Maps of the mind

by Charles Hampden-Turner

This is a sort of textbook or interpretative reference book on the mind, featuring 60 "maps" or graphic illustrations on nine levels. Some maps feature more than one thinker, and some thinkers, including Hampden-Turner himself, are featured in more than one map. Levels include history/religion, psychoanalytic/existential, physiological, creativity, development, language/symbols/communication, cybernetics/psychobiology, paradigms, and myth. It includes revisions and extensions of his own 10 part theory of the "radical person," first published in Radical Man. This is not a book to read from cover to cover, but rather invites one to browse and follow his links through these labyrinths of the mind. Leafing through the pages one is caught by the fascinating illustrations. While it is a challenging read for undergrads, it could nevertheless serve them well as a reference for term papers on a variety of topics. Many of the descriptions are reasonably readable. So who interests you? Noam Choms