Tales From Both Sides of the Brain: A Life in Neuroscience
Author: Michael S. Gazzaniga
ISBN-10: ‎0062228803
ISBN-13: 978-0062228802
 
APA Style Citation
Gazzaniga, M.S. (2015). Tales from both sides of the brain: A life in neuroscience. HarperCollins.
 
Buy This Book
https://www.amazon.com/Tales-Both-Sides-Brain-Neuroscience/dp/0062228803
​

Book Description
Michael Gazzaniga stated, “Science results from a profoundly social process.” Tales From Both Sides of the Brain: A Life in Neuroscience is an autobiography about his research, but also the friendships, opportunities, and professional moves Dr. Gazzaniga made as he changed how we think of the brain. He shares his story of how scientists are a blend of both scientific and personal life experiences. The book focuses on six split-brain patients that helped change much of what is known in cognitive neuroscience. As he quickly points out, while much of scientific work is routine, the discoveries are still exciting! His story is one with a beginning and middle, but no end.
 
Gazzaniga’s early days started at Caltech, under Dr. Roger Sperry. While Gazzaniga was the novice, Sperry was the pro in split-brain research. Most of Sperry’s work was done with cats, but he was a great surgeon and fiercely competitive. Under Sperry’s guidance, Gazzaniga moved from studying animals to human patients in 1962. Their first human patient was William (Bill) Jenkins. They had to figure out the basics of how to test someone with a split brain. The left half of the body sends MOST information about touch to the right hemisphere. However, the mere presence or absence of being touched goes to both hemispheres. They used the visual system because it was simple and highly lateralized. The two had their differences, but when Sperry won the Nobel Prize in 1981, Gazzaniga wrote an appreciation article for him published in Science magazine.
 
Research shows that the left brain specializes in speech and language processes, while the right brain specializes in visual tasks. However, many split-brain patients used external self-cueing to help unify some of their disconnected information. Most eventually gained control of their ipsilateral (same-side) arm. It was this dual control of both the contralateral (opposite-side) and ipsilateral (same-side) that made it hard to evaluate the specialization of the left and right brains. Gazzaniga had no idea how rich split-brain research would become until more cases were added to the pool, and these newer cases were complicating. Like an old married couple…subtle cueing between the two is going on all the time. Similarly, half of the brain is living next to the other half and the ability of split-brain patients to look as if they were integrated develops over time. The two mental systems were being forced to share the same resources, and somehow, they worked it out.  This made it hard to do the research.
 
Gazzaniga’s professional career involved many moves. Wanting his own lab, he moved to the University of California, Santa Barbara. He was both a teacher and researcher, and quickly moved up to department chair. It was here that he began his closest lifelong friendship with David Premack. During this time, he also led his first interdisciplinary forum. Dr. Gazzaniga wanted to be associated with a medical center to see a wider range of neurological patients and with a little east coast fever, he moved to New York. There he set up a weekly lunch with Leon Festinger for the next 20 years. It was his friendships with Premack and Festinger that helped him continually reassess his and Sperry’s claim that there were two minds in one brain. Once again, Gazzaniga was on the move. This time to Dartmouth. His graduate student was Joseph LeDoux and they created a mobile lab to go to the patients. It was a time of new patients, discoveries, and insights. It was discovered that the left brain was an interpreter. When the left brain had no clue what was going on, it would try to explain it away. Gazzaniga moved again to Cornell University Medical College and convinced LeDoux to join him. Together they continued to complete critical experiments to understand the brain. It was in New York that Gazzaniga met up with George Miller. While he found him and his office intimidating, they quickly became friends and together launched cognitive neuroscience, the study of how the brain creates the mind. An important part of Gazzaniga’s academic life was holding special meetings in special places. He led an annual, weeklong conference. When he moved back to Dartmouth, he brought with the Cognitive Neuroscience Institute and created the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. But the west coast was calling and Gazzaniga moved to the University of California, Davis. His patients traveled to him and he did a PBS special hosted by Alan Alda. Dr. Gazzaniga continued his training of the next generation by holding an annual conference, and publishing their work in one large reference book. He also helped with efforts to build a database for brain imaging experiments done around the world. He requested researchers submit data in order to be published in the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. It ended up not working out, but was a great step for more public communication.
 
While science has always been important to Gazzaniga, he is also interested in many other issues. Early on as a graduate student, he hosted a political debate on campus that garnered much attention. He credits this first experience to his ability to organize future scientific meetings and help translate complicated topics for public communication. Over the next several decades, Gazzaniga and his second wife, Charlotte, hosted somewhere around 300 dinner parties. These social gatherings played a significant role in the field of cognitive neuroscience. He also talked his friend, the political commentator, into interviewing his friends (e.g., B.F. Skinner, Premack, Festinger) on his show Firing Line. He became interested in public affairs and wrote on the problem of crime prevention. Gazzaniga also served on the President’s Council of Bioethics and worked to help answer the embryo question- when human life begins? Pursuing diverse issues has always been important to him.
 
Gazzaniga’s story is one of science, people, and experiences. He concludes with reminding the reader the story has not ended. While some of the easy, low-hanging fruit, has been picked in neuroscience, there are still more answers to find.
 
