What I've been reading

Human : The science behind what makes us unique by Micheal S. Gazzanica. (and by the author here )

I wanted to read this book for a long time now but I was bought into by a critic from Amazon review.  Jeez!!, I was wrong and not sure what he was thinking while he wrote the review. It’s the BEST book to take baby steps into the world of neuroscience. 

1. Yes, the book has tons of technical jargon sometimes overwhelming. But the good part is to know these terms since sooner or later they are going be part of our colloquial lingo. Terms like retina, larynx etc and procedures like IVF, Angioplasty were once unknown too.
   
2. Great narrative on the ongoing research, tests, studies, theories and you get to meet lot of people behind the silent crusade on understanding who we are.  (Jonathan Haidt, Mark Hauser, Antonio Damasio etc. Check out this discussion video from Templeton foundation)  
   
3. The best part of the book is the constant comparison (and a fair one) between humans and other animals. Some of the cognitive skills of animals are still unknown and Michael makes no qualms admitting it.
   

      Michael’s brother gives the best and the simplest answer to the question -  “In what ways do you think humans are unique?”

    “Humans sit behind a computer and try to figure out the meaning of life. Animals live life. The question is: Who is better off, the human or the animal?”

  

     My habit of perpetual self reflection has been kept in constant check by Max and paradoxically, Max was the one who forced me into perpetual self-reflection. Does Max involves in self-reflection, I don’t know but I know for sure he is busy and happy living "in" the moment. I do wish every day, I was more like him.

    My answer to the question is every animal is unique in its own way, as they say we are not on the top of the tree but sit on a lonely unique branch of the tree. Every animal has physical characteristics uniquely designed for its survival but lucky for us it happened to our brain.

What makes us unique is unlike other animals, which use their unique design efficiently to better themselves, we don’t use our brain to the fullest potential but instead try to hitch hike on brains of others who tend to use it more and ironically on the other hand we do devote lot of our brain power for betterment of others with no expectations in return (You scratch my back, I scratch yours is not always true).  We have this weird in-species, host-parasite symbiosis unknown to any other species.

Our small brain (2% of the body mass) uses 20% of the body resources, the obvious question is why aren’t we using it to get more bang out the buck?

Michael quotes these beautiful lines by Dalai Lama: 

“This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.”


Now for the wisdom of the crowds - any other theories, ideas on what makes us, the humans unique?