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  • We Know It When We See It

  • What the Neurobiology of Vision Tells Us About How We Think
  • Written by: Richard Masland
  • Narrated by: Matt Kugler
  • Length: 7 hrs and 30 mins
  • 5.0 out of 5 stars (1 rating)

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We Know It When We See It

Written by: Richard Masland
Narrated by: Matt Kugler
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Publisher's Summary

A Harvard researcher investigates the human eye in this insightful account of what vision reveals about intelligence, learning, and the greatest mysteries of neuroscience.

Spotting a face in a crowd is so easy, you take it for granted. But how you do it is one of science's great mysteries. And vision is involved with so much of everything your brain does. Explaining how it works reveals more than just how you see. In We Know It When We See It, Harvard neuroscientist Richard Masland tackles vital questions about how the brain processes information - how it perceives, learns, and remembers - through a careful study of the inner life of the eye.

Covering everything from what happens when light hits your retina, to the increasingly sophisticated nerve nets that turn that light into knowledge, to what a computer algorithm must be able to do before it can be called truly "intelligen", We Know It When We See It is a profound yet approachable investigation into how our bodies make sense of the world.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2020 Richard Masland (P)2020 Basic Books

What the critics say

"A masterful page-turner that braids science and the stories behind the science. Wise, insightful, and written with the approachability and wisdom that only a veteran of the field can achieve." (David Eagleman, neuroscientist at Stanford, New York Times best-selling author)

"How do we recognize a face in a crowd? Starting with this question, Masland teaches us not only how we see but how we think and remember. Step by step, he paints a picture of the brain as a dynamic, wide-ranging coalition of nerve nets. This picture provides striking parallels with artificial intelligence and highlights the remarkable adaptability, creativity, and resilience of the brain." (Susan R. Barry, author of Fixing My Gaze and professor emeritus of neuroscience and behavior, Mount Holyoke College)

"We Know It When We See It is the definitive description of the neuroscience of perception. Using language anyone can understand, Masland teaches us about the hardware - the cells and circuits, and the software - the logic and computations, that our brains use to create our experience of the world. Anyone interested in perception, machines that can learn, or how the brain works should read it." (Andrew D. Huberman, professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology, Stanford University School of Medicine)

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