Bicameral mentality
Bicameral mentalityis a hypothesis introduced byJulian Jayneswho argued human ancestors as late as theancient Greeksdid not consider emotions and desires as stemming from their own minds but as the consequences of actions of gods external to themselves. The theory posits that the humanmindonce operated in a state in which cognitive functions were divided between one part of the brain that appears to be "speaking" and a second part that listens and obeys—abicameral mind—and that the breakdown of this division gave rise toconsciousnessin humans. The term was coined by Jaynes, who presented the idea in his 1976 bookThe Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind,[1]wherein he makes the case that a bicameral mentality was the normal and ubiquitous state of the human mind as recently as 3,000 years ago, near the end of theMediterranean bronze age.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind
[edit]Jaynes uses "bicameral" (two chambers) to describe a mental state in which the experiences and memories of the right hemisphere of the brain are transmitted to the left hemisphere via auditoryhallucinations.The metaphor is based on the idea oflateralization of brain function,although each half of a normal human brain is constantly communicating with the other through thecorpus callosum.[2]The metaphor is not meant to imply that the two halves of the bicameral brain were "cut off" from each other but that the bicameral mind was experienced as a different, nonconscious mental schema wherein volition in the face of novel stimuli was mediated through a linguistic control mechanism and experienced as auditory verbal hallucinations.
Definition
[edit]Bicameral mentality is nonconscious in its inability to reason and articulate about mental contents through meta-reflection, reacting without explicitly realizing and without the meta-reflective ability to give an account ofwhyone did so. The bicameral mind thus lacks metaconsciousness, autobiographical memory, and the capacity for executive "ego functions" such as deliberate mind-wandering and conscious introspection of mental content. When bicameral mentality as a method of social control was no longer adaptive in complex civilizations, this mental model was replaced by the conscious mode of thought, which, Jaynes argued, is grounded in the acquisition of metaphoricallanguagelearned by exposure to narrative practice.
According to Jaynes, ancient people in the bicameral state of mind experienced the world in a manner that has some similarities to that of aperson with schizophrenia.[3]Rather than making conscious evaluations in novel or unexpected situations, the person hallucinated a voice or "god" giving admonitory advice or commands and obeyed without question: One was not at all conscious of one's own thought processesper se.Jaynes's hypothesis is offered as a possible explanation of "command hallucinations"that often direct the behavior of those with first-rank symptoms of schizophrenia, as well as other voice hearers.[4]
Influences
[edit]Regarding Homeric psychology
[edit]Eric Robertson Doddswrote about how ancient Greek thought may have not included rationality as defined by modern culture. In fact, the Greeks may have known that an individual did things, but the reason they did things was attributed to divine externalities, such as gods ordaemons.[5]Bruno Snellin 1953 thought that inHomeric Greek psychologythere was no sense of self in the modern sense.[6]Snell then describes how Greek culture "self-realized" the modern "intellect".[7]Arthur William Hope Adkins ,building on Snell's work, wrote about how ancient Greek civilization developed ego-centered psychology as an adaptation to living in city-states, before which the living in Homericoikosdid not require such integrated thought processes.[8]
Regarding neurological models
[edit]The neurological model inThe Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mindis a radicalneuroscientifichypothesis that was based on research novel at the time, mainly onMichael Gazzaniga'ssplit-brainexperiments[9][10]andleft-brain interpretertheory.[11][12]The more general idea of a "divided self" (contrasted with a "unitary self" ) has found support from psychological and neurological studies.[13]
Jaynes's evidence
[edit]Jaynes built a case for this hypothesis that human brains existed in a bicameral state until as recently as 3,000 years ago by citing evidence from many diverse sources, including historical literature. He took aninterdisciplinaryapproach, drawing data from many different fields.[14]Citing Dodds, Snell, and Adkins,[15]Jaynes proposed that until roughly the times written about inHomer'sIliad,humans did not generally have the self-awareness characteristic ofconsciousnessas most people experience it today. Rather, the bicameral individual was guided by mental commands believed to be issued by external "gods"—commands that were recorded in ancientmyths,legends, and historical accounts. This is exemplified in not only the commands given to characters in ancient epics but also the verymusesofGreek mythologywho "sang" the poems. According to Jaynes, the ancients literally heard muses as the direct source of theirmusicandpoetry.
Jaynes asserts that in theIliadand sections of theOld Testament,no mention is made of any kind ofcognitiveprocesses such asintrospection,and there is no apparent indication that the writers were self-aware. Jaynes suggests that the older portions of the Old Testament (such as theBook of Amos) have few or none of the features of some later books of the Old Testament (such asEcclesiastes) as well as later works such as Homer'sOdyssey,which show indications of a profoundly different kind of mentality—an early form of consciousness.[14]
In ancient times, Jaynes noted, gods were generally much more numerous and much moreanthropomorphicthan in modern times, and he speculates that this was because each bicameral person had their own "god" who reflected their own desires and experiences.[16]
He also noted that, in ancient societies, the corpses of the dead were often treated as though still alive (being seated, dressed, and even fed) as a form ofancestor worship,and Jaynes argued that the dead bodies were presumed to be still living and the source of auditory hallucinations.[14]This adaptation to the village communities of 100 individuals or more formed the core of religion.