Other Related Resources
Author's Website- University of California, Santa Barbara
https://people.psych.ucsb.edu/gazzaniga/michael/
Lessons Learned from a Life in Science
https://www.psychologicalscience.org/observer/lessons-learned-from-a-life-in-science

Psychological Figures and Concepts
Paul Broca
Noam Chomsky
Leon Festinger
Clever Hans
David Hubel
Daniel Kahneman
Karl Lashley
Joseph LeDoux
Kurt Lewin
Margaret Mead
George Miller
Daniel Pinker
David Premack
Stanley Schachter
B.F. Skinner
Roger Sperry
Endel Tulving
Robert Zajonc
 
Attention
Basic research
Bioethics
Blindsight
Brain plasticity
Cognitive dissonance
Cognitive neuroscience
Confabulation
Contralateral vs. ipsilateral control
Corpus callosum
EEG
Embryo
Episodic memory
fMRI
Global aphasia
IRB
Korsakoff’s syndrome
Lateral ventricles
MRI
Parallel processes
Semantic memory
Split-brain research
Synesthesia
Syntax
Theory of mind
Top-down vs. bottom-up processing
WAIS

​Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism
Author: Amanda Montell
ISBN:  978-0-06-299315-1
 
APA Style Citation
Montell, A. (2021). Cultish: The language of fanaticism. Harpers Collins Publishers.
 
Buy This Book
https://www.amazon.com/Cultish-Language-Fanaticism-Amanda-Montell/dp/0062993151
 

​Book Description
When you think of cults, some names come to mind immediately, such as Heaven’s Gate, Jonestown, Waco. Each of these cults were led by a charismatic and powerful leader who used persuasive language and controlling techniques to isolate and manage their followers. Amanda Montell explores the language used in these cult and cult-like environments that expand to pyramid schemes and athletic groups, such as SoulCycle. She argues that each of these groups have a particular language that those on the outside do not understand. This language can work to build a sense of community, but it can also lead to isolation as the individuals interact more and more only with those who share the same “language”. Sometimes language can be inspirational as in athletic teams that push their members to their physical limits. Or it can be more destructive when it is used to deflect questions and further ingratiate members by asking them to ramp up their commitment, as in Scientology. While Montell clarifies that language does not cause someone to believe something they do not want to believe, it does give them a way to support and express ideas they are already open to. Some aspects of cultish life have made it into the public vernacular. “Drinking the Kool-Aid,” which essentially means buying into what someone is saying is a reference to the more than three hundred Jonestown members (children included) who died after drinking a concoction of Kool-Aid mixed with cyanide as federal authorities were closing in on the group.
 
Montell has long had an interest in cults because her father had grown up in the cult Synanon. He was eventually able to extricate himself by sneaking off to attend high school. He had the added advantage of working in a science lab, which taught him to question the beliefs of those around him by applying the scientific method to what he was being asked to believe. Montell poses that the increase in athletic fads that border on cult-like behavior and expectations come from the human need to belong to a group and feel affiliated with others. People are less likely to be involved in organized religion than ever before and she suggests this may account for increased membership in other types of group activities that work together towards a common goal. Membership provides identity, purpose and belonging. 
 
Surprisingly, the most typical person who joins a cult is a middle class, well-educated individual. Members are often gradually drawn in by a shared belief or common experience. This eventually leads to an “us” and “them” mentality in which members of the group must ban together against those from the “outside” who are trying to disband or break up the group. Leaders of cults often use psychological manipulation, which can lead to financial and sexual manipulation. In Synanon (the cult Montell’s father belonged to) there was a mandatory activity called “the Game”. This ritualistic weekly activity had people called out publicly for personal violations or missteps that could later be used against the person. 
 
Once a person’s entire identity and resources are connected to the group, it is difficult for a person to leave even if they start to question some of the practices. There is often a sense of hero worship towards the cult leaders. Members dare not ask questions or raise concerns as this would identify them as disloyal and come with serious repercussions. Confirmation bias is a powerful force that often keeps those inside of cults from questioning the practice and language used, while those outside of the cult are shocked by the level of delusion demonstrated by members. Even if members do start to question the beliefs of the cult, they often fall prey to the sunken cost fallacy meaning they have given everything they have to the cult and so desperately want what they believe to be true they remain in the group. 
 
Montell closes the book with many examples of cult-like behavior from the way in which pyramid schemes work to the latest workout fads that share a common language, ingratiate themselves to members, and make promises that their workout will transform people’s lives. Many of these programs are built on a hierarchy intended to keep people who are trying to work their way up or who have already gained some status and are looking to make it to the next level of the organization. Montell acknowledges the draw of the sense of community that may be part of joining any organization, but warns against language meant to manipulate or isolate. She also encourages readers to check what they think they know and if the group really represents the ideals and belief system of the individual. She believes that by understanding how cults work to draw people in, we can better fight against being manipulated against our will. 
 
Other Related Resources
Preacher Boys Podcast interview with Amanda Montell 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m78Eqc9orYQ
 
WGN News Interview with Amanda Montell
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMGHw1xRqy4
 
The Atlantic: We Choose Our Cults Everyday
https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2021/06/review-cultish-amanda-montell-language-fanaticism/619165/
 
Podcast and Blog about Cults
https://thecultishshow.com
 
Psychological Figures and Concepts
Solomon Asch
Albert Bandura
Daniel Kahneman
Phillip Zimbardo
 
Amygdala
Anti-depressants
Cognitive dissonance
Confirmation bias 
Conformity
Control group
Dissociation
Dopamine
Endorphins
Frontal cortex
Foot-in-the-door
Group therapy
Heuristics
In-group bias
Obedience
Out-group bias
Oxytocin
Placebo
Post-traumatic stress disorder
Pseudoscience
Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
Sunken cost fallacy