Introduction to Sensory Processes by Jacqueline Ludel (review)

158 Books existence of language, indeed of a fairly highly developed language, with words (or metaphors) to describe thinking, selfawareness and decision making. It must therefore have appeared fairly late in human history, and traces of pre-conscious attitudes may appear even in early written language. This is the starting point of Jaynes' inquiry into the origin of consciousness. The earliest humans lived in small tribes or family groups. more or less isolated, communicating, like other primates , only by a fewstereotyped sounds and gestures. Then came the first cities, the first great civilizations, with the appearance of true languages and of religion. This was an age of pyramids and temples, when humans first worked in large organized groups, and the age of the oldest literature that has survived, including the Iliad and the Book of Amos in the Bible. Next, these civilizations collapsed, as a result of some cataclysm-volcanic eruptions destroyed the Minoan civilization , the Assyrians conquered Babylon, and, much later, the Spaniards invaded Mexico and Peru. It was only, Jaynes maintains, as a response to these catastrophes that consciousness was learnedby peoples suddenly deprived of the guidance of their gods; peoples until then were entirely controlled by divine voices that admitted no possibility of discussion or of disobedience. For, under the stress of living in large communities, the people of these 'bicameral' civilizations were ruled by hallucinatory voicesgenerated in the right hemisphere ofthe brain that directed behaviour, which is controlled by the left hemisphere. 'The Trojan War was directed by hallucinations. And the soldiers who were so directed were not at all like us. They were noble automatons, who knew not what they did.' In present-day terms, the humans of the bicameral age were schizophrenics, with neither consciousness of their own identity nor responsibility for their actions. This bold hypothesis is supported by evidence from archaeological sources and by arguments from neurophysiology and from studies of abnormal psychology of recent decades. On the sudden breakdown ofthe bicameral mind, when the gods became silent and humans were forced into consciousness, he is lessclear. Since it was primarily a social revolution, there was simply not time for natural selection to play more than a minor role. How, then, does this square with the hypothesis, which he seems to accept, that schizophrenia is primarily a biochemical abnormality , genetically determined? How did hallucination, from being virtually universal, disappear from 'bicameral' civilizations in the course of a few generations? Many questions are raised and remain unanswered-and Jaynes promises a sequel to complete his hypothesis. But whether or not the concept of 'bicameral' civilization is convincing, this is a remarkable book. I cannot in this brief review do justice to his teeming ideas, to the range of his learning in half a dozen disciplines. His arguments are inevitably simplified and distorted here. Anyone interested in the central problem of consciousness should read and reread this book. Bizarre though the theme may appear, it must profoundly influence views on the development of human awareness. The Self and Its Brain: An Argument for Interactionism. Karl R. Popper and John C. Eccles. Springer International, Berlin, 1977. 597 pp., illus. DM 39.00. Reviewed by F. H. C. Marriott* Interactionism, in its simplest form, needs little defence. Humans are conscious, and make conscious decisions; they have ideas, and communicate them to others. These decisions and ideas affect the physical world, as all human artifacts show. Any description of the world that fails to take account of the evolution of consciousness must be incomplete and misleading. This book falls into three parts. In the first, Popper, with his usual clarity and style, reviews hypotheses of the mind-brain interaction and describes again his three-world model-(l) the physical universe, (2) the world of ideas and (3) the world of encoded human knowledge. In the second, Eccles gives an illuminating description of the present state of knowledge-such as it is-about the brain and its functions. The third part consists *Dept. of Biomathematics, University of Oxford, Pusey St., Oxford OXI 2JZ, England. of a series of twelve dialogues between the authors, elucidating their opinions and differences on the problem of consciousness. The picture that emerges is...