Phi: A Voyage from the Brain to the Soul

==== Context ====For the sake of context, I am a student in the biomedical sciences. I have taken a few psychology and neuroscience classes. I wanted to read this book because I am interested in learning more about the human consciousness and how it is related to the biological brain. However, I have never had any formal introduction to it and none of my classes have focused very much on this topic.==== Overall ====Overall, I enjoyed this book. It was an unique reading experience, but it was definitely not what I expected. This book has a lot to offer beyond just the biological connection to consciousness (which was my expectation). However, there are sections where the author tends to get bogged down in discussion and musings, and to me, this detracts from the overall experience. Not everyone will enjoy this type of book, but the ideas and theories offered by Dr. Tononi on this field are fascinating to think and debate about.=== Synopsis ==="Phi" is a story about the famed astronomer and scientist, Galileo. Similar to "guided enlightenment" theme of "A Christmas Carol", Galileo is helped by three scientists on his journey to understand our consciousness. In the first third of the book, Frick (based on Francis Crick, the geneticist who also spent a great deal of time studying the consciousness) takes our protagonist on a series of encounters to help him answer Galileo's original question: "How could mere matter generate mind?" Once Galileo is convinced of the soul-brain connection, he faces more difficult questions regarding consciousness - questions that can't be explained by simply looking at research and clinical findings. In this second part, Alturi (based off of Alan Turing, whose namesake Test has implications in consciousness and artificial intelligence), demonstrates to Galileo a series of thought experiments, that, along with the facts presented in his first journey, present a theory of consciousness based on Phi. The third part, hosted by a man modeled around Darwin, shows Galileo's understanding the overarching implications of the "phi" theory.Each chapter of the book is meant to convey one big idea or theme regarding consciousness that Galileo and the reader. Most of the time, the bulk of the chapter is spent on a story, discussion, or metaphor that will be presented to the audience in order to emphasize that idea. Every chapter also has many pictures, paintings, or photos dispersed through it, each adding a visual element to the argument being made or evidence being presented. Lastly, a "Notes" section concludes every chapter, where the author provides his own commentary, explains minor characters, translates quotes, elaborates on evidence, provides references for the art, etc.==== What I Liked ====There are many aspects of this book that I really liked. Since I am interested in the brain and the mind, the content had an obvious appeal for me. And the content is really what this book is about. All the other parts of the story are just a way for Tononi to get his point across. I thought the neurological evidence and basic neuroscience was presented in a very clear and intriguing manner. Dr Tononi did a great job with his explanations of the biological background and brain deficits and disorders by presenting them in interesting anecdotes and with relevant historical characters and factual references. The material is definitely accessible to someone new to the field of neuroscience. And for those with a neuro background, it was presented in such a way that it was still interesting and instructive.The structure of the book made it a very unique and enjoyable reading experience. The chapters are often a balance of subjective discussion with a connection to a more objective element, such as neurological evidence, such as when Tononi uses Tale of the Two Cities to explain the difference between the cerebrum and the cerebellum, and why one is involved in consciousness and the other isn't. Likewise, Tononi uses a balance of both scientific evidence and relevant art, history, culture, and mythology. This balance can also be seen in the illustrations used: alongside stunning photographs of stained hippocampal neurons will be Renaissance paintings. Besides photos of Classical Greek sculptures, Tononi will place a hand-sketch of the corpus callosum, the bridge between the brain hemispheres. Yet both elements, the objective brain MRI scans and the subjective portrait of Copernicus, are skillfully woven together by Tononi to illustrate an idea about consciousness.I also really liked the "Notes" section at the end of each chapter. These aren't just references and citations. Rather than write as the author, Dr. Tononi does something unique and adds commentary to Galileo's journey as if he is a detached observer, discussing a journey he is witnessing himself. This definitely adds an interesting perspective to an an already engrossing chapter, and you will definitely want to read every "Notes" section.One of the most obvious elements of the book is the language and writing of Tononi. He writes in a very flowing and eloquent manner that makes it easy and pleasant to read through. It is almost as if you're reading a poem. The dialogue of the characters is also very well written. Frick's lines, such as: "You are empty, Galileo, and have no spirit: nothing enters your immature body at conception and nothing leaves your carcass at death" and "You are merely another beast in the great zoo of the universe" convey his character - that of scientific certainty and arrogance - artfully and make him a far more relatable part of the journey. Tononi's writing style is definitely an enjoyable and attractive part of this tale.Other things I liked include the minor characters, often pulled from literary or historical contexts. I enjoyed reading about their contribution (often counter-argument) to the discussion and how Tononi decided to portray them. And if you don't know much about them, the author talks about them in his "Notes".==== What I Didn't Like =====Back to content, which is the purpose of this book. I have one complaint about the book. It's not huge, but it did bother me and it was prevalent. I thought that at several points throughout the book, Dr. Tononi's discussions became too abstract and too convoluted to clearly convey the point of the chapter. This was especially common problem in the latter parts of Galileo's journey, where the author is attempting to create complex theories and associations and project potential implications. It just feels as if he tries to be too complex and ostentatious, and this can unnecessarily slow down reading all throughout the book. On the last third of the book, I couldn't clearly understand some of the points Tononi was trying to make. Maybe this won't be a problem for a more experienced reader.===== Final Thoughts ====Dr. Tononi's book is not for someone who is looking to understand consciousness through a purely biological lens. In fact, only a third of the book would satisfy such an audience. Nor would I suggest this book to someone who is looking for just a layman's explanation - the biological explanations and bases are explained well and are not very technical, but the abstract discussions and thought experiments might not be what they are seeking. "Phi" is for someone who wants to view consciousness through many different lenses, both objective and subjective, but ultimately connect all those perspectives together to an understanding of the topic reached by Galileo and proposed by Dr. Tononi. As I said, this is a fascinating topic and the book has a lot to offer regarding it, but my suggestions would be to take your time reading it and understanding the ideas and arguments that are made in it. Whether or not you agree with his theories, this will allow you to get the most from this book.In summary, this is a beautiful book that is both instructive and very interesting to read and think about.

