A Language Circuit Wernicke’s areas and Broca’s areas are part

of a connected circuit for receiving and producing language.

Wernicke predicted conduction aphasia – a disorder produced by breaking the connection between the two regions. Results in paraphasia – omitting and substituting

parts of speech. Also, inability to repeat phrases.

Brodmann Areas Different areas of the brain with different

functions have different kinds of neurons. Brodmann mapped the areas based on the

kinds of cells found: Cytoarchitectonic method 52 functionally distinct areas identified by

number.

Support for the Field View Lashley found that the greater the lesions, the

greater the impairment in functioning. No matter where lesions were made, learning was

impaired. Mass action -- brain mass, not specific regions

was most important to functioning. Maze learning involves multiple functions, so

it is unsuitable for studying localization.

The Current View Functions consist of multiple processes that

occur in specific areas of the brain. Imaging studies reveal the different processes,

called elementary operations. Processing is both serial and parallel.

Even the simplest mental activity requires coordination of processes in multiple areas of the brain. Such processing appears introspectively seamless.

The Mind-Body DualitySource:

Robert H. Wozniakhttp://serendip.brynmawr.edu/Mind/Descartes.html

Rene Descartes (1596-1650)

Mind-Body Dualism Descartes -- The rational mind connects with

the animal body at the pineal gland. Thus, mind affects body and body affects mind. Animals have no minds.

We now know the pineal gland does something else, but…

Is there a “mind” or “soul” independent of the brain?

18th Century Philosophy (1700’s) All is mind vs. all is body. Berkeley’s “Immaterialism” – There is no

body because all matter is perceived by the mind and can’t be known apart from it.

Materialism – there is no mind, only matter. Mental events don’t exist. La Mettrie, “L’homme machine.” States of the soul depend upon states of the body.

19th Century Philosophy (1800’s) Localization of cerebral function showed that

the brain is the organ of the mind. Mental states were shown to affect the body.

Trauma, mesmeric trance, mental suggestion. Huxley’s “Epiphenomenalism” – mental states

have no causal efficacy, like paint on a stone (neurophysiology is the stone).

Dual-Aspect Monism Lewes – mental and physical processes are

two aspects of the same psychophysical event. Mind is subjective while body is objective. Terms used to describe the two are not

inter-translatable. Lewes still provides the best argument for why

psychology cannot be replaced by neuroscience.

Mind-Stuff Theory

Higher properties of mind are compounded from mental elements (pieces of mind-stuff).

When molecules come together at a level of complexity sufficient to form a brain and nervous system, correlative mind-stuff forms consciousness.

William James James adopted a pragmatic empirical

parallelism of the sort many psychologists still support.

The "simplest psycho-physic formula…” is a "blank unmediated correspondence, term for term, of the succession of states of consciousness with the succession of total brain processes ..."

Principles of Psychology, p. 182

Ongoing Controversy We still do not know how “mind” emerges from

“body.” The nature of the relationship between specific

mental states and the neural substrate is still not understood.

Those debating mind-body today largely express ideas that are versions of the philosophical arguments proposed over the past 250 years.

Interview with Rodney BrooksHuman as machine, machine as human:

http://www.aaai.org/AITopics/html/show.htmlhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/cta/progs/02/hardtalk/brooks19aug.ram