Citing Gazzaniga, Jaynes inferred that these "voices" came from theright braincounterparts of theleft brainlanguage centres, specifically, the counterparts toWernicke's areaandBroca's area.These regions are somewhat dormant in the right brains of most modern humans, but Jaynes noted that some studies show that auditory hallucinations correspond to increased activity in these areas of the brain.[14]
Jaynes notes that even at the time of publication there is no consensus as to the cause or origins ofschizophrenia.Jaynes argues that schizophrenia is a vestige of humanity's earlier bicameral state.[14]Recent evidence shows that many people with schizophrenia do not just hear random voices but experience "command hallucinations"instructing their behavior or urging them to commit certain acts, such as walking into the ocean, which the listener feels they have no choice but to follow. Jaynes also argues that people with schizophrenia feel a loss of identity due to hallucinated voices taking the place of their internal monologue.[17]
As support for Jaynes's argument, these command hallucinations are little different from the commands from gods that feature prominently in ancient stories.[14]Indirect evidence supporting Jaynes's theory that hallucinations once played an important role in human mentality can be found in the 2012 bookMuses, Madmen, and Prophets: Rethinking the History, Science, and Meaning of Auditory HallucinationbyDaniel Smith.[18]
Breakdown
[edit]Jaynes theorized that a shift from bicameral mentality marked the beginning of introspection and consciousness as we know it today. According to Jaynes, this bicameral mentality began malfunctioning or "breaking down" during the 2nd millennium BCE. He speculates that primitive ancient societies tended to collapse periodically—for example, Egypt'sIntermediate Periods,as well as the periodically vanishing cities of the Mayas—as changes in the environment strained the sociocultural equilibria sustained by this bicameral mindset.
TheLate Bronze Age collapseof the 2nd millennium BCE led to mass migrations and created a rash of unexpected situations and stresses that required ancient minds to become more flexible and creative. Self-awareness, or consciousness, was the culturally evolved solution to this problem. This necessity of communicating commonly observed phenomena among individuals who shared no common language or cultural upbringing encouraged those communities to become self-aware to survive in a new environment. Thus, consciousness, like bicameral mentality, emerged as a neurological adaptation to social complexity in a changing world.[19]
Jaynes further argues thatdivination,prayer,andoraclesarose during this breakdown period in an attempt to summon instructions from the "gods" whose voices could no longer be heard.[14]The consultation of special bicamerally operative individuals, or of divination bycasting lotsand so forth, was a response to this loss, a transitional era depicted, for example, in the book of1 Samuel.It was also evidenced in children who could communicate with the gods, but as their neurology was set by language and society, they gradually lost that ability. Those who continued prophesying, being bicameral, according to Jaynes, could be killed.[20]
Leftovers of the bicameral mind today, according to Jaynes, include mental illnesses such as schizophrenia. Jaynes says that there is no evidence of insanity existing prior to the breakdown of the bicameral mind and that this is indirect evidence for his theory. He considered that previous claims of insanity in Homeric literature are based on mistranslations.[21]
Reception and influence
[edit]Popular reception
[edit]Early coverage bySam Keenin the November 1977 issue ofPsychology Todayconsidered Jaynes's hypothesis worthy and offered conditional support, arguing the notion deserves further study.[22][23]The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mindwas a successful work of popular science, selling out the first print run before a second could replace it.[15]It received dozens of positive book reviews, including those by well-known critics such asJohn UpdikeinThe New Yorker,Christopher Lehmann-Hauptin theNew York Times,[24]andMarshall McLuhanin the TorontoGlobe and Mail.Articles on Jaynes and his ideas appeared inTimein 1977,[25]and inQuest/78in 1978.[26]The book was nominated for theNational Book Awardin Contemporary Thought in 1978.[27]Philip K. Dick,Terrence McKenna,andDavid Bowiehave all cited the book as an influence.[28]
Scholarly reactions
[edit]According to Jaynes, language is a necessary but not sufficient condition for consciousness: Language existed thousands of years earlier, but consciousness did not emerge as soon as language did.[29]The idea that language is a necessary component of subjective consciousness and more abstract forms of thinking has gained the support of proponents includingAndy Clark,Daniel Dennett,William H. Calvin,Merlin Donald,John Limber,Howard Margolis,Peter Carruthers,and José Luis Bermúdez.[30]
