Mind Wars: The Battle for Your Brain

By Ian McFadyen and Ian McFadyen

Arguing that human beings, the so-called intelligent species, are not totally in control of their own thought processes, this new perspective on human behavior and history, known as meme theory,... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 186508316X
• ISBN13: 9781865083162
• Release Date: August 2001
• Publisher: Allen & Unwin
• Length: 232 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.5" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

Honestly Changed My Life

You might think it stange for me to say a book like this could change tmy life. Honestly though My thinking is changed and I feel as though my eyes have me let go and I had let myself slip deeper into understanding things. It is a very interesting book that anyone can undertsand. It presents a new consept and new perspective on how thoughts, consepts, ideas, and tenets are transmitted from person to person and survive as virus (the only both living and nonliving thing in existance besides God).

On indoctrination

Mindwars reads like a how-to guide to forming a new religion or anti-establishment revolution, even with numbered steps. McFadyen likens the spread of doctrines (and really ideas) to the spread of viruses and the coopting of DNA replication. He shows how religious/political/scientific movements can take hold of people. To his credit, he seems to be equally critical of all three of those subject areas. The only real great leap he takes over meme theory, is that he sees the human as a vehicle for the spread of (what he claims is) the superior lifeform that is the doctrine/tenet; superior simply because it "controls us" and we're the dominant species. Regardless, the way he shows how religion/science/politics go about convincing people their way is right, and how he shows why some people refuse to change their point of view, can be helpful for determining an approach for combating those situations.

Chasing Imaginary Rabbits Down A Hole

A fresh look at human behavior/beleif systems from outside the academic circle. McFayden is an astute observer, who doesn't bother to reduce human activity and beleif systems to abstract principles or hidden mechanisms(imaginary rabbits), but describes them and how they change as a process. Academia, on the other hand, has the tendency to look for hidden mechanisms(imaginary rabbits), rather than simply looking at 'what is happening'. Reminds me a lot of the late philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein actually.