The Good, the True, and the Beautiful

Jean-Pierre Changeux

Description

“I wrote this book out of my experiences during thirty years of teaching at the Collège de France.   In it I look both at culture and art – music and painting – as well as life in society, ethics, and the meaning of death; languages and writing, as well as the neural and molecular bases of memory and learning.   This book is a fresco that brings together a great amount of varied data, discussions, and hypotheses. It anchors the substance of contemporary science in the history of a range of disciplines: neurology, ethology, the biology of evolution, the biology of development, the study of consciousness, as well as experimental psychology and genomics.   Finally, this book attempts to show that it is up to us to relentlessly inspire the minds of humans to invent a future that will enable humanity to attain a life of more solidarity, a happier life for and with each one of us.” J.-P. C.   Jean-Pierre Changeux is honorary professor at the Collège de France and at the Institut Pasteur, a member of the French Academy of Sciences. In addition to L’Homme neuronal [Neuronal Man] he is the author of Raison et Plaisir and L’Homme de vérité. He is also co-author, with Alain Connes, of Matière à penser [Conversations on Mind, Matter, and Mathematics] and, with Paul Ricœur, of La Nature et la Règle [What Makes Us Think?]. All thought-provoking works. 

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Esthétique et philosophie de l'art
• Aesthetics
• Philosophy
• Philosophie et théologie

Informations

• Publié par: Odile Jacob
• Date de parution: 14 novembre 2008
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9782738147486
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 5 Mo

Extrait

Originally published in French as Du beau, du vrai, du bien by Jean-Pierre Changeux © Editions Odile Jacob, 2008.
A previous English version was published as The Good, the True and the Beautiful © Yale University Press and Editions Odile Jacob, 2012.
The present English-language edition is published by Editions Odile Jacob.
© Odile Jacob, January 2019.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever without written permission of the publisher. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
www.odilejacob.com www.odilejacobpublishing.com
ISBN : 978-2-7381-4748-6
This digital document has been produced by Nord Compo .
C ONTENTS

