In “Feeling & Knowing: Making Minds Conscious,” neuroscientist Antonio Damasio explores the mystery of consciousness

Emily Cataneo in Undark:

Consciousness is such a slippery and ephemeral concept that it doesn’t even have its own word in many Romance languages, but nevertheless it’s a hot topic these days. “Feeling & Knowing” is the result of Damasio’s editor’s request to weigh in on the subject by writing a very short, very focused book. Over 200 pages, Damasio ponders profound questions: How did we get here? How did we develop minds with mental maps, a constant stream of images, and memories — mechanisms that exist symbiotically with the feelings and sensations in our bodies that we then, crucially, relate back to ourselves and associate with a sense of personhood?

Damasio argues that the answers are not simple (not so simple as an algorithm, anyway) but it’s also not as complex as some theorists and scientists believe.

More here.