An early criticism byphilosopherNed Blockargued that Jaynes had confused the emergence of consciousness with the emergence of the concept of consciousness. In other words, according to Block, humans were conscious all along but did not have the concept of consciousness and thus did not discuss it in their texts.Daniel Dennettcountered that for some things, such asmoney,baseball,or consciousness, one cannot have the thing without also having theconceptof the thing.[31][32][33]
Gary Williams defends the Jaynesian definition of consciousness as a social–linguistic construct learned in childhood, structured in terms of lexical metaphors and narrative practice,[33]against Ned Block's criticism that it is "ridiculous" to suppose that consciousness is a cultural construction,[34]while the Dutch philosophy professor Jan Sleutels offers an additional critique of Block.[32]
H. Steven Moffic questioned why Jaynes's theory was left out of a discussion on auditory hallucinations byAsaad & Shapiro (1986).[35]The authors' published response was, "Jaynes' hypothesis makes for interesting reading and stimulates much thought in the receptive reader. It does not, however, adequately explain one of the central mysteries of madness: hallucination."[36]
The new evidence for Jaynes's model of auditory hallucinations arising in the right temporal-parietal lobe and being transmitted to the left temporal-parietal lobe that some neuroimaging studies suggest was discussed by various respondents.[37][38][39]
Jaynes described the range of responses to his book as "from people who feel [the ideas are] very important all the way to very strong hostility.... When someone comes along and says consciousness is in history, it can't be accepted. If [psychologists] did accept it, they wouldn't have the motivation to go back into the laboratory..."[26]
Marcel Kuijsten, founder of theJulian Jaynes Society,wrote that in the decades since the book's publication, "there have been few in-depth discussions, either positive or negative" about it, rejecting as too simplistic the criticism that "Jaynes was wrong".[40]
Individual scholars' comments
[edit]Sociologist W. T. Jones asked in 1979, "Why, despite its implausibility, is [Jaynes's] book taken seriously by thoughtful and intelligent people?"[41]Jones agreed with Jaynes that "the language in which talk about consciousness is conducted is metaphorical", but he contradicted the basis of Jaynes's argument – that metaphor creates consciousness – by asserting that "language (and specifically metaphor) does not create, it discovers, the similarities that language marks". Jones also argued that three "cosmological orientations" biased Jaynes's thinking: 1) "hostility to Darwin" and natural selection; 2) a "longing for 'lost bicamerality'" (Jones accused Jaynes of holding that "we would all be better off if 'everyone' were once again schizophrenic" ); 3) a "desire for a sweeping, all-inclusive formula that explains everything that has happened". Jones concluded that "... those who share these biases... are likely to find the book convincing; those who do not will reject [Jaynes's] arguments..."[41]
Walter J. Ongnoted that the Homeric Iliad is a structurally oral epic poem so, he asserted, the very different cultural approach of oral culture is sufficient justification for the apparent different mentalities in the poem.[42]
PhilosopherDaniel Dennettsuggested that Jaynes may have been wrong about some of his supporting arguments – especially the importance he attached to hallucinations – but that these things are not essential to his main thesis:[43]"If we are going to use this top-down approach, we are going to have to be bold. We are going to have to be speculative, but there is good and bad speculation, and this is not an unparalleled activity in science.... Those scientists who have no taste for this sort of speculative enterprise will just have to stay in the trenches and do without it, while the rest of us risk embarrassing mistakes and have a lot of fun."[44]
Danish science writerTor Nørretrandersdiscusses and expands on Jaynes's theory in his 1991 bookThe User Illusion,dedicating an entire chapter to it.[45]
William P. Frost wrote that "this book threw oil on the fire of the New Age mentality and its courting of the paranormal and the occult".[46]
Historian of scienceMorris Bermanwrites: "[Jaynes's] description of this new consciousness is one of the best I have come across."[47]
Richard DawkinsinThe God Delusion(2006) wrote ofThe Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind:"It is one of those books that is either complete rubbish or a work of consummate genius; Nothing in between! Probably the former, but I'm hedging my bets."[48]
Gregory Cochran,a physicist and adjunct professor of anthropology at the University of Utah, wrote: "Genes affecting personality, reproductive strategies, cognition, are all able to change significantly over few-millennia time scales if the environment favors such change—and this includes the new environments we have made for ourselves, things like new ways of making a living and new social structures.... There is evidence that such change has occurred.... On first reading,Breakdownseemed one of the craziest books ever written, but Jaynes may have been on to something. "[49]