A scholar of impeccable credentials, on returning from a sabbatical in Europe, said: "The French come up with all the great original ideas, the Germans do the back-breaking scholarly research, and then the Italians publish it in beautiful books." I thought of this constantly as I read Phi: A Voyage from the Brain to the Soul, by neuroscientist Giulio Tononi. This is the latest in what seems a never-ending series of brilliant books on "the nature of consciousness," a subject in which we all have a vested interest, a fact we take for granted until something affects our ability to be fully conscious, and a theme that brings together philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists, and theologians. When taught in Philosophy Departments it is called: "Philosophy of Mind," and there are web-based courses available on iTunes, as well as an excellent course by Patrick Grimm from The Teaching Company. Three years ago I loudly proclaimed that Patricia Churchland's book Braintrust: What Neuroscience Tells Us About Morality, was an awesome update on the problem of Consciousness. Two years ago I profiled Antonio Damasio's Self Comes to Mind as the best book on the topic for that year; last fall I reviewed Christof Koch's book, Consciousness: Confessions of a Romantic Reductionist, and said it was the best book of 2012 on the topic. I am going out on a limb and saying it is impossible for anyone to publish a better book on consciousness in 2013 than Tononi's book, and I have every confidence I will be correct! The book not only updates current thinking about the nature and scope of consciousness, it is beautifully illustrated, with an ingenious selection of paintings and pictures that document the author's convictions.I am, by dint of fifty years of experience, an Aristotle scholar, and I tend to begin my own philosophical investigations by seeing what Aristotle had to say on any given topic. Aristotle's ruminations on "thought" come in a book whose Greek title is PERI PSYCHES, which we might best translate as "On the nature of mental life." Aristotle said there was something very distinctive about human thought, something that smacked of "the immaterial." If you take a stamp into moist wax, it leaves an imprint; when you think, said Aristotle, something like that happens, only there is nothing physical that leaves an imprint. Here is Aristotle, in his own words:"Thus it is in old age the activity of mind or intellectual apprehension declines only through the decay of some inward part; mind itself does not change. Thinking, loving and hating are affections not of mind, but of that which has mind, to whatever extent it can exercise it. That is why, when the vehicle decays, memory and love cease: they were activities, not of mind, but of the composite (mind and physical brain), and the composite has perished. Mind itself is something more divine and not subject to decay." (Aristotle, PERI PSYCHES, 408b23-29, my translation of the Greek text.)Texts like these were used by Moslem, Jewish, and Christian theologians for thousands of years as they deliberated questions of immortality of the soul and/or resurrection of the body. Aristotle is somewhat out of favor in the neuroscience literature, but his insights, and the "common sense" character of his reflections, very much influence the way we think about our mental life. But the neuroscientists are building a very different vocabulary, and even popular reflections on the nature of what consciousness is, and how the mind works, will be driven by these consciousness researchers.Rene Descartes is generally regarded as the first "modern" philosopher, and everybody has heard of "I think, therefore I am." Perhaps it was Descartes' obsession with his own thinking that has driven modern philosophy down the path of so much reflection on the nature of consciousness. This is what Descartes had to say: "Consciousness never expires, not even for a moment. What the brain does is immaterial; consciousness uses it to communicate with the body, and through the body with the world, but consciousness is a different substance, and does not need the brain to exist." (Tononi's translation.) We take consciousness all too much for granted; it seems like at least once a year, a book comes along that awakens me from my dogmatic slumbers, and, while any one of the books I have mentioned will work well as an introduction to the study of consciousness, I think Tononi's is in a league by itself. Here is what two famous neuroscientists have to say about the book:"Giulio Tononi is a man of bold and original mind who has developed a fundamental new theory of consciousness. In Phi, he calls on all the resources of drama, metaphor, and the visual arts (the artistic illustrations in the book are spellbinding) to present his scientific insights, in the form of imaginary dialogues in which Galileo meets Francis Crick, Alan Turing, and other major thinkers of the twentieth century. This is an astonishing and risky literary device, but Tononi pulls it off triumphantly. He makes the deepest neuroscientific insights come alive." --Oliver Sacks, author of The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat."You may or may not endorse Giulio Tononi's views on how the brain generates consciousness, but you can certainly agree that his book is a garden of intellectual delights." --Antonio Damasio, author of Self Comes to Mind.If you choose to read this book, expect that it will take you more than a month to read the 350 pages, for you will read less than 10 pages a day. But if you choose to do so, it will be among the most mind-boggling times of your life. What does it mean to be conscious? What are you doing when you are thinking? Why does your brain work better at some times than at other times? Tononi might help you think through some of these problems for your self---if indeed that conscious self is what you really are...

