On this episode of “Death in The Garden,” we discuss the incredibly fascinating, profound, and instructive book, The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World by Iain McGilchrist. Following a similar structure to the book, we first talk about what brain lateralization is; what the difference between the left and right hemisphere is (along with the misconceptions); the importance of attention, metaphor, and theory of mind; and then we talk about why this concept of left brain dominance (with right brain primacy) is so important. We then dive into the history as McGilchrist lays it out in his expansive book, showing the oscillation between the right hemisphere being respected, and the left hemisphere taking control. Always orienting towards the distinction between manifestions of right and left hemisphere attitudes and behaviors, we discuss antiquity, Ancient and Classical Greece, Rome, the Renaissance and Reformation, the Enlightenment, Romanticism and the Industrial Revolution, Modernism and Postmodernism, ending on today, where the left hemisphere (which governs our impulse towards mechanical thinking, control, quantification, objectivication, among so many other qualities) has taken dominion, leaving our humanity and earth systems imperiled. Of course, we talk about death, and the fear of death, and its profound role in all of this, as the left hemisphere abhors death and all that is uncertain. We then discuss what we might be able to do in the face our awareness of this incredibly potent phenomenon, and how we might again, allow the right hemisphere to resume its rightful place as Master.

This book is profoundly important (perhaps one of the most important books of our time), so please buy it, read it, and come to your own conclusions.

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