{"product_id":"brain-fiction-self-deception-and-the-riddle-of-confabulation-9780262582711","title":"Brain Fiction: Self-Deception and the Riddle of Confabulation","description":"\u003cp\u003e • Author(s): William Hirstein\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher: Bradford Book\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher Imprint: Bradford Book\u003cbr\u003e • BISAC: Neuropsychology\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSome neurological patients exhibit a striking tendency to confabulate--to construct false answers to a question while genuinely believing that they are telling the truth. A stroke victim, for example, will describe in detail a conference he attended over the weekend when in fact he has not left the hospital. Normal people, too, sometimes have a tendency to confabulate; rather than admitting \"I don't know,\" some people will make up an answer or an explanation and express it with complete conviction. In \u003ci\u003eBrain Fiction\u003c\/i\u003e, William Hirstein examines confabulation and argues that its causes are not merely technical issues in neurology or cognitive science but deeply revealing about the structure of the human intellect.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHirstein describes confabulation as the failure of a normal checking or censoring process in the brain--the failure to recognize that a false answer is fantasy, not reality. Thus, he argues, the creative ability to construct a plausible-sounding response and some ability to check that response are separate in the human brain. Hirstein sees the dialectic between the creative and checking processes--\"the inner dialogue\"--as an important part of our mental life. In constructing a theory of confabulation, Hirstein integrates perspectives from different fields, including philosophy, neuroscience, and psychology to achieve a natural mix of conceptual issues usually treated by philosophers with purely empirical issues; information about the distribution of certain blood vessels in the prefrontal lobes of the brain, for example, or the behavior of split-brain patients can shed light on the classic questions of philosophy of mind, including questions about the function of consciousness. This first book-length study of confabulation breaks ground in both philosophy and cognitive science.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Bradford Book","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":46891615387799,"sku":"9780262582711","price":4535.0,"currency_code":"INR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0666\/3471\/1191\/files\/9780262582711.webp?v=1770275349","url":"https:\/\/atlanticbooks.com\/products\/brain-fiction-self-deception-and-the-riddle-of-confabulation-9780262582711","provider":"Atlantic Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}