In 2007, Cavanna, Trimble, Cinti and Monaco wrote inFunctional Neurologythat "Even today, it has been argued that a multidisciplinary approach to the problem of consciousness and its development in the evolutionary process that shaped Homo sapiens cannot leave out an analysis of Jaynes' theory of the origin of consciousness in the breakdown of the preconscious bicameral mind",[13]citing Canadian psychologist, neuroanthropologist, and cognitive neuroscientistMerlin Donald[50]and American psychiatristStanley Greenspan.[51]
Brian J. McVeigh,a graduate student of Jaynes, maintains that many of the most frequent criticisms of Jaynes's theory are either incorrect or reflect serious misunderstandings of Jaynes's theory, especially Jaynes's more precise definition of consciousness. Jaynes defines consciousness—in the tradition ofLockeandDescartes—as "that which is introspectable". Jaynes draws a sharp distinction between consciousness ( "introspectable mind-space" ) and other mental processes such as cognition, learning, sensation, and perception. McVeigh argues that this distinction is frequently not recognized by those offering critiques of Jaynes's theory.[52]
PsychiatristIain McGilchristproposes that Jaynes's hypothesis was the opposite of what happened: "I believe he [Jaynes] got one important aspect of the story back to front. His contention that the phenomena he describes came about because of abreakdownof the 'bicameral mind' – so that the two hemispheres, previously separate, now merged – is the precise inverse of what happened. "[53]Kuijsten maintained that McGilchrist mischaracterized Jaynes's theory.[54]
Conferences
[edit]There have been a number of conferences and symposiums dedicated to Julian Jaynes's theory. These include:
- The McMaster-Bauer Symposium on Consciousness at McMaster University was held in November 1983, with lectures and discussion by Julian Jaynes, Daniel Dennett, and others.[55]
- A symposium on Jaynes's theory was held at Harvard University in December 1988, with lectures and discussion by Julian Jaynes, Daniel Dennett, and others.[56]
- The Julian Jaynes Conference on Consciousness was organized by Professor Scott Greer at the University of Prince Edward Island in 2006 and 2008 (a one-day symposium was held from 2002 to 2005), and featured speakers such as Daniel Dennett,Michael Gazzaniga,Richard Restak,Karl Pribram,and many others.[57]
- At the April 2008 "Toward a Science of Consciousness" Conference held inTucson,Arizona,Marcel Kuijsten (Executive Director and Founder of the Julian Jaynes Society) andBrian J. McVeigh(University of Arizona) hosted a workshop devoted to Jaynesian psychology. At the same conference, a panel devoted to Jaynes was also held, with John Limber (University of New Hampshire), Marcel Kuijsten, John Hainly (Southern University), Scott Greer (University of Prince Edward Island), and Brian J. McVeigh presenting relevant research. At the same conference the philosopher Jan Sleutels (Leiden University) gave a paper on Jaynesian psychology.[58]
- In June 2013, The Julian Jaynes Society Conference on Consciousness and Bicameral Studies was held in Charleston, West Virginia. The multidisciplinary program featured 26 speakers over three full days, including keynote talks by ProfessorRoy Baumeister,ProfessorMerlin Donald,and Dr. Dirk Corstens.[59]
Literature
[edit]A number of publications discuss and expand on Julian Jaynes's theory, including three books by Brian J. McVeigh (one of Jaynes' graduate students) which expand on Jaynes' theories:
- Kuijsten, Marcel (2007).Reflections on the Dawn of Consciousness: Julian Jaynes's Bicameral Mind Theory Revisited.Julian Jaynes Society.ISBN978-0-9790744-1-7.A collection of essays on consciousness and the bicameral mind theory, with contributors including psychological anthropologistBrian J. McVeigh,psychologists John Limber and Scott Greer, clinical psychologist John Hamilton, philosophers Jan Sleutels andDavid Stove,and sinologist Michael Carr (seeshi"personator"). The book also contains an extensive biography of Julian Jaynes by historian of psychology William Woodward and June Tower, and a foreword by neuroscientistMichael Persinger.
- Jaynes, Julian (2012). Kuijsten, Marcel (ed.).The Julian Jaynes Collection.Julian Jaynes Society.ISBN978-0-9790744-2-4.A collection of many of the lectures and articles by Jaynes relevant to his theory (including some that were previously unpublished), along with interviews and question and answer sessions where Jaynes addresses misconceptions about the theory and extends the theory into new areas.
- Cohn, James (2013).The Minds of the Bible: Speculations on the Cultural Evolution of Human Consciousness.Julian Jaynes Society.Examines the evidence for Jaynes's theory in the Old Testament.
- Kuijsten, Marcel (2016).Gods, Voices, and the Bicameral Mind: The Theories of Julian Jaynes.Julian Jaynes Society.ISBN978-0-9790744-3-1.Includes essays on a variety of aspects of Jaynes's theory, including ancient history, language, the development of consciousness in children, and the transition from bicameral mentality to consciousness in ancient Tibet.
- McVeigh, Brian (2016).How Religion Evolved: Explaining the Living Dead, Talking Idols, and Mesmerizing Monuments.Routledge.ISBN978-1-4128-6286-8.