Tononi stresses that consciousness is involved with some areas of the brain such as the cortex, but not at all with others, although different regions are based on similar neuronal processing. He suggests that the difference may lie in the greater degree of connectivity between cells such as cortical cells.He points out that consciousness is not a given for types of brain activity. Thus in non-dream sleep there is no consciousness. So a change in brain activity from wakefulness to sleep can oblate consciousness. This shift also appears to relate to changes in connectivity.He reminds us that an entity may be more than the sum of its parts. In the brain individual processes, such as forming and retrieving memories, or understanding speech and finding words, are performed outside of consciousness, although they may lead towards conscious processing.Consciousness is viewed as the integration of multiple concepts or modalities. The more that is integrated within the brain, the more behaviour becomes a function of internal processing rather than direct reaction to the environment, so behaviour is a product of the whole rather than the parts.It is further suggested that the integration of information allows a whole to distinguish more than the sum of the parts. The author identifies this as phi or the conscious process. He asks why even such integrated processing should give rise to subjective consciousness. The 'combination problem' haunts this book. Both Leinbiz and William James failed to properly resolve the combination problem of how small elements could combine into the experienced unity of consciousness. It is argued here that consciousness is low at the level of individual neurons. It is suggested to be most effective, not at the level of large groups such as neuronal assemblies, but instead at the level of small groups of neurons. The same restriction of consciousness to particular conditions appears to be true from a temporal point of view. Consciousness could not arise in zero time, but it does appear to relate to short periods of time.The style of this book, presented as the imagined ruminations of scientific figures from the past, is frustrating in that it obscures the serious content. In particular, more could have been made of recent neuroscientific evidence, where reiterative feedback in brain processing provides a clear indication of the build up of activity in brain areas involved in consciousness.

This shows where the founders of IIT were coming from, but if you really want to understand the theory (without consulting academic papers) and see where it leads regarding the possibility (or not) of conscious machines I highly recommend the amazing "The Feeling of Life Itself" by Christof Koch.

This is not at all what I was expecting but the author draws you in and before you know it it is 3am and you're getting you head around some incredible concepts without really seeming to try. The book is also beautiful, with carefully selected pictures and illustrations - so much so that I may need to purchase the physical print version. I highly recommend this book to anyone remotely interested in concepts of consciousness and intelligence - the implications of the theory expanded in the book are profound.

Bought in relation to a course, but meh, basically useless.

A really beautifully produced book, a pleasure to handle. Closely argued and a delight which takes you slowly through the workings of the mind. I have the advantage of having read Antonio Damasio's books and that of Christof Koch so am not unfamiliar we the problem of consciousness. I hope like Dante's works this will be remembered many years hence.