More on the Process of Human Thought

In the article “How We Think” (by Michael D’Antonio, May 2), economist Colin Camerer jokingly states that what humans possess “is basically a monkey brain with a good publicist.” As a postdoctoral fellow at Caltech, I beg to disagree with such an egregious label. That both human and monkey brains process their emotions using the same areas does not mean the difference between us is in how we make those emotions be known. I wish that the neuroscientists would look at the brains of mothers sacrificing selflessly for their children, elderly caretakers, firefighters, Michelangelo, Van Gogh or T.S. Eliot, to name a few, so they could peek at something more than the brains of “volunteers” doing imaginary games. Get real!

Maria Elena de Bellard

Pasadena