Translator's Preface
Acknowledgments for the French Edition
The Good, the True, and the Beautiful
Introduction
In Defense of Neuroscience
FIRST CHAPTER - The Beautiful - Neuroesthetics
What Is Neuroesthetics?
How Can We Define Beauty?
From the Light of Antiquity to Today: An Introduction to Plastic Arts
The Eye and Light Receptors
Antagonist Cells, Concentric Fields, and Shape
Preservation of the Retinal Image on the Cerebral Cortex
Parallel and Hierarchical Organization of the Visual Pathways
Color Vision
The Importance of Color Context
Empathy and Artistic Creation
Sympathy and Contestation
Mental Synthesis and Art's Power to Awaken
Artistic Creation and Mental Darwinism
Music and Painting
CONSENSUS PARTIUM AND PARSIMONY
SYNESTHESIA : RIMBAUD'S SYNDROME
Hearing music
AMUSIA
CONSONANCE AND DISSONANCE
MUSICAL CHILLS: THE EMOTIONAL RESPONSE TO MUSIC
Physiology of Collection and Collectors
EXPLORE, COLLECT, UNDERSTAND
COLLECTING AND CONTEMPLATING ART
Charles Le Brun, Founding Father of Neuroesthetics?
CHAPTER TWO - The Good - Neuroscience and Ethical Norm ativity
The Complexity of the Brain
Mental Objects
The Violence Inhibitor and Sympathy
Internalization of Moral Rules and Social Conventions
Ethical Normativity
ORIGINS OF MORAL NECESSITY
SUCCESSIVE LEVELS IN THE NORMATIVE PROCESS
Models of Social Life and Evolution of Moral Theories
MORAL SENTIMENTS FROM ANTIQUITY TO NIETZSCHE
THE RATIONALIST MODEL AND THE SOCIAL CONTRACT
EPIGENES IS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS
A GENERALIZED EVOLUTIONARY MODEL
The Natural Foundations of Ethics
Cultural Evolution
MODELS OF SOCIETY AND ETHICAL THEORIES
SOCIAL LIFE
SOCIAL UNDERSTANDING AND THEORY OF MIND
Coevolution of Genes and Culture, and Cooperative Behavior
KIN SELECTION
TIT-FOR-TAT SELECTION
GROUP SELECTION
DECISION MAKING IN AFRICAN BUFFALO
NORMATIVE SOCIAL INFLUENCE AND COLLECTIVE DECISION MAKING
CHAPTER THREE - Truth - A Naturalistic Concept of the World
How Have We Arrived at a Naturalistic Concept of the World?
Representation and Knowledge: The Major Stages since Antiquity
The Objective World
The Raging Beast—Cognition and Language
THE NEURAL BASIS OF CONSCIOUSNESS
NEUROPSYCHOLOGY
Contemporary Theories and Debates on Consciousness
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE THALAMOCORTICAL SYSTEM
ELECTROPHYSIOLOGY, EEG, AND EVOKED POTENTIALS
THALAMOCORTICAL RESONANCE AS A NEURAL BASIS OF CONSCIOUSNESS
CRICK, EDELMAN, AND BAARS: THE FIRST DEBATES ON NEURONAL CORRELATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
THE DEBATE CONTINUES
OUR FORMAL MODEL
THE GLOBAL NEURONAL WORKSPACE
Consciousness and Social Interaction
THEORIES O F COMMUNICATION: CODE MODEL OR INFERENTIAL MODEL?
MIRROR NEURONS AND RECIPROCITY OF COMMUNICATION OF INTENTIONS
THE NEURONAL BASIS OF THEORY OF MIND AND ATTRIBUTION
THE CONSCIOUS NEURONAL WORKSPACE: A NEURONAL MODEL OF SOCIAL NORMALIZATION
The Neural Basis of Language
LANGUAGE SPECIALIZATION IN THE HUMAN BRAIN
NEUROPSYCHOLOGY O F LANGUAGE
Epigenesis of the Sign
ALLIANCE OF SIGNIFIER AND SIGNIFIED
SYNAPTOGENES IS AND EFFECTS OF LEARNING DURING DEVELOPMENT
The Cerebral Imprint of Writing
WORDS AND WRITING
PREHISTORIC WALL PAINTINGS
THE INVENTION OF WRITING
PICTO-IDEOGRAPHIC WRITING
CUNEIFORM WRITING
Evolution of the Sign
EGYPTIAN
CHINESE
KOREAN AND JAPANESE
The Birth of the Alphabet
The Circuits of Writing
NEURO PSYCHOLOGY OF WRITING
CHAPTER IV - The Molecular Biology of the Brain
Genes and Phylogenesis
THE QUESTION OF ORIGINS: CREATIONISM OR EVOLUTION
COMPARATIVE ANATOMY AND PALEONTOLOGY OF THE BRAIN
GENETIC EVOLUTION AND HOMINIZATION
HUMAN NATURE IN SILICO
GENETICS OF BODY SHAPE: THE EXAMPLE OF DROSOPHILA
CONSEQUENCES OF RESULTS FROM DROSOPHILA
TURING AND BRAIN EVOLUTION
CRITICISM OF THE NOTION OF A GENETIC PROGRAM
GENETIC MECHANISMS OF VARIATION OF THE BRAIN
THE ROLE OF SPONTANEOUS ACTIVITY IN THE DEVELOPING NERVOUS SYSTEM
SPONT ANEOUS FETAL ELECTRICAL ACTIVITY AND PARADOXICAL SLEEP
CRITICISM OF THE EMPIRICIST POSITION
CHAPTER V - Molecules and the Mind
The Discovery of Neurotransmitter Receptors
The Contribution of Electrophysiology
Is the Acetylcholine Receptor an Allosteric Protein?
The Electric Organ of Torpedo: Identification of the Acetylcholine Receptor
Molecular genetics of the acetylcholine receptor
Functional Properties of the Acetylcholine Receptor
What Is New with Channel Receptors?
Receptors with Seven Transmembrane Domains
Cellular and Molecular Mechanisms of Learning
Evolution of Theories and Models of Learning: Birth of Experimental Psychology
Allosteric Receptors and Molecular Models of Learning
Aplysia, a Cellular Model of Learning
The Chemistry of Consciousness
THE CHEMISTRY OF WAKING AND SLEEPING
GENERAL ANESTHETICS
MECHANISMS OF ACTION ON THE MEMBRANE
RECEPTORS FOR GENERAL ANESTHETICS
RECEPTORS LINKED TO ION CHANNELS
SPECIFIC NEURONAL CIRCUITS
CHAPTER VI - Where Do We Stand Today? - From neuronal man to the physiology of truth
The Development of Brain Science: a Little History
The Power of the Genes
The Genetic Origins of the Human Brain
The Proteome and Cerebral Morphogenesis: From One Dimension to Three
Epigenesis by Selective Stabilization of Synapses
THE ROLE OF SPONTANEOUS ACTIVITY IN EPIGENESIS BY SELECTION
EPIGENESIS OF DIFFERENT SENSORY MODALITIES
SENSORY COMPENSATION IN THE BLIND
GENETIC CONSTRAINTS OF CONNECTIONAL EPIGENESIS
MOLECULAR BIOLOGY OF EPIGENESIS BY SELECTION
Problems of Consciousness
Enriching Knowledge
CHAPTER SEVEN - Epilogue
The Significance of Death Seen by an Evolutionary Neurobiologist
DEATH IS NOT CHARACTERISTIC OF MAN ALONE
THE HUMAN BRAIN AND CONSCIOUSNESS OF DEATH
THE MYTHS OF DEATH
Conclusion
The good, the true, and the beautiful
Selected bibliography
Index
Translator’s Preface

