FEELING AND KNOWING

From one of the world's leading neuroscientists--a succinct, illuminating, wholly engaging investigation of the phenomenon of consciousness.

In recent decades, many philosophers and cognitive scientists have declared the question of consciousness unsolvable, but Antonio Damasio is convinced that recent findings in neurobiology, psychology, and AI have given us the necessary tools to solve its mystery. Now, he not only elucidates its myriad aspects, but presents his analysis and insights in a way that is faithful to our own intuitive sense of the experience of consciousness. In the 45 brief chapters of the book, he helps us understand the relation between consciousness and mind; why being conscious is not the same as either being awake or sensing; the essential role of feeling; and the biological brain and development of consciousness. He synthesizes the recent findings of various sciences with the outlook of philosophy, and, most significantly, presents his original research which has transformed our understanding of the brain and human behavior. Here is an indispensable guide to understanding consciousness, the fundamental human capacity for informing--and transforming--our experience of the world around us and our perception of our place in it. ANTONIO DAMASIO is University Professor; David Dornsife Professor of Neuroscience, Psychology, and Philosophy; and director of the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California. Awards he has received include the Prince of Asturias Prize in Science and Technology, the Grawemeyer Award, the Honda Prize, and the Pessoa and Signoret prizes. In 2017 he received the Freud Medal from the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences. Damasio is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. He is the author of Descartes' Error, The Feeling of What Happens, Looking for Spinoza, Self Comes to Mind, and The Strange Order of Things, all of which have been published in translation and are taught in universities throughout the world.