognizes the subjective phenomenal qualities of mental states and events, and an important sense in which mind is over and above mere chemical matter. Along the way, Lycan reviews some diverse philosophical accounts of consciousness-including those of Kripke, Block, Campbell, Sellars, and Casta eda, among others-and demonstrates how what is valuable in each opposing view can be accommodated within his own theory.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eConsciousness\u003c\/i\u003e is Lycan's most ambitious book, one that has engaged his attention for years. He handles a fascinating subject in a unique and undoubtedly controversial manner that will make this book a mainstay in the field of philosophy of mind.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eConsciousness, with these earlier works, is a Bradford Book.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":51450726416657,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51450726973713,"sku":"GOR002461582","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52594154373393,"sku":"NLS9780262620963","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0262620960.jpg?v=1751101141"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/collections\/author-books-by-consciousness.oembed","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}