Book Report

Following the chain of citations in a book you enjoy can be a great way to deepen your knowledge about a subject. Some time ago, I read Malcolm Gladwell's bestseller Blink. As you may know, it is a book about how human judgment often functions instinctually, in a "blink" of an eye, rather than through a more drawn out cognitive process. It is full of great examples drawn from police work, real estate, aesthetics, and employment of how this process works (and sometimes fails). For me, it put me on a path toward rethinking my thinking and wanting to get a better understanding of my "feelings".

That book by Gladwell, along with the recommendation of a friend, led me to read Strangers to Ourselves by Timothy Wilson. In many ways, Wilson's book is about the same process Gladwell discusses, and Gladwell cites Wilson's work in Blink. Strangers to Ourselves discusses what Wilson calls the "evolutionary unconscious" a system we all rely on to do many of the things we think of as "being human". This brain network, far older than our neo-cortex, is responsible for allowing most of our senses to work in concert, but also for things like goal setting and decision-making. People who pride themselves on rationality might be surprised to learn that much of what they consider to be "rational" is actually transpiring on a sub-conscious level. Were we to ever meet someone lacking this "evolutionary unconscious" not only would they seem to lack the basic judgment we look for in other human beings -- they'd likely also be unable to see in 3 dimensions or keep their balance. While the functioning of the "neo-cortex" (our "new brain") gives us all sorts of mastery over language and argumentation, Wilson points out how it also leads to run-away confabulation. While the "evolutionary unconscious" makes snap decisions, our neocortex is capable of inventing some fairly loopy rationalizations for what transpired on a subconscious level.

One area Wilson explores that was particularly interesting to me was how it can be difficult to "know ourselves" because so much of who we are is shaped by unconscious processes we are not aware of, nor have any sort of direct access to. Ever have the feeling of really knowing who you are when you are around a close friend or loved one? That may be due to the ability to read the other person's reactions to yourself -- giving you the closest read on yourself you may be able to get. Wilson points out this is also the main value of therapy: it doesn't matter so much what form of training the therapist has bought into, the main value is in experiencing another persons largely subconscious reactions to what you have to say.

Wilson's book led me back toward one more book both he and Gladwell discuss, Antonio Demasio's Descarte's Error. At the heart of Demasio's work is what he call's the "somatic marker hypothesis" -- a fancy way of describing a "gut feeling" that helps us make decisions. Demasio discusses the case histories and experiments with individuals who have suffered brain lesions that have damaged parts of their brain involved in the sort of involuntary processing that Gladwell and Wilson describe. From this experimental record, Demasio argues that it is an error to think that what we think of as "being rational" is something apart from our feelings or emotions. Instead, we rely on "bodystate feelings" to feedback and feed-forward information that is crucial to forming sound judgment.

Our culture doesn't always reward emotion or feeling in decision-making or public deliberation -- it can seem like someone is "melting down" or "getting angry" when "bodystate" is visibile on the face of a leader -- but it's worth remembering that what we prize about good judgment relies on a whole interplay of feeling to reach decisions.

Comments

[August3366]

I really liked what you had to say about "Strangers to Ourselves." But do you feel comfortable knowing you are largely unaware of who is behind the curtain pulling on the strings of your unconscious mind. I know it is disquieting to me. And yet we are to be reasured by Mr. wilson that nothing neccessarily sinister is at work within the adaptive unconscious.