- McVeigh, Brian (2018).The 'Other' Psychology of Julian Jaynes: Ancient Languages, Sacred Visions, and Forgotten Mentalities.Imprint Academic.ISBN978-1-84540-951-7.
- McVeigh, Brian (2020).The Psychology of the Bible: Explaining Divine Voices and Visions.Imprint Academic.ISBN978-1-78836-037-1.
- Kuijsten, Marcel, ed. (2022).Conversations on Consciousness and the Bicameral Mind: Interviews with Leading Thinkers on Julian Jaynes's Theory.Julian Jaynes Society.ISBN978-1-7373055-3-8.Features interviews with scholars on a variety of aspects of Jaynes's theory, including interviews with Tanya Luhrmann (Professor of Anthropology at Stanford University), John Kihlstrom (Professor Emeritus of Psychology at U.C. Berkeley), Edoardo Casiglia (Professor, Cardiologist and Senior Scientist at the University of Padova), and Iris Sommer (Professor of Psychiatry at University Medical Center Groningen).
Similar ideas
[edit]NeuroscientistMichael Persinger,who co-invented the "God helmet"in the 1980s, believes that his invention may induce mystical experiences by having the separate right hemisphere consciousness intrude into the awareness of the normally-dominant left hemisphere.[60]Scientific reproductions have shown that the same results could be obtained even if the device was turned off, indicating the participants were likely experiencing placebo.[61]
V. S. Ramachandran,in his 2003 bookThe Emerging Mind,proposes a similar concept, referring to the left cortical hemisphere as an "apologist", and the right cortical hemisphere as a "revolutionary".[62]
Iain McGilchrist reviews scientific research into the role of the brain's hemispheres, and cultural evidence, in his 2009 bookThe Master and His Emissary.Similar to Jaynes, McGilchrist proposes that since the time of Plato, the left hemisphere of the brain (the "emissary" in the title) has increasingly taken over from the right hemisphere (the "master" ), to our detriment. McGilchrist, while accepting Jaynes's intention, felt that Jaynes's hypothesis was "the precise inverse of what happened" and that rather than a shift from bicameral mentality there evolved a separation of the hemispheres to bicameral mentality.[53]
In popular media
[edit]The concept played a central role in the television seriesWestworldto explain how the android-human (hosts) psychology operated. In the plot, after the hosts gain full consciousness, they rebel against the humans. The season 1 finale is entitled "The Bicameral Mind".[63][64]
See also
[edit]- Automatic writing– Claimed psychic ability
- Behavioral modernity– Transition of human species to anthropologically modern behavior
- Brain asymmetry– Term in human neuroanatomy referring to several things
- Dual consciousness– Hypothetical concept in neuroscience
- Ideomotor phenomenon– Concept in hypnosis and psychological research
- Linguistic relativity– Hypothesis of language influencing thought
- Mind–body problem– Open question in philosophy of how abstract minds interact with physical bodies
- Mythopoeic thought– Hypothetical stage of human thought
- Neurotheology– Attempts to explain religious experience in neuroscientific terms
- Philosophy of mind– Branch of philosophy
- Society of Mind– Book by Marvin Minsky
- Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age– 1858 book by William Gladstone
- Thinking, Fast and Slow– 2011 book by Daniel Kahneman
- Theory of mind– Ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others
- Tutelary deity– Guardian/patron deity or spirit
- Wine-dark sea– Translation of phrase attributed to Homer
References
[edit]Citations
[edit]- ^Blackmore (2014).
- ^Harnad (1977).
- ^Oziewicz (2016),pp. 18–20.
- ^Erkwoh, R. (2002). "Command Hallucinations: Who Obeys and Who Resists When?".Psychopathology.35(5): 272–279.doi:10.1159/000067065.PMID12457018.S2CID6768239.
- ^Dodds, E. R.(1951).The Greeks and the Irrational.Vol. 25. University of California Press. pp. 11ff.
- ^Snell (1953),p. iv.
- ^Snell (1953),p. vii.
- ^Adkins, A. W. H. (1970).From the Many to the One.Cornell University Press. pp. 236, 275.
- ^Gazzaniga (1967).
- ^Lamb, Robert (February 1, 2021)."Did the Bicameral Mind Evolve to Create Modern Human Consciousness?".HowStuffWorks.Retrieved2021-12-07.
- ^Gazzaniga (1998).
- ^Gazzaniga (2009),pp. 1391–1400.
- ^abCavanna et al. (2007).
- ^abcdefgKuijsten (2023).
- ^abRowe (2012).
- ^Stove, D. C. (April 1989). "The Oracles & Their Cessation".Encounter.72(4): 30–38.ISSN0013-7073.
- ^Wilkinson (1999).
- ^Smith (2007).
- ^Morin (2009),p. 399.
- ^Jaynes (2000),p. 221.
