Mind Myths
Exploring Popular Assumptions About the Mind and Brain
March 1999
312 Pages, Softcover
Wiley & Sons Ltd
Currently there is a gap between what scientists know aboutthe mindand brain and the assumptions that others draw from sources ofeveryday information such as newspapers, popular press andtelevision. Mind Myths attempts to close this gap by bringingtogether top international neuroscientists and psychologists toprovide a fascinating and scientifically reliable insight into theneuropsychological and cognitive phenomena that are frequentlyreported in the media. A multitude of mind myth topics are tackled,for example
* the resuscitation from coma thanks to a patient's avourite songs
* the creativity of the right hemisphere
* the false memory syndrome
* the placebo effect
* learning while sleeping
"Mind Myths...includes the remarkably persistent fallacy that weonly ever use 10% of our brains, the assumption that our rightbrains function as artistic hippies and our left as desiccatedaccountants ...the book is written in a lively style and will, Ihope, be read widely by science journalists, and others who helpperpetuate the various myths... an excellent focus for anundergraduate seminar, providing a stimulating bridge between thepsychological laboratory and the rather untilled field of folkpsychology." From the Foreword by Alan Baddeley
This unique book will appeal to professionals and students acrossthe psychology and science disciplines and anyone else with aninterest in how the brain works in everyday situations.
1. Whence Cometh the Myth that We Only Use Ten Percent of Our
Brain? (Barry Beyerstein).
2. Are We in Our Right Minds? (Michael C. Corballis).
3. Energy and the Brain: Facts and Fantasies (Fernando D.
Saravi).
4. Pseudoscience and the Brain: Tuners and Tonics for Aspiring
Superhumans (Barry L. Beyerstein).
SECTION 2: THE TWILIGHT ZONE BETWEEN LIFE AND DEATH.
5. Near-Death Experience and Ecstasy: A Production of the
Organisation of the Human Brain (Michael Persinger).
6. Lazarus? Syndrome (Ennio De Renzi).
SECTION 3: MYTHS ABOUT MEMORY AND CREATIVE THINKING.
7. Lie Down and Let Me Tell You About Your Childhood...
(Maryanne Garry, Susan Frame and Elizabeth F. Loftus).
8. Repetita (Non) Iuvant (Robert H. Logie and Sergio Della
Sala).
9. Creative Thinking: Myths and Misconceptions (K.
Gilhooly).
SECTION 4: CONTROVERSIAL ISSUES: CLONES, AGEING, AND
HYPNOSIS.
10. The Myth of the Clonable Human Brain (G. Berlucchi).
11. When Age Is In, the Wit Is Out? (Pat Rabbitt).
12. Hypnosis (Graham F. Wagstaff).
SECTION 5: THE MULTIFARIOUS ASPECTS OF DECEPTION.
13. I Shall Please: the Mysterious Power of Placebos (Edzard
Ernst and Neil C. Abbott).
14. The Magicians? Best-Kept Secrets (James Randi).
15. It?s All in the Mind. On the Mechanisms of Deception in
Psychic Fraud (Massimo Polidoro).
16. Recent Advances in Moving Backwards (Katharine M. Leafhead
and Michael D. Kopelman).
SECTION 6: MEDIA WATCH.
17. The Media and the Brain (Toby Howard and Steve
Donnelly).
"... thoroughly enjoyable book...." (Neuropsychological Rehabilitation, October 2000)
"This book tells a fascinating story." (International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, Volume 15, 2000)