| The Forgetting Machine: Memory, Perception, and the "Jennifer Aniston Neuron" Contributor(s): Quian Quiroga, Rodrigo (Author), Woren, Dan (Read by) |
|
 |
ISBN: 1538461447 ISBN-13: 9781538461440 Publisher: Blackstone Audiobooks OUR PRICE: $22.46 Product Type: Compact Disc Published: October 2017 |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Psychology | Cognitive Neuroscience & Cognitive Neuropsychology - Psychology | Cognitive Psychology & Cognition - Science | Life Sciences - Neuroscience |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: If we lose our memories, are we still ourselves? Is identity merely a collection of electrical impulses? What separates us from animals, or from computers?From Plato to Westworld, these questions have fascinated and befuddled philosophers, artists, and scientists for centuries. In The Forgetting Machine, neuroscientist Rodrigo Quiroga explains how the mechanics of memory illuminates these discussions, with implications for everything from understanding Alzheimer's disease to the technology of artificial intelligence.You'll also learn about the research behind what Quiroga coined "Jennifer Aniston Neurons"-cells in the human brain that are responsible for representing specific concepts, such as recognizing a certain celebrity's face. The discovery of these neurons opens new windows into the workings of human memory.In this accessible, fascinating look at the science of remembering, you'll learn how we turn perceptions into memories, how language shapes our experiences, and the crucial role forgetting plays in human recollection. You'll see how electricity, chemistry, and abstraction combine to form something more than the human brain-the human mind. And you'll gain surprising insight into what our brains can tell us about who we are.The Forgetting Machine takes us on a journey through science and science fiction, philosophy and identity, using what we know about how we remember (and forget) to explore the very roots of what makes us human. |
Contributor Bio(s): Quian Quiroga, Rodrigo: - Rodrigo Quian Quiroga holds a research chair at the University of Leicester, UK. He is the director of the Center for Systems Neuroscience and the head of bioengineering at the University of Leicester. He graduated in physics at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina, and obtained his PhD in applied mathematics at the University of Luebeck, Germany. Before joining the University of Leicester in 2004, he was a post-doctoral fellow at the Research Center Juelich, Germany, a Sloan fellow at the California Institute of Technology, USA, and had short stays at RIKEN, Japan, and the University of Nijmegen, the Netherlands. He has held visiting positions at the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology in Magdeburg, the International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA) in Trieste, Italy, the University of California Los Angeles, the California Institute of Technology, the University of Buenos Aires, and CONICET. He obtained a young investigator award by the American Epilepsy Society, in 2010 a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award, and in 2014 he was selected as one of the 10 UK RISE Leaders in Science and Engineering. His main research interest is on the study of the principles of visual perception and memory. He discovered what has been named "concept cells" or "Jennifer Aniston neurons"-neurons in the human brain that play a key role in memory formation- a finding that was selected as one of the top 100 scientific stories of 2005 by Discover Magazine. His work has been published in about 100 research articles and has received worldwide media attention, including articles in the New York Times, Washington Post, Scientific American, New Scientist, Independent, and others. He is also the author of Borges and Memory, linking the thoughts of Argentinean writer Jorge Luis Borges with memory research in neuroscience. Woren, Dan: -Dan Woren is an American voice actor and Earphones Award-winning narrator. He has worked extensively in animation, video games, and feature films. He is best known for his many roles in anime productions such as Bleach and as the voice of Sub-Zero in the video game Mortal Kombat. |