How the Self Controls Its Brain
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How the Self Controls Its Brain[1] is a book by Sir John Eccles, proposing a theory of philosophical dualism, and offering a justification of how there can be mind-brain action without violating the principle of the conservation of energy.
Eccles called the fundamental neural units of the cerebral cortex "dendrons", which are cylindrical bundles of neurons arranged vertically in the six outer layers or laminae of the cortex, each cylinder being about 60 micrometres in diameter. Eccles proposed that each of the 40 million dendrons is linked with a mental unit, or "psychon", representing a unitary conscious experience. In willed actions and thought, psychons act on dendrons and, for a moment, increase the probability of the firing of selected neurons, while in perception the reverse process takes place.
[edit] References
- ^ John C. Eccles, How the Self Controls its Brain, Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 1994. ISBN 3-540-56290-7.
[edit] See also
- Dualistic interactionism
- Eccles' Model of the Self Controlling Its Brain by Donald Watson and Bernard Williams.
- Introduction to the Theory of Enformed Systems by Donald Watson and Bernard Williams.