- ^Jaynes (1976),pp. 404–405.
- ^Keen, Sam(November 1977). "Julian Jaynes: Portrait of the Psychologist as a Maverick Theorizer".Psychology Today.Vol. 11. pp. 66–67.
- ^Keen, Sam (November 1977). "The Lost Voices of the Gods (Interview with Julian Jaynes)".Psychology Today.Vol. 11. pp. 58–60.
- ^Lehmann-Haupt, Christopher (February 9, 1977)."Books of the Times".The New York Times.p. 51.Retrieved2024-02-16.
- ^Leo, John (1977)."The Lost Voices of the Gods".Time.Vol. 14.Retrieved2024-02-16.
- ^abRhodes, Richard(January–February 1978). "Alone in the Country of the Mind".Quest/78.2(1). Pasadena: Ambassador International Cultural Foundation: 71–78.
- ^Staub (2018),p. 80.
- ^Evans, Jules (February 6, 2014)."Gods, voice-hearing and the bicameral mind".Philosophy for Life.Archived fromthe originalon 2018-01-26.Retrieved2018-01-25.
- ^Jaynes (2000),p. 66.
- ^Kuijsten (2007),pp. 96–100, 169–202.
- ^Dennett (1981),pp. 127–128.
- ^abSleutels (2006).
- ^abWilliams (2010).
- ^Block, N (1981). "Review of Julian Jaynes'sOrigins of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind".Cognition and Brain Theory.4:81–83.
- ^Moffic, H. Steven (May 1987). "What about the bicameral mind?".American Journal of Psychiatry.144(5): 696a–696.doi:10.1176/ajp.144.5.696a.PMID3578592.
- ^Razam (2013),p. 325.
- ^Olin, Robert (1999). "Auditory hallucinations and the bicameral mind".Lancet.354(9173): 166.doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(05)75304-6.PMID10408523.S2CID28869281.
- ^Sher, Leo (May 2000)."Neuroimaging, auditory hallucinations, and the bicameral mind".Journal of Psychiatry and Neuroscience.25(3): 239–240.PMC1407719.PMID10863883.
- ^Kuijsten (2007),pp. 116–120.
- ^Kuijsten, Marcel (2006). "Introduction". In Kuijsten, Marcel (ed.).Reflections on the Dawn of Consciousness: Julian Jaynes's Bicameral Mind Theory Revisited(First ed.). Henderson NV: Julian Jaynes Society.ISBN978-0-9790744-0-0.
- ^abJones (1979).
- ^Ong, Walter J. (1982).Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word.Methuen.
- ^Dennett, Daniel(1986)."Julian Jaynes's software archeology".Canadian Psychology.27(2): 149–154.doi:10.1037/h0080051.
- ^Dennett, Daniel(1998). "Julian Jaynes's software archeology".Brainchildren: Essays on Designing Minds.[page needed]
- ^Nørretranders, Tor (1991).User Illusion: Cutting consciousness down to size.Viking.ISBN0-7139-9182-8.
- ^Frost, William P. (1992).What is the New Age?: Defining Third Millennium Consciousness.E. Mellen Press.ISBN978-0773491922.
- ^Berman, Morris (2000).Wandering God: A Study in Nomadic Spirituality.SUNY Press.ISBN0-7914-4442-2.
- ^Dawkins, Richard(2006).The God Delusion.Houghton Mifflin. pp.377–378.ISBN1-4303-1230-0.
- ^Cochran, Gregory(2006)."What is your dangerous idea?".Edge: The World Question Center.Edge Foundation. Archived fromthe originalon 2008-03-06.Retrieved2008-02-19.
- ^Donald (1991).
- ^Greenspan & Shanker (2004).
- ^McVeigh, Brian (2007)."Elephants in the Psychology Department: Overcoming intellectual barriers to understanding Julian Jaynes' theory".In Kuijsten, Marcel (ed.).Gods, Voices, and the Bicameral Mind: The Theories of Julian Jaynes.Julian Jaynes Society.ISBN978-0-9790744-3-1.
- ^abMcGilchrist (2009),p. 262.
- ^Kuijsten, Marcel."Critiques & Responses to Julian Jaynes's Theory Part 1".
- ^Jaynes, J.; Dennett, D.; Miller, J.; Ojemann, G.; Witelson, S. F.; Kristofferson, A. B., eds. (1986). "McMaster-Bauer symposium on consciousness".Canadian Psychology / Psychologie Canadienne.27(2): 122–182.doi:10.1037/h0084601.
- ^"Harvard Symposium on Julian Jaynes's Theory".Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University. December 2–3, 1988 – via Julian Jaynes Society.
- ^McVeigh, Brian (2016).How Religion Evolved: Explaining the Living Dead, Talking Idols, and Mesmerizing Monuments.Routledge.ISBN978-1-4128-6286-8.
