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By Matthew MacDonald
First Edition
May 2008
Pages: 274
Series: The Missing Manuals
ISBN 10: 0-596-51778-5 |
ISBN 13: 9780596517786
Press Release
(Average of 2 Customer Reviews)
Your Brain: The Missing Manual is a practical look at how to get the most out of your brain -- not just how the brain works, but how you can use it more effectively. What makes this book different than the average self-help guide is that it's grounded in current neuroscience. You get a quick tour of several aspects of the brain, complete with useful advice you can apply to everyday situations.
Full Description
Puzzles and brain twisters to keep your mind sharp and your memory intact are all the rage today. More and more people -- Baby Boomers and information workers in particular -- are becoming concerned about their gray matter's ability to function, and with good reason. As this sensible and entertaining guide points out, your brain is easily your most important possession. It deserves proper upkeep.
Your Brain: The Missing Manual is a practical look at how to get the most out of your brain -- not just how the brain works, but how you can use it more effectively. What makes this book different than the average self-help guide is that it's grounded in current neuroscience. You get a quick tour of several aspects of the brain, complete with useful advice about:
Exploring your brain is the greatest adventure and biggest mystery you'll ever face. This guide has exactly the advice you need.
Browse within this book
Your Brain: The Missing Manual is a practical look at how to get the most out of your brain -- not just how the brain works, but how you can use it more effectively. What makes this book different than the average self-help guide is that it's grounded in current neuroscience. You get a quick tour of several aspects of the brain, complete with useful advice about:
- Brain Food: The right fuel for the brain and how the brain commands hunger (including an explanation of the different chemicals that control appetite and cravings)
- Sleep: The sleep cycle and circadian rhythm, and how to get a good night's sleep (or do the best you can without it)
- Memory: Techniques for improving your recall
- Reason: Learning to defeat common sense; logical fallacies (including tactics for winning arguments); and good reasons for bad prejudices
- Creativity and Problem-Solving: Brainstorming tips and thinking not outside the box, but about the box -- in other words, find the assumptions that limit your ideas so you can break through them
- Understanding Other People's Brains: The battle of the sexes and babies developing brains
Exploring your brain is the greatest adventure and biggest mystery you'll ever face. This guide has exactly the advice you need.
Featured customer reviews
Your Brain: The Missing Manual, July 16 2008
Rating:
Submitted by
Randy A Lakin
[Respond | View]
I read a lot of books on science and the human body, so I expected the usual on this book. Matthew MacDonald’s book, “Your Brain, The Missing Manual” blew me away. In this book MacDonald covers the entire brain from neurons, to glands, to emotions. The book starts out covering the brains biological workings. It covers neurons, synapses, the Endocrine system and the Nervous system. Next he covers how the brain uses energy and how it gets its food. In this section MacDonald includes the Brain-Friendly Diet and explains how Protein, Fat and even Chocolate affect the brain. There is a great explanation on how the Human Appetite works. In one chapter he discusses the brain and sleep. He writes how the human brain needs light and dark to regulate the sleep cycle. In the book, MacDonald, state how sunlight or bright lights can wake you up fasters. I tried it for myself, I got out of bed early one morning and stepped outside and faced the morning sun. I was amazed at how fast my mind woke up and how clear my mind was.
The Sections on the mind’s visual perception and memory were extremely interesting. I enjoyed the Optical Illusions that he included in the book. One thing I would like to point out is that MacDonald references several websites throughout the book were you can get additional information. I found this very useful and learned a lot on these websites. In addition, the section on how to improve your memory helped me significantly. There MacDonald lists several methods on how to boost your memorization powers, don’t skip this section trust me.
The author goes on to cover such topics as Emotions, Reason, Personality and more. MacDonald lays all the information out in an easy to understand format. This is one of those books that you’re skeptical on getting, but once you’ve read it you know it was well worth the purchase price. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to better understand the brain, or just wants to improve their memory. This books is a must have on every book shelf, you won’t be disappointed with “Your Brain, The Missing Manual”.
The Monty Hall problem, July 09 2008Submitted by Matthew MacDonald [Respond | View]
The Monty Hall problem is a tricky one, because the solution seems so thoroughly counterintuitive. The short answer is that the final choice between two doors isn't a "simple probability problem" because the state of those doors (what's behind them) has been influenced by the host's prior decision, and the host's decision was not made randomly. But if you aren't convinced by the probability tree, try the game that's described in the book, and enjoy the chance to beat the pants off your friends two thirds of the time! (I know I did.) Or, for a more intense mathematical explanation, head to Wikipedia and search for "Monty Hall problem" or "Three Prisoners problem."
Incidentally, I didn't intend to give mathematicians a bad rap--during the Parade controversy a significant minority wrote in to express embarassment that so many of their colleagues had jumped to the wrong conclusion using their instincts, rather than take the time to work out the problem on paper.
Why I recommend this book, July 07 2008
Rating:
Submitted by
Hartley Jackson
[Respond | View]
There are a number of reasons why I can recommend this book.
Matthew MacDonald displays a great sense of humor in Your Brain: The Missing Manual.
He covers a complex subject as complex as the human brain in simple easy to understand language and does it in about a third the number of pages needed to cover a much simpler computer operating system.
He includes summaries of the information that can help you to use this understanding for your own brain maintenance.
I believe some of the most useful information that he provides has to do with how the brain and our own expectations can fool us into an unshakable belief in something that is absolutely untrue.
I also believe that his own brain fooled him into including a probability example from a 1990 Parade magazine article. I had read about this before and the author repeated what I had read - that hundreds of math professors wrote in with faulty logic to "correct" the solution that was given in the Parade article.
A person is to pick the one of three doors that leads to the prize. After he picks the door, the host then eliminates one of the remaining doors that does not contain the prize. The person is not told whether the door he picked leads to the prize or not. It is true, but maybe not obvious, that this first choice is absolutely meaningless and provides no information about what is behind the other two doors.
The person is then told that he can pick either of the two doors. Wording this instruction in terms of switching or sticking to the person's initial choice obscures the fact that this is now a new separate simple probability game where choosing either door has a 50 - 50 chance of winning.
If you cannot see that this simple solution is correct, it is probably because who are we to question it when hundreds of math professors wrote it with faulty logic to "correct" it?
I recommend reading this book to learn more about how our brains and others words lead us to incorrect conclusions, and about ways we might better maintain the way our brains function.
If you read the above probability example remember that the probability depends only upon the doors and has nothing to do with whether he changes his mind.
Media reviews
"One of the beauties of the Missing Manuals is that there is always something new to discover and the research is quite thorough...I kept finding snippets of information, in the way of Tips or Notes, that would give just that bit extra."
-- Graham K. Rogers, Bangkok Post
"I have reviewed quite a number of Missing Manual books and I am always impressed with them. David Pogue is a Mac master and the depth of his knowledge shines through."
-- Roger Bernau, ACT Apple User Group Incorporated
"[Your Brain: The Missing Manual is a] useful discussion of the brain & its role in development & behavior..."
-- Marty Winston, Newstips Bulletin
Read all reviews
"One of the beauties of the Missing Manuals is that there is always something new to discover and the research is quite thorough...I kept finding snippets of information, in the way of Tips or Notes, that would give just that bit extra."
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