Editing How the Self Controls Its Brain

{{short description|1994 book by John Carew Eccles}}
{{Infobox book 
| name          = '''How the Self Controls Its Brain'''
| title_orig    = 
| translator    = 
| image         = How the Self Controls Its Brain - bookcover.jpg
| caption       = 
| author        = [[John Carew Eccles]]
| illustrator   = 
| cover_artist  = 
| country       = [[Australia]]
| language      = [[English language|English]]
| series        = 
| subject       = [[Psychology]]
| genre         = 
| publisher     = [[Springer-Verlag]]
| release_date  = [[1994 in literature|1994]]
| english_release_date =
| media_type    = Print
| pages         = 
| isbn          = 3-540-56290-7
| dewey= 128/.2 20
| congress= B105.M55 .E33 1994
| oclc= 29634892
| preceded_by   = 
| followed_by   = 
}}

'''''How the Self Controls Its Brain'''''<ref>{{Cite book |last=Eccles |first=John C. |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/29634892 |title=How the self controls its brain |date=1994 |publisher=Springer-Verlag |isbn=3-540-56290-7 |location=Berlin |oclc=29634892}}</ref> is a book by [[John Carew Eccles|Sir John Eccles]], proposing a theory of philosophical [[Mind-body dualism|dualism]], and offering a justification of how there can be mind-brain action without violating the principle of the [[conservation of energy]]. The model was developed jointly with the nuclear physicist [[Friedrich Beck]] in the period 1991–1992.<ref name="Odyssey">{{Cite journal |last=Beck |first=Friedrich |year=2008 |title=My Odyssey with Sir John Eccles |url=http://www.neuroquantology.com/index.php/journal/article/view/170 |journal=[[NeuroQuantology]] |volume=6 |issue=2 |pages=161–163|doi=10.14704/nq.2008.6.2.170 }}</ref><ref name="Beck1992">{{Cite journal |last1=Beck |first1=Friedrich |last2=Eccles |first2=John C. |year=1992 |title=Quantum aspects of brain activity and the role of consciousness |url=http://www.pnas.org/content/89/23/11357.full.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180727094440/http://www.pnas.org/content/89/23/11357.full.pdf |archive-date=2018-07-27 |url-status=live |journal=Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. |volume=89 |issue=23 |pages=11357–11361 |bibcode=1992PNAS...8911357B |doi=10.1073/pnas.89.23.11357 |pmc=50549 |pmid=1333607 |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref name="Beck1998">{{Cite journal |last1=Beck |first1=Friedrich |last2=Eccles |first2=John C. |year=1998 |title=Quantum processes in the brain: A scientific basis of consciousness |url=https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/jcss/5/2/5_2_2_95/_pdf |journal=Cognitive Studies: Bulletin of the Japanese Cognitive Science Society |volume=5 |issue=2 |pages=95–109}}</ref>

Eccles called the fundamental neural units of the [[cerebral cortex]] ''"dendrons"'', which are [[Cortical column|cylindrical bundles]] of [[neurons]] arranged vertically in the six outer [[Cerebral cortex#Laminar pattern|layers or laminae]] of the cortex, each cylinder being about 60 [[micrometre]]s in diameter.  Eccles proposed that each of the 40 million dendrons is linked with a mental unit, or ''"psychon"'', representing a unitary [[consciousness|conscious]] experience. In willed actions and thought, psychons act on dendrons and, for a moment, increase the probability of the firing of selected [[neuron]]s through [[quantum tunneling]] effect in [[synapse|synaptic]] [[exocytosis]], while in perception the reverse process takes place.

'''Previous mention of the "psychon"'''

The earliest prior use of the word "psychon" with a similar meaning<ref>{{Cite web |title=psychon |url=https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=psychon&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cpsychon%3B%2Cc0#t1%3B%2Cpsychon%3B%2Cc1 |website=Google Books ngram viewer}}</ref> of an "element of consciousness" is in the book "Concerning Fluctuating and Inaudible Sounds" by K. Dunlap in 1908.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Dunlap |first=K. |year=1908 |title=Concerning Fluctuating and Inaudible Sounds |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-DgvAAAAYAAJ&q=%22psychon%22&pg=RA1-PA40}}</ref>
The most popular prior use is in [[Robert Heinlein]]'s short story [[Gulf (novella)|Gulf]], wherein a character refers to the fastest speed of thought possible as "one psychon per chronon".

==See also==
* [[Human brain#Brain and mind|Brain and mind]]
* [[Dualism (philosophy of mind)#Interactionism|Dualistic interactionism]]

==References==
<references/>

{{Consciousness}}

[[Category:Science books]]
[[Category:Works about consciousness]]


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