Here, as elsewhere, the striking phrase tips over beyond sweeping generalization to land askew ... When Eliot Weinberger chose 19 different translations of Wang Wei’s poem he also added his own trenchant commentary. Mr. House prefers to riff off the “various and sometimes contradictory theories' he presents without offering much in the way of critique, making it so'etimes hard to tell whether the author really buys the ideas he’s selling ... Mr. House seems both definitive and radically unsure ... The compressions and elisions of Nineteen Ways of Looking at Consciousness are sometimes exhilarating and at other times exasperating, but this stylish, witty and insightful introduction to a frustrating discipline whets the appetite for more.
[House] uses extended anecdotes that put complex concepts into accessible terms even while acknowledging that there are no easy answers in the study of consciousness ... House makes an interesting detour to wonder if a society of blind people could deduce the existence of the moon, while other essays look at the functioning of memory and prediction, which takes up a remarkable amount of the brain’s capacity. There is also a theory that consciousness links to movement, which is one of the most essential, if often unconscious, aspects of brain function. Though the author occasionally gets lost in his own musings, he offers readers plenty of fascinating questions about the brain, the mind, and the soul ... Mixing science, metaphors, and philosophy, House provides elegant frameworks for ways to think about thinking.