Abstract
Scientists and poets can agree that consciousness is like a bonfire— a conflagration in which the mind blazes and retreats, only to erupt again. Such flames, as we shall see in the next three chapters, burn within a hundred billion individual nerve cells in the human brain. Because this fire in its native setting is not to be carelessly approached or easily manipulated, we must first examine the vital essence of the neurological world: a single spark from one neuron.
Companion of my griefs! thy sinking frame Had often drooped, and then erect again With shews of health had mocked forebodings dark; — Watching the changes ofthat quivering spark, I feared and hoped, and dared to trust at length, Thy very weakness was my tower of strength. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
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Scott, A. (1995). The Nerve Afire. In: Stairway to the Mind. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-2510-2_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-2510-2_4
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