The Brain that Changes Itself Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science

I don't know if I was just not the intended audience, but for the most part this book felt too long and unfulfilling. I did enjoy many of the stories and proofs of brain plasticity, but the book felt like a chore in the short term. The author took particular pains to add excruciating detail on the sexual plasticity brain portions where it was not needed, which was a strange choice. I think this book could've done with some editing and chopping of the rather boring bits. It didn't weave together well for me. Perhaps for a neurologist it would be a better read.

** spoiler alert ** Neuroplasticity of brain seems good and also curse what's we don't want to see to happen. Remapping what's your brain will able to do and will do is seems matter of imagination and perception. Seems like visualization techniques can be as powerful as return you back to life after traumatic event. Seems quite exciting topic of course After few chapters books tells you than even after uneventful situations, your brain can learn get back and fight paralysis which is amazing hope in some sort of down situations >It will replace her vestibular apparatus and send balance signals to her brain from her tongue >that the human libido is not a hardwired, invariable biological urge but can be curiously fickle, easily altered by our psychology and the history of our sexual encounters. >Sexual plasticity may seem to have reached its height in those who have had many different partners, learning to adapt to each new lover, but think of the plasticity required of the aging married couple with good sex life. They looked very different in their twenties when they met than they do in their sixties, yet their libidos adjust, so they remain attracted. >Animals exposed to a complex pattern, such as a melody of six tones, will not simply link together six different map regions but will develop a region that encodes the entire melody. These more complex melody maps obey the same plastic principles as maps for single tones. >Children are needy and typically develop passionate attachments to their parents. If the parent is warm, gentle, and reliable, the child will frequently develop a taste for that kind of relationship later on; if the parent is disengaged, cool, distant, self-involved, angry, ambivalent, or erratic, the child may seek out an adult mate who has similar tendencies. >Whereas many neuroplasticians work to help people develop or recover skills — to read, move, or overcome learning disabilities — Ramachandran uses plasticity to reconfigure the content of the mind. He shows that we can rewire our brains through comparatively brief, painless treatments that use imagination and perception. >When Ramachandran put a drop of warm water on Tom's cheek, he felt a warm trickle move down his cheek and also down his phantom limb.

Comprehensive view on neuroplasticity

Good facts

There's hope for a damaged brain