The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral MindNational Book Award Finalist: "This man's ideas may be the most influential, not to say controversial, of the second half of the twentieth century."— Columbus Dispatch At the heart of this classic, seminal book is Julian Jaynes's still-controversial thesis that human consciousness did not begin far back in animal evolution but instead is a learned process that came about only three thousand years ago and is still developing. The implications of this revolutionary scientific paradigm extend into virtually every aspect of our psychology, our history and culture, our religion—and indeed our future. "Don't be put off by the academic title of Julian Jaynes's The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. Its prose is always lucid and often lyrical...he unfolds his case with the utmost intellectual rigor."— The New York Times "When Julian Jaynes . . . speculates that until late in the twentieth millennium BC men had no consciousness but were automatically obeying the voices of the gods, we are astounded but compelled to follow this remarkable thesis."—John Updike, The New Yorker "He is as startling as Freud was in The Interpretation of Dreams, and Jaynes is equally as adept at forcing a new view of known human behavior."— American Journal of Psychiatry |
Contents
The Consciousness of Consciousness | |
Consciousness | |
The Mind of Iliad | |
The Bicameral Mind | |
The Double Brain | |
The Origin of Civilization | |
Gods Graves and Idols | |
Literate Bicameral Theocracies | |
A Change of Mind in Mesopotamia | |
The Intellectual Consciousness of Greece | |
The Moral Consciousness of the Khabiru | |
MODERN WORLD | |
The Quest for Authorization | |
Hypnosis | |
Schizophrenia | |
The Auguries of Science | |
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Common terms and phrases
Achilles analog ancient animal aoidoi Assyrian auditory hallucinations become beginning behavior bicameral kingdoms bicameral mind bicameral paradigm bicameral voice brain breakdown called changes chapter civilizations collective cognitive imperative command culture cuneiform described divine Dorian invasions E. R. Dodds earlier Egypt epic evidence evolution experience eyes feel function glossolalia gods Greek hallucinated voices hallucinations Hammurabi hear heard Hesiod Hittite human hypnosis hypnotic hypostases idols Iliad important introspect kind king language later learning left hemisphere Marduk mentality Mesopotamia metaphier metaphor metaphrand mind-space narratization nervous system neurological noos occur Odyssey Olmec omens oracles paraphrands particularly patients perhaps period person phenomena phrenes poem poetry poets possession problem psyche Psychology relationship right hemisphere schizophrenia second millennium B.C. sense similar simply social sometimes spatial speak speech subjective consciousness suggest tablets temporal lobe theocracy theory things thumos trance translated Umbanda visual Wernicke's area word ziggurats