The Mind and the Brain

Neuroplasticity and the Power of Mental Force

By: Jeffrey M. Schwartz, Sharon Begley

Narrated by: Arthur Morey

Length: 14 hrs and 27 mins

Publisher's summary

Conventional science has long held the position that 'the mind' is merely an illusion, a side effect of electrochemical activity in the physical brain. Now in paperback, Dr Jeffrey Schwartz and Sharon Begley's groundbreaking work, The Mind and the Brain, argues exactly the opposite: that the mind has a life of its own.

Download the accompanying reference guide.

©2002 Jeffrey M. Schwartz and Sharon Begley (P)2011 HarperCollins Publishers

This book has it all

I love this book because it's so mentally stimulating and so well written. The book covers a broad range of topics in it's quest to describe neuroplasticity. This book gives an in-depth account of how scientists discovered neuroplasticity, the current theories about how neuroplasticity can be used in treatment, the concept of neuroplasticity and its connection to quantum physics and Buddhist meditation practices, and more. I find this book really intriguing, exciting, and interesting, and I would highly recommend this book to anyone curious about neuroplasticity and the biology of changing bad habits.

Great information!

I enjoyed this book very much and it has some great information on the brain and Neuroplasticity. I highly recommend it!

Worth reading, despite the religious undertones

Listening to this book gave me a lot of conflicted feelings. I had high hopes for this book initially, as it seemed to be offering techniques to deal with OCD thinking, which is something I have been looking to find. I was not disappointed in that regard. Unfortunately, throughout the book the author also attempts to refute the views of mainstream scientists, and prove the existence of imaginary concepts like "free will." Early on I began to realize that this was going to be a difficult book for me to listen to with "open ears." I was suspicious that there was a religious thing behind it all.

Jeffrey Schwartz basically sets out to disprove “materialism,” and convince the reader that the 99% of the scientific community which follows that concept are incorrect. I myself am very comfortable with materialism, and do not want to hear a long argument against it.

That may seem closed minded, and perhaps it is, but Schwartz honestly doesn’t do much to help himself. His dogmatic tone—especially when you consider that he’s saying things that are almost anti-science at this point—is off-putting. In addition, Schwartz provides ample evidence, throughout the book, that almost no one agrees with him. I realize that a large theme for the book is that Schwartz, like others before him, is saying things that place him in a very small minority, but he really doesn’t end up proving that he’s one of those geniuses who actually do prove to be right when everyone else is wrong. So in the end, the one thing that he convinces the reader of is that all of science disagrees with him.

The idea that our thoughts and feelings are a result of neurons and chemical reactions just doesn’t bother me. It does bother Schwartz however, and that’s really the crux of the matter. This is very personal for him. Indeed, from almost the opening paragraph Schwartz injects his own personal, first person thoughts and experiences into the narrative. Now, authors often do this in a preface or introduction, or perhaps in the afterward. But Schwartz does it throughout. The book really is autobiographical to some extent.

And the reader can tell from very early on that we’re dealing with a situation where a very smart person has decided not to accept certain ideas, simply because they don’t like them. Schwartz does not want to think that things like love for a spouse or a child are based solely on microscopic goings on inside the brain. He doesn’t like that reality, so he has determined to find a way for it not to be so. This is a pretty constant theme throughout the book, and is going to be a source of annoyance for readers who don’t want to hear about that. The interesting thing is that apart from this, the book is actually really, really good.

It wasn’t just that I was resistant to Schwartz’ contrarian viewpoints, I’m also just not at all interested in them. He insists upon differentiating between "the mind" and "the brain” (hence the title of the book). This seems pointless to me, because whatever the “mind” is, it comes about due to the brain. There’s no mind without the brain. Schwartz makes a huge deal out of the fact that even though scientists know what neurons cause consciousness, they don’t know exactly how they do so. I have no interest in that. So there are things going on that we don’t exactly understand: big deal. I think we all accept that.

The author spends much of the book trying to convince the reader that because people can train themselves to think differently, this proves the existence of "volition" or something he describes as “free will.” This is, however, irrelevant to the argument of free will. It's pretty much common knowledge at this point that people have the power to use mental tactics in order to effect their bodies (and that other people can help guide them in doing this). Jeffrey Schwartz seems to think this is some startling breakthrough that changes everything, when it's old news. More importantly, proving that people can change how they think does not prove “free will,” in the real sense of that phrase. Free will is the religious concept that everyone is responsible for their own actions and therefore can be considered good or evil and be punished or rewarded. How on Earth is this proven by the mere fact that through therapy patients with OCD can gain better control over their compulsions? The real point in the free will argument is that people don’t decide what their DNA is going to be. They don’t determine what tendencies they are going to have. For a 9-year old girl who for some reason is a spoiled brat just like her aunt and her grandmother, free will would be saying that genetics and things like that are not responsible for this, the kid is just being a brat.

