The Tyranny of the Left

[UltraBudgie]

...of the left-brain, that is.

In recent years, I have been amazed at the resurgence of what I thought was an outdated psychological theory, that of left-brain vs right-brain.  The idea being that the left-brain is rigid, analytical, logical, and the right-brain is artsy, imaginative, flighty.  It seems like over-simplified 1970s pop-psychology.

Well, modern functional MRI technology and neuroscience is revealing some startling truth to this model.  It turns out, we are far more 'split in two' that is commonly accepted.  The idea of a single, unified personality within an individual human doesn't actually seem to be supported by modern science.

I'm basing most of this on research done by Scottish neuroscientist Iain McGilchrist, documented in his recent epic book "The Matter With Things". Really, the thing is literally epic -- two volumes, 1500 pages, almost 200 pages of which are bibliography. Thousands of citations to exacting neuroscience research. In it, he makes the case that the left-brain and the right-brain each operate mostly independently, seeing the world in vastly different ways. One reviewer summarized:

The Two Hemispheres of the Brain.

The prism through which McGilchrist explains his ideas is that of the difference between the two sides of the brain. As in his previous and widely acclaimed book, The Master and his Emissary,[2] he demonstrates how the two halves perform in distinct though complementary ways. For example, ‘from the left hemisphere’s point of view, imagination […] is a species of lying, from the right hemisphere’s point of view, it is […] necessary for access to the truth’ (p. 767).

McGilchrist’s thesis is that the left hemisphere has come to dominate in our society; he maintains for instance that ‘the left hemisphere [is] being used largely for paying narrow-beam, sharply focussed attention to the world, for the purpose of manipulation’ (p. 21). It is also the hemisphere ‘devoted to re-presentation’ (p. 105), hence our attachment to maps and models of reality. The right hemisphere, by contrast, is characterised by ‘paying open, sustained, vigilant attention to the world, in order to understand and relate to the bigger picture’ (p. 21). It is, therefore, he argues, ‘a more important guide and a more reliable one to the nature of reality’ (p.134).
https://besharamagazine.org/newsandviews...gs-review/

Wikipedia gives this generally-accepted map:



The book looks extensively at the (rather gruesome) cases of full-hemisphere debilitating strokes and psychiatric hemispherectomy -- where an entire half of the brain is removed, presumably to "treat" a stubborn condition (thankfully something that is no longer widely practiced). One would think that such a radical change in the brain would completely disrupt consciousness, leaving only a vegetable, and it certainly causes great changes, but what is so surprising is that often an entire functional personality remains. The way that person views and interacts with the world changes in measurable ways.

This implies that we are all "of two minds", the left and the right brains embodying them, and that they "see the world" in fundamentally different ways. And functional MRI tests indicate that, rather than our overall personalities emerging as a cooperative synthesis of the two hemispheres, they in fact act to inhibit each other far more they act in unified accord. I think we've all seen people who's instinct is to ruthlessly suppress "the illogical", or those "pie in the sky" types who seem to disregard anything that can be measured. Well, there's science supporting the idea that, to some extent, that's all of us.

The book goes further, theorizing that this fundamental insight in neuroscience has ramifications that affect sociology. The LA Review of Books summarizes:

McGilchrist’s chief argument is that, over the last three and a half centuries, we have developed a worldview that draws almost entirely on the propensities of the LH side of the brain, ignoring for the most part the contribution of the RH side. This means that our apprehension of the world focuses largely on the particular, with a view to controlling and manipulating it. It is driven by a search for certainty, which is achieved by a kind of “divide and rule” strategy, favoring the fragmentary and all that can be measured and analyzed, while ignoring or deeming “subjective” all that which cannot be subjected to this regime.
https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/beyo...th-things/

There's evolutionary foundation for this. A hunter gatherer, potential prey, needs to be able to respond directly and immediately. It needs a useful model of how to act and respond, that can be applied instantly. There's not time to speculate or imagine. The left-brain excels at this kind of thinking, to the point where its models are its reality. If it cannot be measured and used, in some way, it doesn't exist. This is contrasted with the right hemisphere, which is constantly making models, discarding them, and moving outside their bounds. The right hemisphere has a very different sense of time, where everything is flow and change. The concept of a 'snapshot' is a left-hemisphere construct.

Really, this is very difficult to summarize, as McGilchrist spends chapters going into detail. I found Book 1 to be a almost comprehensive review of modern neuroscience, bridging the 30-year gap from when I last studied it in detail in the 90s.

So, the results of this viewpoint are astounding. Once familiar with the paradigm, it become quite apparent when you see those who insist "there is no truth beyond science", or "the universe is immeasurable", exactly what parts of the apparatus of cognition they're giving dominance to. And I think McGilchrist is right -- society is suffering a disease of the tyranny of the left-brain:

McGilchrist concludes The Matter with Things with an epilogue which is nothing less than a cri de coeur. ‘We have unmade the world’, he writes, ‘This is entirely new in the history of humanity and it is impossible to exaggerate its significance’ (p. 1310). He continues:

We would appear to be engaged in committing suicide, intellectual and moral – if not indeed literal; excluding whole aspects of reality, resulting in a version of the world that ‘computes’ as far as the left hemisphere is concerned, but is grossly impoverished and lacking in meaning. One that is, in sum, more fit for a computer than a human being. (pp. 1314–5)

Thoughts? Ideas? Thank you.

The Matter With Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World