What connects the dualism of body and mind, Charles Darwin, institutionalized religion, biology and neuroscience, the psychologist Else Frenkel-Brunswik, propaganda, extremism and Brexit? At first glance there seems to be no common denominator in the crowd. But in the end, it all has to do with our most important, most complex and, ironically, most confusing organ: the brain.
Leor Zmigrod, scientist and founder of political neurobiology, devotes herself to this in her research and in her book “The Ideological Brain”. This anecdotal and insightful work is chock-full of descriptions of various psychological tests as well as studies and findings from other researchers – always in search of the origins of ideological thinking. The history of science is combined with conceptual history, theses on the culture of debate and political essays in an easy-to-understand manner. We are often challenged to think and think.
Zmigrod is aware that research on ideological consciousness is still in its infancy. So she asks herself and us many questions that need to be deepened and answered in the coming period. What is clear, however, is that everything that happens in the brain shapes the body and that every form of rigidity and ideology manifests itself internally and externally. A complex, captivating read. Alexander Schramm
Leor Zmigrod
The ideological brain
Suhrkamp Verlag, 302 pages, € 24,-
ISBN 978-3-518-47485-3