Product Description

Traditionally, the human soul is regarded as a nonphysical concept that can only be examined by psychiatrists and theologists. In his new book, The Astonishing Hypothesis, Nobel Laureate Francis Crick boldly straddles the line between science and spirituality by examining the soul from the standpoint of a modern scientist, basing the soul's existence and function on an in-depth examination of how the human brain "sees."

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #245954 in Books
• Published on: 1995-07-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Nobel Prize-winning biochemist Crick (co-discoverer with James Watson of DNA's double helix structure) here takes readers to the forefront of modern brain research. Geared to serious lay readers and scientists, this speculative study argues that our minds can be explained, without recourse to religious concepts of a soul, in terms of the interactions of a vast assembly of nerve cells and associated molecules. Crick delves into the nature of consciousness by focusing on visual awareness, an active, constructive process in which the brain selectively combines discrete elements into meaningful images. Early chapters include numerous interactive illustrations to demonstrate the brain's shortcuts, tricks and habits of visual perception. In later chapters Crick discusses neural networks--electronic pathways that can "remember" patterns or produce spoken language--and outlines research strategies designed to pinpoint the brain's "awareness neurons" that enable us to see.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Nobel Prize winner Crick, who with James D. Watson discovered the molecular structure of DNA, considers the nature of human consciousness, focusing in particular on visual consciousness in an explanation of how the brain "sees."
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Winner, with James Watson, of a Nobel Prize in 1962 for their world-changing discovery of the molecular structure of DNA, Crick here devotes his considerable mental powers to the study of the brain and the nature of consciousness. No topic could be more demanding or fraught with subjectivity--not to mention mysticism--but Crick insists upon the value of rational thought, logic, and experimental verification. This perspective underlies the "Astonishing Hypothesis," which states "that `You,' your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules." How's that for reductionism? But think about it. Could anything actually be more astonishing than learning that neurons make, store, and retrieve memories? Create moods? Or, and this is Crick's focus, interpret light as images? Given the impossibility of tackling consciousness in its entirety, Crick has chosen to concentrate on one crucial manifestation, visual awareness, a process far more complicated than most of us realize. While scientists have begun to understand how the brain breaks down visual information, no one knows how it puts it back together. What Crick presents is a lucid, if challenging, explanation of the components and actions of neurons, the many levels of "neural architecture" in the neocortex, and all the dynamic and constructive cognitive processes relating to vision that evolve from the incessant pulse of a myriad of molecular events. Donna Seaman

Customer Reviews

What is so astonishing, Dr. Crick?
The problem with Crick's book--a rather common problem these days--is that it does not do what it sets out to do. According to Crick, there is this revolutionary and "astonishing" hypothesis that most people either do not know or cannot accept, namely the century-old idea that neurons, as individual and independent units of the brain, are solely responsible for all the higher functions that most people attribute to God, to mind, or to some mysterious agent. Well, if you tell this to any neuroscientist, you probably won't astonish him; if you tell this to a lay man, you won't astonish him any more than, say, the god hypothesis. So Crick, who is a reductionist in need of a little sophistication, really isn't telling us anything extraordinary. His arguments neither shock nor enlighten. The primary merit of this book lies in a solid, if technical, summary of some interesting research in recent years. It is handy as reference, but not particularly a pleasure to read. Crick is not much of a writer; nor is he competent enough in other fields to talk about some of the issues that he does talk about. The more entertaining part of the book, for me, is the delightful bibliography, in which Crick briefly describes each book that he recommends. His remarks are sometimes sharp and witty. Overall, though, this is merely an average book on a most popular subject.

Not a light read
Francis Crick is probably best known to most of us from high school biology classes for his pioneer work with James Watson on the structure and function of DNA. In his book the Astonishing Hypothesis he tackles a topic hardly less complex, the origin of awareness. Although the subtitle would suggest that the discussion is the scientific proof for the existence of the soul--and possibly thereby the existence of God--the reader who takes up the book with this expectation will be resoundingly disappointed. Instead he or she will find a very convoluted discussion of brain neurophysiology, the theoretical basis of sensory systems, the attempts to synthesize human neural function in computers, and the author's personal theory of free will. What if anything any of this has to do with the soul is anybody's guess.

On the whole, I have no quarrel with the author's choice of subject matter, but I found the book at times overly in depth and at others too brief in its discourse. I also found that the train of thought was a little confusing, as though the author went off on interesting tangents at great lengths and could only with great effort get back on track. It was as though he could have used a better outline to begin with or had attempted to cover too much in too small a space. It might also have arisen from his need to extensively paraphrase the work of others in fields in which he himself has less expertise. The discussion of the neural function of the human brain, particularly the oddities of its dysfunction were quite good. Indeed I felt it was an excellent update on what I had learned years ago in A&P for nursing school. The discussion of neural networks and artificial intelligence got a little too detailed for me, but if you're the type who finds Roger Penrose a pleasant afternoon's read, then Crick's account might actually be a little too light minded for you.

In general I found the writer's style was labored enough for it to require a concerted effort to plow my way through it. It took several attempts, during which I read several other books on wholly different topics, before I could actually finish it. I even went to the extreme of taking it with me to my health club where I would be a "captive audience" with nothing better to take my mind off the boredom of my half hour on the tread mill. On the whole, I preferred boredom. While I've no doubt the gentleman is a very learned individual, I've undertaken more readable books on the subject of mind and awareness. States of Mind by Conlon and Hobson would probably be more understandable by and enjoyable to the average reader, although this book too tends to try to cover too much in too little space.

The Not So Astonishing Hypothesis
I purchased "The Astonishing Hypothesis" by Francis Crick with great expectations. I am very much interested in the scientific search for what some call "soul" and was under the impression that Crick (co-discoverer of the double helix DNA structure) had marshalled plausible or powerful evidence that the soul merely is a person's mental activities that result from the behavior of nerve cells, glial cells, atoms, molecules and ions that influence glial or nerve cells. For the most part, mutatis mutandis, I affirm Crick's hypothesis. However, I don't think "The Astonishing Hypothesis" comes anywhere close to providing information that supports Crick's hypothesis. His detour on how the human brain sees is at times interesting, but ultimately not all that helpful in illuminating Crick's "astonishing hypothesis." The book (page 259) supplies a reasonable answer to presupposed objections via-a-vis Crick's modus operandi for supporting his hypothesis. The scientist explains why he chose the visual system to buttress his hypothesis. It evidently yields most easily to "experimental attack" and is only the start (i.e. a prolegomenon) of explaining what soul is. The work's provisional nature is to be applauded. However, since the attack on "soul" has just started, it seems that Crick should have been more modest in his claims and not proclaimed the death of the human soul (as the term is commonly understood) until a full "experimental attack" of the brain had been carried out. Personally, I believe that theoreticians who have undertaken studies in the philosophy of mind offer more reasonable alternatives or explanations for "soul" than Crick does. The concept of supervenience more adequately accounts for "mind" or "soul" than "The Astonishing Hypothesis" does. While "mindness" is probably a higher-level phenomenon based on a lower-level phenomenon, as are qualia, it is my belief that mind is not reducible to brain states. But without the brain, mind does not exist: mind supervenes on the brain. William Hasker's "The Emerging Self" satisfactorily develops these points.