This is an older series of 24 1/2 hour lectures about the evolutionary origins of the human mind. Actually, about half of the lectures are a basic introduction to the brain and mind, and how they relate with each other through physiology and psychology. He spends several lectures exploring the most common mental illnesses and tries to show their biological and sociological basis and how these maladies could persist in the genome even through centuries of natural selection. Throughout the lectures he is fairly clinically detached, almost, at times, to the level of creepiness. He almost seems to regret ethical restrictions that don't allow scientists to do certain kinds of clinical studies. I was therefore a little surprised when he finished the series with a fairly personal story of his own father and his struggle with severe mental illness. Overall, it is a good lecture series. The presenter is knowlegeable and intelligible. I have listened to several books and lectures on similar topics, so there wasn't a whole lot of new information for me in this series. I think the main new take-away I had was that sometimes genes that, in certain combinations, cause mental illness, in other combinations probably helped our ancient ancestors survive. That is somehow oddly comforting. (2010, 12 hrs)
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