Patrick House is the author of 19 Ways of Looking at Consciousness. He studied mind control parasites as part of his PhD in neuroscience. In nature, there are a handful of these cases where something will get in and kind of shape or change the behavior of the organism that it's host effectively.
How does the mind work? What makes us sad? What makes us laugh? Despite advances in neuroscience, the answers to these questions remain elusive. Neuroscientist Patrick House talks about these mysteries and about his book Nineteen Ways of Looking at Consciousness with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. House's insights illuminate not just what we know and don't know about our minds--he also helps us understand what it means to be human.