Название: Neuroscience For Dummies, 3rd Edition
Автор: Frank Amthor, PhD
Издательство: For Dummies
Год: 2023
Страниц: 419
Язык: английский
Формат: pdf (true)
Размер: 14.7 MB

A fascinating look at what's rattling around in your skull.

Neuroscience For Dummies introduces you to the mind-boggling study of the human brain. It tracks to the content of a typical introductory neuroscience class at the college level - and it's perfect for anyone curious about what makes us tick. New technologies and an explosion of research have completely transformed our understanding of memory, depression, the mind-body connection, learning, and genetics. This updated edition - still in classic, beginner-friendly Dummies style - covers the latest research advances and technologies in the field of neuroscience. Put some knowledge about the brain into your brain.

The central mystery about the brain is simply this: How can a bunch of interconnected cells make each of us what we are — not only our thoughts, memories, and feelings, but our identity. At present, no one can answer this question. Some philosophers think it is not answerable in principle.

I believe we can understand how the brain makes us what we are. This book, while surely not containing the complete answer, points the way to what the answer looks like: In short, the brain is made of neurons, each of which is a complex little computer. Parts of the nervous system make suggestions to the rest of it about what you should do next. Other parts process the sensory inputs you receive and tell the system how things are going so far. Still other parts, particularly those associated with language, make up a running dialog about all of this as it is going on; this is your consciousness.

Those concepts aren’t too difficult to grasp, but people think of neuroscience as hard. And why? Because in order for your nervous system to perform these functions, it takes 86 billion neurons and a quadrillion synaptic connections. All this was structured over billions of years of evolution and over all the human years of development and learning.

You need to know three main things to understand how the nervous system works. The first is how the neurons themselves work. The second is how neurons talk to each other in neural circuits. The third is how neural circuits form a particular set of functional modules in the brain. The particular set of modules that you have make you a human. The content of your specific modules make you unique.

• Grasp the basic concepts and applications of neuroscience
• Understand the brain's structure and function
• Explore how the brain impacts memory, learning, and emotions
• Discover how the brain is connected with other physical systems

For students and general readers alike, Neuroscience For Dummies is a great way to understand what's going on inside our heads.