100 books like The Spiritual Brain

Best recent book examining human morality from a scientific, psychological point of view.

Darwinians used to think humans had to be selfish and immoral. Contemporary evolution argues the opposite, that humans evolved moral limits on our selfishness in order to live together. Haidt’s is the best book presenting this new evolutionary psychology.

But it goes further to connect those scientific issues with contemporary politics, explaining why people from “red” and “blue” states cannot understand each other: they each embody a short list of human moral values, but different ones. This is a great book for thinking carefully about human morality and contemporary politics. Students love it, and so do I. 

I admit that Huxley’s final novel is a rather difficult one to read. It’s long, it goes on too long in some places, it’s kind of fiction and philosophy together, and it includes a book within a book. However, The Island is a work of genius.

There’s the utopian island of Pala (not dystopian), and all through the book, there’s the threat of the invading Rendang kingdom. It includes some Buddhist ideas with the birds on the island that say karuna (meaning compassion) and "attention" to remind islanders of the now, yet ultimately, in the end, the island is invaded, and the utopia becomes exposed as a fake.

The Varieties of Religious Experience has not only been an inspiration to me throughout my career, but has laid the foundation for the entire exploration of the most powerful experiences people have.

By combining psychology and religion, James embarked on a journey to recount and organize our understanding of religious experiences. Importantly, he also related his analysis to religion itself providing a basis for exploring the field of neurotheology – linking the brain and spirituality – long before we had the technology of MRI or PET brain scans.

His remarkable combination of philosophy, psychology, religion, and spirituality

Mysticism and Logic is a significant work written by British philosopher Bertrand Russell. It has always been a favorite of mine as it engages two seemingly contradictory aspects of human thought: mysticism and logic.

He delves into the nature of mystical experiences and attempts to analyze them with the principles of logical reasoning. By exploring these contrasting perspectives, Russell invites readers to question and critically examine different ways of understanding the world and reality. While acknowledging the profound influence of mystical experiences on human thought and culture, he subjects mystical beliefs and experiences to logical scrutiny.

By applying principles of rationality, he challenges the coherence and evidential basis of mystical claims. This critical evaluation encourages us to approach mystical experiences with a balanced and critical mindset that I feel is at the heart of neurotheology.

This book offers an interesting perspective on the potential biological basis for religious experiences and beliefs, supported by scientific research.

Even without a background in neuroscience or psychology, I still found it to be a fully understandable book, well-written but not overly complicated. In the modern era where we need to provide a logical basis and justification, it adds to the overall endeavor to bridge science and spirituality.

While I can’t say this book has many practical tips, it has deepened my perspective on the subject of spirituality, allowing me to better comprehend and visualize physical correlates of certain esoteric experiences.

V. S. Ramachandran is a gifted experimentalist and writer who does not hesitate to pursue deep and important questions about our minds. Rather than employing expensive imaging or large sample sizes, he is more likely to use a cardboard box, an old stereopticon, or a rubber hand in his experiments. 

His creativity in finding concrete ways to test seemingly vague but interesting claims about our minds has led to several breakthroughs, in our understanding of phantom limbs and our ability to treat phantom pain, and also in our study or synesthesia—cases in which people see numbers as having colors, for example.

As I can attest, he is able to transmit to his students the idea that pursuing scientific questions can thrilling, fulfilling, and so much fun that you can’t wait to get to work in the morning.

I love this book because it reveals that we are all creatures of neuronal habit, which brainwashers exploit to their own benefit. The neurons that trigger most frequently tend to dominate our thoughts. I see how the brain science revealed in Taylor’s book helps to account for our current Age of Misinformation.

With advertiser-click business models, social media allows would-be brainwashers to repeat and spread their messages beyond their former wildest imaginations. They need only plant a misinformation seed to see it spread virally by users whose neurons have been preconditioned to accept and like the message. I feel that social media regulations are needed to mitigate the creation of echo chambers in which brainwashed messages sow political polarization that threatens to make nations ungovernable.

The opening paragraph of this book is pure poetry in motion, putting me in a trance and craving to read the entire book. 

You wouldn’t know this is a book about neuroscience when reading the opening lines in Chapter 1. Connectome is a thought-provoking exploration of the brain's neural connections and their potential to transform our understanding of ourselves and our place in the world. 

Given that artificial intelligence is inspired by neuroscience it’s a great book to understand how the brain works.

Let’s face it, this book is heavy. It is a university textbook, so it requires hard work. But it is worth it.

This is a magical mystery tour into the bizarre wonders of our own brains: why spend a fortune exploring the world when you can explore your own brain sitting in a chair, for free?

By the end of it, I was left ruminating over how we really see and think and over reality itself. The book is your entry ticket to a world of wonder: your own brain.

The book is a massive antidote to all the pop psychology books out there, and will enable you to be a far more critical and insightful reader of such books.

The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons is a fun, engaging, and well-written introduction to your brain and some of the most interesting characters in the history of neuroscience.

Sam Kean is an excellent science writer—the type who draws you in so much with his storytelling that you forget you’re actually learning something. By the end of this book, you’ll know more about how the brain works, but perhaps better yet you’ll have enjoyed an array of colorful historical tales that explain how our knowledge of the brain has advanced over the years.