The Body Has a Mind of Its Own, Sandra Blakeslee
The Body Has a Mind of Its Own, Sandra Blakeslee
2 Rating(s)
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The Body Has a Mind of Its Own
How Body Maps in Your Brain Help You Do (Almost) Everything Better

Author: Sandra Blakeslee, Matthew Blakeslee

Narrator: Kate Reading

Unabridged: 9 hr

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 10/02/2007


Synopsis

Why do you still feel fat after losing weight? Why do you duck your head when you drive into an underground parking garage? Why are your kids so enthralled by video games?

The answers to these questions can be found in a new understanding of how your brain interacts with your body, the space around your body, and the social world. Every point on your body, each internal organ, and every point in space out to the end of your fingertips is mapped inside your brain. Your ability to sense, move, and act in the physical world arises from a rich network of flexible body maps distributed throughout your brain.

The science of body maps has far-reaching applications. It can help people lose weight, improve their ability to play a sport, or assist recovery from stroke. It points the way to new treatments for anorexia and phantom limbs. It helps explain out-of-body experiences, auras, placebos, and healing touch. It provides a new way to understand human emotions from love to hate, lust to disgust, pride to humiliation.

With scientific discoveries from every corner of the globe, Sandra and Matthew Blakeslee have written a compelling narrative that is positively mind-bending and that will appeal to readers of Sharon Begley's Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain.

About Sandra Blakeslee

Sandra Blakeslee is a science correspondent at the New York Times who specializes in the brain sciences. She has witnessed firsthand the major developments and discoveries in neuroscience, both in the United States and abroad, for well over twenty years. She has cowritten many books, including the bestselling Second Chances with Judith Wallerstein. She is the third generation in a family of science writers.


Reviews

Goodreads review by John on May 14, 2016

Yet another science writer claiming the self and freewill are illusions. Normally when I hear this kind of thing, it sounds rather self-defeating. Just how much truth value does information contain when it is coming from an author who is merely an illusory automaton? If what she compulsively wrote a......more

Goodreads review by Julie on May 03, 2008

FAAAASCINATING. Honestly, I kept pestering Kent, "Listen to this..." and then reading a paragraph or two. It's about the science of how the brain and body connect. We have "body maps" in our brain, that tell us exactly where our body parts are, and how they are doing. (This is why we can touch our n......more

Goodreads review by Martha on December 22, 2015

The Body Has a Mind of It’s Own is a fascinating, easy read, particularly if you are interested in brain research. Sandra and Matthew Blakeslee explain in detail body mapping, and how we obtain our body image and why it is difficult to change it. I particularly found important and accessible their e......more

Goodreads review by Elliott on December 22, 2022

The Blakeslees have produced a wonderful piece of popular science writing. Fascinating, clearly written and up-to-date, it eschews the more impenetrable specialist details of the neurologists' trade without speaking down to the reader or oversimplifying. I found it a dazzling follow-up read to Damas......more

Goodreads review by Marsha on December 09, 2008

For some reason I found this book extremely fascinating. I listened to the audio book twice, then I got the print version. It explains how your brain perceives your own body, how that process is somewhat distorted, and how problems with body maps and body perception can affect our lives. Despite how......more