During the lengthy first chapter I kept thinking that maybe I didn’t understand the argument he was making. It seemed like he was trying to point out that there are things science can’t explain. Duh. I thought maybe the argument was over my head and I simply didn’t know what it was yet. And I was able to hold on to that hope because Schwartz moves away from the free will thing and onto more interesting subjects in the next few chapters.

Chapter 2 describes fascinating experiments on monkeys. There is some excellent stuff concerning the orbital frontal cortex. But then Schwartz gets back into the free will thing. It’s really a shame that he uses that term, and not others, but I would come to realize that there was a reason behind that. I could never really shake the suspicion that there was some sort of a religious motive here. I must admit that this suspicion became stronger when Schwartz included commentary from “Dr. Benjamin Carson.” This book was published long before most of the country had ever heard of the famous pediatric brain surgeon. At the time the book was written, almost any reader would have thought, “Wow! A pediatric brain surgeon, that’s pretty compelling testimony.” I just had to think that there might be something else going on.

Next the author goes on to describe the work he has done treating OCD and Tourette’s patients. This was all I had hoped for. It really was great and has proven helpful to me.

Chapter 4 is made up of a long biology lesson that readers may have to listen to more than once to keep up.

This middle portion of the book really is excellent. Schwartz gives a lot of great information on the history of philosophy and science. He explains that the brain continues to develop into early adulthood. There is great stuff here about neuroplasticity. The author gives a lot of good info on OCD, Tourette’s, and depression.

The highlight of the book is Schwartz’ recounting of the Silver Springs Macaque controversy.

Schwartz talks about the part of the brain that controls directional skills and how that area is enlarged in taxi drivers. That’s the kind of thing we came for.

Then there is a great chapter on quantum physics.

After a long break, we get back to free will late in the book, and the return is unwelcome. Unfortunately, Schwartz can’t help bringing in religion. It’s not like he hits you over the head with it, but it’s there. Schwartz is careful to include things about Buddhism, so it’s not all coming from the western religion view. He finally gets around to saying that what he really means is that we have “free won’t.” In other words, we can’t help our thoughts and urges but can help whether we act on it.

First off, all this does is reiterate what anyone who has ever gone to a counselor instinctively believes: that there are ways they might be able to help themselves. This is not in any way profound. More importantly, putting all of this stress on “control,” is obviously a moral thing, and it’s clear that again Schwartz is trying to find a way to make sense of the world in a way that satisfies him.

Schwartz goes so far as to reference the Ten Commandments, pointing out that they mostly concern actions and not thoughts. Here we’re really getting into dangerous territory. I mean, I understand that much of the world is still religious, but I would think that most people who purchase a book called “The Mind and the Brain,” are not going to expect the author to mention the Ten Commandments as a reason why his ideas make sense. And it doesn’t matter how many times he mentions Buddhism; if the reader was just waiting around to hear their judeo-Christian beliefs validated, the damage is done.

And of course this all still doesn’t solve the problem that free will/won’t is impacted by tendencies, and those tendencies are based on DNA, and development, and environment; none of which are chosen by the individual.

Towards the end things get extremely complex, and again, readers may want to go over the last chapter a few times.

Schwartz explicitly states towards the end that the idea that “the brain is always going to do what it was always going to do” is wrong. Unfortunately for him, he has done nothing to back this statement up. In fact, he’s hardly even been dealing with that subject. No one doubts the idea that cognitive therapy can work. But what of the individual who can’t receive cognitive therapy? What about the large percentage of people who get no benefit from therapy? You can put someone through a weightlifting regiment and they can become stronger. However, there are some kids who will find exercise to be a natural habit, and some other kids will be lazy. That’s what we mean by free will. The idea that doing things like concentrating on something can change the brain has naught to do with the judeo-christian concept of free will.