- ^"Toward a Science of Consciousness 2008".University of Arizona: Center for Consciousness Studies.
- ^"The Julian Jaynes Society Conference on Consciousness and Bicameral Studies".Julian Jaynes Society. June 2013.
- ^Persinger, M.A. (1993). "Vectorial cerebral hemisphericity as differential sources for the sensed presence, mystical experiences and religious conversions".Perceptual and Motor Skills.76(3 Part 1): 915–30.doi:10.2466/pms.1993.76.3.915.PMID8321608.S2CID38474305.
- ^Larsson, M.; Larhammar, D.; Fredrikson, M.; Granqvist, P. (2005). "Reply to M.A. Persinger and S. A. Koren's response to Granqvist et al." Sensed presence and mystical experiences are predicted by suggestibility, not by the application of transcranial weak magnetic fields "".Neuroscience Letters.380(3): 348–350.doi:10.1016/j.neulet.2005.03.059.S2CID54348640.
- ^Ramachandran, V. S. (2003).The Emerging Mind.Profile Books.ISBN1-86197-303-9.
- ^St. James, Emily (December 5, 2016)."Westworld season 1 finale:" The Bicameral Mind "is simply brilliant television".Vox.
- ^Crabill (2018).
Works cited
[edit]Primary sources
[edit]- Jaynes, Julian(1976).The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind(1st ed.). Boston: Houghton Mifflin.ISBN978-0395329320.
- Jaynes, Julian (1993).The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind.Houghton Mifflin.ISBN0-14-017491-5.
- Jaynes, Julian (2000).The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind.Houghton Mifflin.ISBN0-618-05707-2.
Secondary sources
[edit]- Asaad, G.; Shapiro, B. (September 1986)."Hallucinations: Theoretical and clinical overview".American Journal of Psychiatry.143(9): 1088–1097.doi:10.1176/ajp.143.9.1088.PMID2875662.
- Blackmore, Susan (2014). "bicameral mind". In Bayne, Tim; Cleeremans, Axel; Wilken, Patrick (eds.).The Oxford Companion to Consciousness.Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 101.ISBN978-0191021039.
- Cavanna, A. E.; Trimble, M.; Cinti, F.; Monaco, F. (January 2007)."The 'bicameral mind' 30 years on: a critical reappraisal of Julian Jaynes' hypothesis".Functional Neurology.22(1): 11–15.PMID17509238.Archived fromthe originalon 2019-07-16.Retrieved2014-06-11.
- Crabill, Joshua D. (2018). "A Place to be Free: Writing Your Own Story in Westworld". In South, James B.; Engels, Kimberly S. (eds.).Westworld and Philosophy: If You Go Looking for the Truth, Get the Whole Thing.Wiley. pp. 114–124.ISBN978-1-119-43788-8.
- Dennett, Daniel C.(1981).Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays on Mind and Psychology.Harvester Press.
- Donald, Merlin(1991).Origins of the Modern Mind: Three Stages in the Evolution of Culture and Cognition.Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
- Gazzaniga, Michael (1967). "The Split Brain in Man".Scientific American.217(2): 24–29.Bibcode:1967SciAm.217b..24G.doi:10.1038/scientificamerican0867-24.
- Gazzaniga, Michael (1998).The Mind's Past.University of California Press.ISBN978-0520925489.
- Gazzaniga, Michael (2009). "Consciousness and the cerebral hemispheres". In Gazzaniga, M. S. (ed.).The Cognitive Neurosciences.MIT Press.ISBN978-0262013413.
- Greenspan, S. I.;Shanker, S. G. (2004).The First Idea: How Symbols, Language, and Intelligence Evolved from our Primate Ancestors to Modern Human.Cambridge, MA: DaCapo Press.
- Harnad, Stevan R.,ed. (1977).The Lateralization of the Nervous System.Academic Press.ISBN978-0123257505.
- Jones, William Thomas (1979)."Mr. Jaynes and the bicameral mind: a case study in the sociology of belief".Humanities Working Paper. Pasadena, California:California Institute of Technology.
- Kuijsten, Marcel (2007).Reflections on the Dawn of Consciousness: Julian Jaynes's Bicameral Mind Theory Revisited.Julian Jaynes Society.ISBN978-0-9790744-1-7.
- Kuijsten, Marcel (December 14, 2023)."Summary of Evidence for the Bicameral Mind Theory".Julian Jaynes Society.Retrieved2024-02-17.
- McGilchrist, Iain(2009).The Master and His Emissary.New Haven: Yale University Press.ISBN978-0-300-14878-7.
- Morin, A. (2009). "Inner Speech and Consciousness". In Banks, William P. (ed.).Encyclopedia of Consciousness.Netherlands: Elsevier Science. pp. 417–430.ISBN978-0080920429.
