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    Natural Intelligence & the Logic of Consciousness

    Author Antonio Damasio
    Ebook
    Knopf | Pantheon
    On sale Sep 15, 2026 | 224 Pages | 9798217207558
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    From one of the world’s foremost neuroscientists and acclaimed author of Descartes’ Error comes a bold new theory of the origins—and consequences—of human consciousness

    Throughout his illustrious decades-long career, Antonio Damasio has been at the leading edge of science’s enduring quest to unravel the mysteries of the human mind. Now, drawing on a lifetime of groundbreaking research as well as the newest findings of neurobiology, Damasio seeks to move the conversation about the origins of consciousness from the world of high-level cognition and abstract reasoning into the wondrous realm of interoception—the human body’s own internal monitoring system.

    At the heart of his argument is the revolutionary idea that homeostatic feelings—those primal sensations intrinsically tied to our survival such as hunger, thirst, and pain—are the foundation of conscious experience, not only central to the body’s effort to maintain its physical well-being but carrying with them the initial glimmers of subjectivity, the very first sense of a “self.” Here Damasio redefines consciousness as a natural solution to the problem of regulation in complex, vulnerable organisms and along the way wrestles with the notion of sentience in plants and bacteria; considers the social phenomena of politics, religion, and commerce through the perspective of homeostasis; and addresses the rise and risks of artificial intelligence and its mimicry of the conscious mind.

    A probing synthesis of neurobiology, evolutionary science, and philosophy from one of the most notable leaders in his field, Natural Intelligence & the Logic of Consciousness offers readers a scientifically rigorous and deeply profound re-examination of what it means to be alive and aware.
    © Jean-Baptiste Huynh

    ANTONIO DAMASIO is University Professor, David Dornsife Professor of Neuroscience, Psychology, and Philosophy, and director of the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Awards he has received include the Prince of Asturias Prize in Science and Technology, the Grawemeyer Award, the Honda Prize, and the Pessoa and Signoret prizes. In 2017 he received the Freud Medal from the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences. Damasio is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. He is the author of Descartes’ Error, The Feeling of What Happens, Looking for Spinoza, Self Comes to Mind, The Strange Order of Things, and Feeling & Knowing, all of which have been published in translation and are taught in universities throughout the world.

    www.antoniodamasio.com

    View titles by Antonio Damasio

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    From one of the world’s foremost neuroscientists and acclaimed author of Descartes’ Error comes a bold new theory of the origins—and consequences—of human consciousness

    Throughout his illustrious decades-long career, Antonio Damasio has been at the leading edge of science’s enduring quest to unravel the mysteries of the human mind. Now, drawing on a lifetime of groundbreaking research as well as the newest findings of neurobiology, Damasio seeks to move the conversation about the origins of consciousness from the world of high-level cognition and abstract reasoning into the wondrous realm of interoception—the human body’s own internal monitoring system.

    At the heart of his argument is the revolutionary idea that homeostatic feelings—those primal sensations intrinsically tied to our survival such as hunger, thirst, and pain—are the foundation of conscious experience, not only central to the body’s effort to maintain its physical well-being but carrying with them the initial glimmers of subjectivity, the very first sense of a “self.” Here Damasio redefines consciousness as a natural solution to the problem of regulation in complex, vulnerable organisms and along the way wrestles with the notion of sentience in plants and bacteria; considers the social phenomena of politics, religion, and commerce through the perspective of homeostasis; and addresses the rise and risks of artificial intelligence and its mimicry of the conscious mind.

    A probing synthesis of neurobiology, evolutionary science, and philosophy from one of the most notable leaders in his field, Natural Intelligence & the Logic of Consciousness offers readers a scientifically rigorous and deeply profound re-examination of what it means to be alive and aware.

    Author

    © Jean-Baptiste Huynh

    ANTONIO DAMASIO is University Professor, David Dornsife Professor of Neuroscience, Psychology, and Philosophy, and director of the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Awards he has received include the Prince of Asturias Prize in Science and Technology, the Grawemeyer Award, the Honda Prize, and the Pessoa and Signoret prizes. In 2017 he received the Freud Medal from the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences. Damasio is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. He is the author of Descartes’ Error, The Feeling of What Happens, Looking for Spinoza, Self Comes to Mind, The Strange Order of Things, and Feeling & Knowing, all of which have been published in translation and are taught in universities throughout the world.

    www.antoniodamasio.com

    View titles by Antonio Damasio

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