The Master and His Emissary
Iain McGilchrist, 2009, The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World
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Why is the brain divided?
The difference between right and left hemispheres has been puzzled over for centuries. Drawing upon a vast body of brain research, the renowned psychiatrist, author, and thinker Iain McGilchrist reveals that the difference between the two sides is profound―two whole, coherent, but incompatible ways of experiencing the world.
The detail-oriented left hemisphere prefers mechanisms to living things and is inclined to self-interest, while the right hemisphere has greater breadth, flexibility, and generosity.
McGilchrist takes the reader on a journey through the history of Western culture, illustrating the tension between these two worlds as revealed in the thought and belief of thinkers and artists from the ancient to the modern, from Aeschylus to Magritte.
He ultimately argues that, despite its inferior grasp of reality, the left hemisphere is increasingly taking precedence in today’s world―with potentially disastrous consequences.
Key-ideas
- The different functions of the two hemispheres of your brain and what this means for how you experience the world.
- How language and categorisation can stifle and give the false illusion of understanding our own reality.
- How the types of attention we pay to the world dramatically impact the way we perceive the world.
Brain modes cycle
Which tool are we looking for?
- Intuition, imagination
- Analysis, reason, science
- Aha, Eureka, Fit in?, I see it!
How do you approach it?
- Picnic
- Builder job
- Rabbit hole, let it go, wait & see
How does it work?
- Context, directions, flow, connections, whole, dynamic, meaning
- Parts, categories, black or white, static, mechanics. just isolated elements.
- Maps of meaning, deep understanding.