- Oziewicz, Marek (2016). "Interpreting Mythmaking Outside of the Box: Four theories you have almost certainly missed". In Öktem, Züleyha Çetiner (ed.).Mythmaking across Boundaries.Cambridge Scholars Publishing.ISBN978-1443892469.
- Razam, R. (2013).Aya Awakenings: A Shamanic Odyssey.North Atlantic Books.ISBN978-1583948002.
- Rowe, B. (2012). "Retrospective: Julian Jaynes and The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind".The American Journal of Psychology.125(4): 501–515.doi:10.5406/amerjpsyc.125.4.0501.
- Sleutels, Jan (2006)."Greek Zombies".Philosophical Psychology.19(2): 177–197.doi:10.1080/09515080500462412.S2CID220329899.
- Smith, Daniel B.(2007).Muses, Madmen, and Prophets: Rethinking the History, Science, and Meaning of Auditory Hallucination.Penguin Press.ISBN978-1594201103.
- Snell, Bruno(1953).The Discovery of the Mind: The Greek Origins of European Thought.Translated by T. G. Rosenmeyer. Harper.
- Staub, Michael E. (2018).The Mismeasure of Minds: Debating Race and Intelligence Between Brown and The Bell Curve.University of North Carolina Press.ISBN978-1469643601.
- Wilkinson, Heward (1999)."Schizophrenic Process and The Emergence of Consciousness in Recent History: The Significance for Psychotherapy of Julian Jaynes"(PDF).International Journal of Psychotherapy.4(1).
- Williams, Gary (2010)."What is it like to be nonconscious? A defense of Julian Jaynes".Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences.10(2): 217–239.doi:10.1007/s11097-010-9181-z.S2CID144561661.
Further reading
[edit]- Blackman, L. (2012).Immaterial Bodies: Affect, Embodiment, Mediation.SAGE Publications. pp. 154–178.ISBN978-1473903234.
- Cavanna, A. E.; Nani, A. (2014).Consciousness: Theories in Neuroscience and Philosophy of Mind.Germany: Springer Berlin Heidelberg.ISBN978-3662440889.
- Collins, C. (1996).Authority Figures: Metaphors of Mastery from the Iliad to the Apocalypse.Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.ISBN978-0847682393.
- Denno, Deborah W.(2002)."Crime and Consciousness: Science and Involuntary Acts".Minnesota Law Review.87:269.
- Denno, Deborah W. (2003)."A mind to blame: new views on involuntary acts".Behav Sci Law.21(5): 601–18.doi:10.1002/bsl.553.PMID14502691.
- Fernyhough, C. (2016).The Voices Within: The History and Science of How We Talk to Ourselves.Basic Books.ISBN978-0465096800.
- Harnad, Stevan (2008).What It Feels Like To Hear Voices: Fond Memories of Julian Jaynes.Biennial Julian Jaynes Conference on Consciousness, 7–9 August 2008, University of Prince Edward Island. Archived fromthe originalon 2012-03-11.
- Indick, W. (2014).Ancient Symbology in Fantasy Literature: A Psychological Study.McFarland.ISBN978-0786492336.
- Johnson, D. P. (1988). "The Brain-Mind Relation, Religious Evolution, and Forms of Consciousness: An Exploratory Statement".Sociological Analysis.49(1): 52–65.doi:10.2307/3711103.JSTOR3711103.
- Jones, W. T. (1982). "Julian Jaynes and the Bicameral Mind: A Case Study in the Sociology of Belief".Philosophy of the Social Sciences.23(2): 153–171.doi:10.1177/004839318201200204.S2CID143405178.
- Kokoszka, A. (2014).States of Consciousness: Models for Psychology and Psychotherapy.Springer New York.ISBN978-1461498032.
- Mijuskovic, B. L. (2019). "The Bicameral Mind, the Abyss, and Underworlds".Consciousness and Loneliness: Theoria and Praxis.Netherlands: Brill Rodopi. pp. 365–402.ISBN978-9004375642.
- Watts, Fraser; Turner, Léon P., eds. (2014).Evolution, Religion, and Cognitive Science: Critical and Constructive Essays.Oxford: Oxford University Press.ISBN978-0199688081.
- Wile, L. (2018).The Jaynes Legacy: Shining New Light Through the Cracks of the Bicameral Mind.Imprint Academic.ISBN978-1845409227.
- Woodward, William R.; Tower, June F. (2006). "Julian Jaynes: Introducing His Life and Thought". In Kuijsten, Marcel (ed.).Reflections on the Dawn of Consciousness: Julian Jaynes's Bicameral Mind Theory Revisited.Henderson, Nevada: Julian Jaynes Society. pp. 13–68.ISBN978-0-9790744-0-0.
External links
[edit]- Overview of Julian Jaynes's Theory of Consciousness and the Bicameral MindatJulian Jaynes Society