The image of Robinson Crusoe, an isolated individual, embodies a metaphor for the human mind. It is the metaphor that has determined the practices of contemporary neuroscience until now. To bridge the worlds of mind and brain, Leslie Brothers replaces this isolated mind metaphor and reveals the brain as a social organ. Findings from neuroscience, cognitive science, psychiatry, neuropsychology, anthropology, palaeontology, and sociology together present a convincing argument: that it is not possible to understand the products of human evolution - whether language, consciousness, or emotion - in the absence of a social context.