Customer Reviews
Reasonably insightful, but repetitive series of expert consciousness interviews - By: Daniel Bor, 27 Sep 2008 
Involves about 25 conversations with leading philosophers & neuroscientists on consciousness & free will. It's inevitably rather repetitive given the format (half the people give almost identical answers to why consciousness is an important or difficult topic, & what free will is), & there are times when both Blackmore's or her interviewee's conversations are rather unintelligent or incoherent. But on the whole it was reasonably interesting, with some useful insights & clarifications.
Very informative, directly from the best people on the field! - By: A. Kogevinas, 24 Dec 2007 
You get all the different raprochements on the relation of consciousness to matter: You get the theories of those who believein gods, of those who believein classical laborious science & of those who suggest a quantum raprochement. I strongly suggest this book because it opens access to many other writers & books, depending on which theories includedin this book persuade you best.
Brief and kept incredibly simple - By: Theis Egeberg, 30 Aug 2006 
Roughly the same questions are given to alot of the most interesting peoplein contemporary consciousness research. It spans over psychology, philosophy, neuro-science & religion - & does so without getting boring.
It's spread out into the "conversations" & it's a very good-night read - but don't expect any real depth from it. Each conversation gets about 10-15 pages (if I remember correctly) - so it's hard to be anything but superficial.
Where it REALLY wins me over isin the way it creates a map of the different ideas & thoughts within the field of consciousness. It does this REALLY well, so if you want to get a grasp of the different ideas & paths there are to explore - this would be a great place to start.
It puts focus on free will & what consciousness really "is" - & how it is formed.
If you buy this book, please remember to look at the little dictionaryin the back, it's got all the terms describedin a way that almost everyone can understand it.
A synopsis of current theories - By: ianscardiff, 24 Aug 2006 This is not a detailed book on consciousness. The author interviews most of the current consciousness theoreticians to get a flavour of their ideas & how they differ from each other. Each person gets about 10 pages or so, so don't expect more than a brief appreciation of each.
The language is also quite technical (-there is a glossary, but it's very short), so I would not recommend this as a first read on the subject. Being a series of interviews, the text does not flow as well as a book & is sometimes rather stacato.
Overall, this is a good synopsis on the current thinking : use it to choose the theory you find most attractive & then search for books by that author to get the real meat of their theory.