In 1985 I translated Jean-Pierre Changeux’s L’homme neuronal as Neuronal Man, and so I was very pleased when Jean-Pierre and Odile Jacob asked me to take on the English edition of Du vrai, du beau, du bien.
The original French edition, published in 2008, was compiled partly from lectures given by Jean-Pierre Changeux at the Collège de France over thirty years and was a natural progression from Neuronal Man. In this English edition, we took the opportunity to transform it into a series of reflections on the human brain from morphological, physiological, chemical, and genetic standpoints, as well as to put it clearly in the context of psychology, philosophy, and, perhaps above all, art.
The title is based on Plato’s definition of the universal questions of the natural world. He saw the Good, the True, and the Beautiful as independent celestial essences, but so intertwined as to be inseparable. This book uses a top-down approach to place the Good, the True, and the Beautiful within the human brain’s neuronal circuitry.
Molecular biology and genetics of the brain are described in terms of molecules and the mind, notably neurotransmitters, including acetylcholine and its receptor.
More global consequences are introduced, such as neuroesthetics: the definition of beauty and how we perceive it, artistic creation in plastic arts and music, and the physiology of collecting and collectors.
Consideration is given to ethics and morality and their evolution through genetic and epigenetic factors, as well as to consciousness, learning, language, and writing. These more moral and social aspects of the brain are related to the theory of a conscious neuronal workspace as a reality within the brain circuitry. Illustrations are derived from the phenomena of waking and sleeping, anesthesia, and consciousness of death.
 
I want to thank Jean-Pierre for thinking of me in the first place, Odile Jacob for her support and encouragement, and Jean Thomson Black of Yale University Press for her tireless attention to the numerous pitfalls unavoidable in such an enterprise.
Laurence Garey
Acknowledgments for the French Edition

This book owes its existence to the inspiration and extraordinary competence of Odile Jacob, her constant striving for excellence, her energy and intelligence, which have all allowed it to be produced in a very short time.
It also owes much to the application and critical judgment of Claude Debru, who contributed directly to the choice and logic of the presentation of the texts, as well as to the editorial expertise of Marie-Lorraine Colas.
These texts bear witness to thirty years of teaching at the Collège de France, and I thank its administrator, Pierre Corval, for authorizing their publication.
Jean-Pierre Changeux
The Good, the True, and the Beautiful
Introduction

The good is the beautiful… and the beautiful is the good.
—Plato, Dialogues

In Defense of Neuroscience
The human brain is the most complex physical object in the living world. It remains one of the most difficult to understand. If you tackle it head-on, you risk total failure. In the jungle of nerve cells