Upon finishing the book, I felt compelled to further investigate the author and this book. I often research an author or book before listening to it, to make sure I have an idea of what I’m getting into and what biases they might have. I rarely do more research after a book because I still want to be able to judge for myself what I think, and not be further influenced by other opinions. This time, however, I felt I really needed to.

I discovered that as I had suspected all along, there was indeed a religious thing going on. Schwartz has been quoted as saying that religion and science should not be separated. That statement alone, is so at odds with my worldview there really would be no way for me to respect his opinions on anything in regards to that subject. I should have known when he had quotes from Carson in the book. But I discovered that it was actually worse than even I had imagined. It turns out that Schwartz believes in intelligent design and panders to creationists.

No matter how smart someone is, they may be incapable of dealing with reality as it is, and will therefore do anything to hold on to a belief in the way they wish things were. Obstinately holding on to beliefs which have been proven wrong often has nothing to do with education or even intelligence, but instead is contingent on a person’s ability to deal with reality as it is. If someone cannot deal with the way things are they will go to extreme lengths to hold on to a belief in the way they wish things were, even if they are in the top 1% of intelligence.

Neuroplasticity

There is a lot of scientific jargon and information in this but if you can get through that it gives great insight into how everyone has the potential capacity to make significant long lasting changes in our behavior and even some medical conditions.

Brain science made not exactly simple

Would you consider the audio edition of The Mind and the Brain to be better than the print version?

Although this book is full of great material increasing non-brain-scientists knowledge about what can go wrong in the brain and why mental disorders are,in fact, physical disorders, the audio version is not good. It sounds like the computer voice on my Kindle.

What other book might you compare The Mind and the Brain to and why?

Sharon Begley has written a lot about brain/Mind science, and she is extremely good at articulating issues that might leave us scratching our heads. I have enjoyed her other works that cover nearby areas very much. The information in this book is so important for therapists to know. It really is the century of the brain, and if we don't understand why things go wrong we will never get better at treating them. The research is piling up day by day, but its not getting into therapist training programs or continuing Ed. This book explains in detail how a person develops OCD and would be useful for people with this diagnosis, and for family members trying to understand the constant checking and washing. In addition, his truly helpful information about mindfulness in therapy could benefit anyone. Learning how to manage our thinking (thinking about our thinking) may be the most important mental wellness thing we can do for ourselves. And why aren't we teaching Mindfulness Meditation to our children???

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Monotonous voice, flat affect and very little variation, really almost a computer-like reader.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

Hmmmm. Fantastic Voyage II - Into the Brain. Tag line: This time, its about the neural networks!

Any additional comments?

So much amazing information for the public to educate themselves about Brain Disorders. This is a really important book. Too bad the reading detracts from it.

I'll need to pay more attention next time.

great book with enough voice to keep an uneducated listener from dropping off. the audio chapters are different, and that is a little disappointing. but, I will need to listen and pay more attention when I listen to chapter 10 till the end.

good content, ok narrator

The narrator's cadence seemed odd to me and made things hard to follow at first. But once I got used to it, things were fine.

Must Read on the Hard Problem of Consciousness

This book takes you on at least 3 journeys: The pitfalls of the Naturalistic explanation for the hard problem of consciousness, the exciting (but sometimes lengthy) history of neuroplasticity; and the link between the proposed theory of mental force and quantum physics. The authors provide hard scientific evidence that not only is the mind a real entit t, but it is the most critical and valuable driver of mental health and overall well-being.

Heavy at times but fabulous !

If you could sum up The Mind and the Brain in three words, what would they be?

Brilliant, thought provoking, a bit wafty

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

no

Any additional comments?

A wonderful book that will change the way you look at the world both inner and outer. It is heavy going at times and the writer sometimes seems to go on and on a bit, but overall I really loved it and have recommended it to my friends. If it gets a bit boring, stick with it because there are some really fabulous chapters.
I love books that change me- this did
I learnt a lot

Complex

Buyer beware, this is not an easy "read". The author uses a good deal of analogy to represent his subject matter, which I found helpful. He also uses a great deal of description, which added interest and humanness of the subject while at the same time added to the complexity of the book. But if you like science and medicine, as I do, this is an interesting read. The author provides insight and description on many medical problems which are affected by brain function, but from a neurological perspective only. As far as usefullness of the information in the book, to either my practice or personal life, the book leaves a lot to be desired. I've listened to it once, and am currently going through it again to try to get more understanding of the information. Morey does an amazing job making such a complex subject interesting, but his speed was too fast for me due to the complexity of the book.