El Cerebro Dividido / The Divided Mind Maneras de prestar atención y construir el mundo / Ways to Pay Attention and Build the World

Olvidemos todo lo que creíamos conocer acerca de las diferencias entre los dos hemisferios cerebrales, porque en buena medida es erróneo. Lo importante no es lo que hace cada hemisferio –ambos participan en todo–, sino en cómo lo hace cada cual. La principal diferencia es el modo en que manejan la atención. Necesitamos que un hemisferio preste más atención a los detalles mientras que el derecho se ocupa del resto. Resultado: uno de los hemisferios aprovecha mejor el mundo, el otro lo comprende de manera más adecuada. La atención no solo es receptiva, sino que altera y crea activamente el mundo en que habitamos. Por tanto, la forma de prestar atención a algo –o de no prestarle atención– tiene gran importancia. Este libro nos ayudará a percibir aquello que nuestra peculiar cultura nos enseña a no detectar.

Let's forget everything we thought we knew about the differences between the two cerebral hemispheres, because it is largely wrong. The important thing is not what each hemisphere does – both participate in everything – but how each one does it. The main difference is the way they handle attention. We need one hemisphere to pay more attention to detail while the right hemisphere takes care of the rest. The result: one hemisphere makes better use of the world, the other understands it more adequately. Attention is not only receptive, but it actively alters and creates the world we inhabit. Therefore, the way you pay attention to something – or not pay attention to it – is of great importance. This book will help us to perceive what our peculiar culture teaches us not to detect.

Iain McGilchrist es Quondam Fellow del All Souls College de Oxford, miembro del Royal College of Psychiatrists, miembro de la Royal Society of Arts, y antiguo Director Clínico del Bethlem Royal & Hospital Maudsley de Londres. Ha sido investigador en neuroimagen en el Hospital Johns Hopkins de Baltimore y miembro del Institute of Avanced Studies en Stellenbosch. Es autor de Against Criticism, The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Search of Meaning y Why Are We So Unhappy?

Iain McGilchrist is a Quondam Fellow at All Souls College, Oxford, a Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and former Clinical Director of Bethlem Royal & Maudsley Hospital in London. He has been a neuroimaging researcher at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore and a member of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Stellenbosch. He is the author of Against Criticism, The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Search of Meaning and Why Are We So Unhappy?