UG Humanities Semester III (Ways of Doing)

Module 2 The Brain and the Mind Instructors: Sabah Siddiqui and Tejaswini Niranjana The relation between mental states and brain states has long intrigued and even confused scientists and philosophers. With new scientific and technological advances, the gap between the two is finding moments of intersections. Nonetheless there are several paradoxical findings, which this module will argue also provides us the next moment in this line of inquiry. This module will explore the puzzles confronting us today in artificial intelligence, dreams as well as musical and aesthetic appreciation as requiring an integrated framework.

Session 1 Sep. 2, 2013 The cognitive turn Recap from first semester: the Cognitive Revolution in psychology Concepts and history philosophy of psychology Session 2: Sep. 5, 2013 Brain studies Introducing philosophy of biology (specifically neuroscience) the problem of localization of function modularity in the brain Session 3: Sep 6, 2013 The integration argument Intersecting the brain and the mind associationism plasticity mirror neurons in the evolution of cultural phenomenon Session 4: Sep 12, 2013 Integrated thematic: Artificial Intelligence Neural networking human and artificial comparative cognition intentionality the puzzle of nonlinearity Session 5: Sep 13, 2013 Integrated thematic: Aesthetic and musical appreciation Link between creative genius and abnormal madness neurodegeneration and creativity factors contributing to aesthetic experience Session 6: Sep 16, 2013 Integrated thematic: Dreams Function of dreams psychoanalytic takes on dreams neurological basis for psychoanalytic thinking and interpretation Session 7: Sep 19, 2013 Winding up and assignment

Course Readings: ESSENTIAL READINGS Miller, G. A. (2003). The cognitive revolution: a historical perspective. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, Vol.7, No.3, March 2003. Ramachandran, V. S. (2011). The tell-tale brain. New York: W. W. Norton. (Chapters: Introduction - No Mere Ape Chapter 1 - Phantom Limbs and Plastic Brains Chapter 4 - The Neurons that Shaped Civilization Chapter 7 - Beauty and the Brain: The Emergence of Aesthetics) Freud, S. (1925). A Note upon the "Mystic Writing Pad". Turnbull, O. and Solms, M. (2003). The Brain and the Inner World: An Introduction to the Neuroscience of Subjective Experience. New York: Other Press Book. (Chapter 6 - Dreams and Hallucinations)

EXTRA READINGS Bickle, John, Mandik, Peter and Landreth, Anthony (2012). The Philosophy of Neuroscience. In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Edward N. Zalta Ed. ) Retrieved from http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2012/entries/neuroscience/. Dhar, Anup (2010). Science(s) of the Mind: Fort-Da between the Windscreen and the Rearview Mirror. In Materialism and Immaterialism in India and the West: Varying Vistas (Volume XII, Levels of Reality, Part 5 ed. Partha Ghosh, in Project of History of Indian Science, Philosophy and Culture (PHISPC), General Ed. D P Chattopadhyay Solms, Mark and Turnbull, Oliver (2011). What is Neuropsychoanalysis? Neuropsychoanalysis, 2011, 13 (2) 1. Searle, John (1997). Roger Penrose, Kurt Godel, and the Cytoskeletons. In the Mystery of Consciousness. New York: The New York Review of Books. Sacks, Oliver (2007). Keeping Time, Rhythm and Movement. In Musicophilia: Tales of music and the brain. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. J. Allan Hobson, Edward F. Pace-Schott, and Robert Stickgold (2003). Dreaming and the brain: Toward a cognitive neuroscience of conscious states. In Sleeping and Dreaming (Edward PaceSchott, Mark Solms, Mark Blagrove, & Stevan Harnad, Eds.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.