Table of Contents

Overture: Reflections of a Metaphysical Flaneur Part I: Brains, Persons and Beasts 1. Am I My Brain? 2. Was Schubert a Musical Brain? 3. Wickedness and Wit: Is It All in the Brain? 4. Are Conscious Machines Possible? 5. David Chalmers's Unsuccessful Search for the Conscious Mind 6. A Conversation with My Neighbour 7. Silk: Metamorphoses Beyond Biology Part II: Philosophy and Physics 8. Should We Just Shut Up and Calculate? Does Physics Need Philosophy? 9. You Chemical Scum, You 10. Did Time Begin with a Bang? 11. A Hasty Report from a Tearing Hurry Part III: Philosophy and Physic 12. Medical Ethics in the Real Mess of the Real World 13. On Caring and Not Caring 14. Coinages of the Mind: Hallucinations 15. Becoming the Prisoners of Our Free Choices 16. The Right to an Assisted Death Epilogue: And So to Bed: Notes towards a Philosophy of Sleep from A to Zzzzzzz

About the Author

Raymond Tallis trained as a doctor before going on to become Professor of Geriatric Medicine at the University of Manchester. He was elected Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences for his research in clinical neuroscience. He retired from medicine in 2006 to become a full-time writer. He has published over a dozen books of cultural criticism and philosophical anthropology including, most recently, "The Kingdom of Infinite Space" (2008), "Aping Mankind" (Acumen, 2011), and "In Defence of Wonder" (Acumen, 2012).

Reviews

"This book will be my companion for life" - A. N. Wilson, The Spectator