• Cite/Export
  Cite/Export

  Copy a citation

  APA (6th ed.)

  

  Chicago (Author-Date, 15th ed.)

  

  Harvard (18th ed.)

  

  MLA (7th ed.)

  

  Turabian (6th ed.)

  

  Export a citation

  Export to RefWorks   Export to EndNote / Reference Manager   Export to EasyBib
  Export to EndNote / Reference Manager(non-Latin)   Cancel

  Note: Citations are based on reference standards. However, formatting rules can vary widely between applications and fields of interest or study. The specific requirements or preferences of your reviewing publisher, classroom teacher, institution or organization should be applied.
• Print
• E-mail
  E-mail

  All fields are required.

  The E-mail Address(es) field is required. Please enter recipient e-mail address(es).

  The E-mail Address(es) you entered is(are) not in a valid format. Please re-enter recipient e-mail address(es).

  You may send this item to up to five recipients.

  Enter recipient e-mail address(es): Separate up to five addresses with commas (,)

  The name field is required. Please enter your name.

  Enter your name: The subject field is required. Please enter the subject. Subject:

  The E-mail message field is required. Please enter the message.

  E-mail Message: I thought you might be interested in this item at http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/30593111 Title: Shadows of the mind : a search for the missing science of consciousness Author: Roger Penrose Publisher: Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 1994. ISBN/ISSN: 0198539789 9780198539780 0099582112 9780099582113 0195106466 9780195106466 OCLC:30593111

  
  

  Please verify that you are not a robot.

  Cancel
• Share
• Permalink
  Permalink

  Copy this URL to link to this page:

• Write a review
• Rate this item:
• • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

Shadows of the mind : a search for the missing science of consciousness

Author:	Roger Penrose
Publisher:	Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 1994.
Edition/Format:	Print book : EnglishView all editions and formats
Summary:	A New York Times bestseller when it appeared in 1989, Roger Penrose's The Emperor's New Mind was universally hailed as a marvelous survey of modern physics as well as a brilliant reflection on the human mind, offering a new perspective on the scientific landscape and a visionary glimpse of the possible future of science. Now, in Shadows of the Mind, Penrose offers another exhilarating look at modern science as he mounts an even more powerful attack on artificial intelligence. But perhaps more important, in this volume he points the way to a new science, one that may eventually explain the physical basis of the human mind. Penrose contends that some aspects of the human mind lie beyond computation. This is not a religious argument (that the mind is something other than physical) nor is it based on the brain's vast complexity (the weather is immensely complex, says Penrose, but it is still a computable thing, at least in theory). Instead, he provides powerful arguments to support his conclusion that there is something in the conscious activity of the brain that transcends computation - and will find no explanation in terms of present-day science. To illuminate what he believes this "something" might be, and to suggest where a new physics must proceed so that we may understand it, Penrose cuts a wide swathe through modern science, providing penetrating looks at everything from Turing computability and Godel's incompleteness, via Schrodinger's Cat and the Elitzur-Vaidman bomb-testing problem, to detailed microbiology. Of particular interest is Penrose's extensive examination of quantum mechanics, which introduces some new ideas that differ markedly from those advanced in The Emperor's New Mind, especially concerning the mysterious interface where classical and quantum physics meet. But perhaps the most interesting wrinkle in Shadows of the Mind is Penrose's excursion into microbiology, where he examines cytoskeletons and microtubules, minute substructures lying deep within the brain's neurons. (He argues that microtubules - not neurons - may indeed be the basic units of the brain, which, if nothing else, would dramatically increase the brain's computational power.) Furthermore, he contends that in consciousness some kind of global quantum state must take place across large areas of the brain, and that it is within microtubules that these collective quantum effects are most likely to reside. . For physics to accommodate something that is as foreign to our current physical picture as is the phenomenon of consciousness, we must expect a profound change - one that alters the very underpinnings of our philosophical viewpoint as to the nature of reality. Shadows of the Mind provides an illuminating look at where these profound changes may take place and what our future understanding of the world may be.  Read more...
Rating:	(not yet rated) 0 with reviews - Be the first.
Subjects	Artificial intelligence. Thought and thinking. Gödel's theorem. View all subjects
More like this	User lists Similar Items