Quick takeaways

• The left and right hemispheres of the brain have different ways of attending to and experiencing the world, with the left focusing on manipulating the world and the right sustaining a sense of being in the world and broad attention.

• The left hemisphere's perspective, dominated by control and mechanistic thinking, has influenced recent centuries of Western civilization, leading to reductionism in fields like economics, while the right hemisphere's perspective emphasizes context, collaboration, and understanding human interactions.

• Attention plays a crucial role in shaping our experience of the world, and a reductionist, mechanistic view limits our ability to find meaning and fulfillment; cultivating a balanced and holistic understanding of the brain can lead to a more accurate perception of reality.

Deep dives