Beyond the Zonules of Zinn: A Fantastic Journey Through Your Brain
by David Bainbridge
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Book Summary Information
Author: David BainbridgeEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2008-02-28
ISBN: 0674026101
Number of pages: 352
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Book Reviews of Beyond the Zonules of Zinn: A Fantastic Journey Through Your Brain
Book Review: Irresistible
Summary: 5 Stars
When I came across 'Beyond the Zonules of Zinn' by David Bainbridge, memories of Harlan Ellison's SF story 'Adrift Off the Islets of Langerhans' had me searching for more details. Now, as most of you likely know, the Islets of Langerhans are where the hormone producing cells of the pancreas are grouped. The details of the Bainbridge book indicated that the Zonules, like the Islets, were an anatomical structure, but that the book was, unlike the Islets, fact not fiction and dealt with the central nervous system and the brain. It was structured as a trip - an exceedingly fantastic voyage - up the spinal cord and into the brain, discussing the extraordinary features which occur seemingly at every millimeter along the way.
Now I am not only an SF fan (so that the very title of Bainbridge's book made purchasing it inescapable) but I occasionally - well, actually, only too frequently - buy books based on their cover, and this cover pledged a journey into surrealistic realms. Snakes, booze, Odalisques (that is, sex), food, flowers, music...all seemed inevitable companions on the pilgrimage. But, yet again, I find books about the structure and the working of the brain and the mind virtually irresistible, and have done so since my first year at university, 54 years ago, when I discovered the Medical Library (yes, I'm really that old a fart). I had to buy the book. And I am penning this short article because it not only lived up to expectations, but surpassed them in terms of wit, humour, graceful writing, and, above all, interest and knowledge. I urge all who are inquisitive readers, to buy the book.
For those, who like me on reading the words Zonules of Zinn, want to know just what they are, it is that they are features of the eye. The lens of the eye is focussed by a muscular ciliary which acts to flatten the lens by connections between the muscle and the lens. These connections are the `many minuscule fibers...tiny tendrils, the most delicate part of the brain' called the Zonules of Zinn. And if you're worried about that last statement - `the most delicate parts of the brain' being within the eye - well, that's not an error. Bainbridge points out that the eyeball, in a fetus, is initially a plaque on the skin of the embryo to which part of the brain is attracted. This stalk turns into a cup which almost surrounds the eye plaque, and then closes off the sequestration with the cornea. But the interior of the eye - the retina - and the optic nerve (or tract) are one, and part of the brain. As Bainbridge says: "So when you gaze lovingly into somebody's eyes, you are actually staring at the perforated frontmost extension of his or her brain... Yes, the iris is the brain - the window on the soul after all...and it is the only part of the brain which can move itself".
Which I think is pretty fantastic. But there is much, much more in the book. You will learn about other SF landscape features, such as The Island of Reil, The Islands of Calleja, Galen's Bridge, Area 51 (which may be an alien site after all!), and "the Tolkienesque Tract of Goll". What about the stegosaurus' second brain - is it real? Why do shingles come in stripes? What is the origin of gin, and how is it connected to the central nervous system? Why does the world spin when you lie down after a heavy bout of drinking? Was it just a conceit of Herman Melville to have Ishmael say : "...whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul...whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me...then I account it high time to get to sea", or is there some neurological underpinning to Ishmael's `hypos'? And are vertebrates simply the insect body plan turned upside down? How new are language and color in the evolution of humans? Was Richard Feynman `the most convincing creative synesthete'? Questions which are raised, and answered in this wonderful book.
Summary of Beyond the Zonules of Zinn: A Fantastic Journey Through Your Brain
In his latest book, David Bainbridge combines an otherworldly journey through the central nervous system with an accessible and entertaining account of how the brain's anatomy has often misled anatomists about its function. Bainbridge uses the structure of the brain to set his book apart from the many volumes that focus on brain function. He shows that for hundreds of years, natural philosophers have been interested in the gray matter inside our skulls, but all they had to go on was its structure. Almost every knob, protrusion, canal, and crease was named before anyone had an inkling of what it did--a kind of biological terra incognita with many weird and wonderful names: the zonules of Zinn, the obex ("the most Scrabble-friendly word in all of neuroanatomy"), the aqueduct of Sylvius, the tract of Goll.
This uniquely accessible approach lays out what is known about the brain (its structure), what we can hope to know (its function), and what we may never know (its evolution). Along the way Bainbridge tells lots of wonderful stories about the "two pounds of blancmange" within our skulls, and tells them all with wit and style.
(20080101)General Books
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