Kludge

Kludge -- The Haphazard Construction of the Human Mind (脳はありあわせの材料から生まれた)
Gary Marcus
ISBN 978-4-15-208997-7 (Japanese Translation)

I thought this book is about evolutionary theory of brains at first.
But, Gary Marcus, author of the book, is a psychologist, and this book focuses on characteristic features of human mind and its relationship with history of human (brain) evolution.

Our brains are consists of mainly two parts.
One is very old one, paleocortex, which rules instinctive and involuntary activities.
The other is a relatively new one, neocortex which rules higher level activities such as rational nature.

Here, one more important point is that the multiple layer structure was not designed from scratch. According to mutations and natural selection, the above structure of us survived just because it had an advantage in the evolutionary processes. In this sense, Marcus says "Kludge" to describe the design of human brain. Furthermore, we need to concentrate or calm down to use the functions of neocortex. That often leads us doing irrational things especially when they appeals to our instinct.

Marcus also mentions that neocortex was developed too quickly.
That's why it's difficult for us to make full use of neocotex.
Maybe we need hundreds of more centuries to do so. :o

Thus, it's different from my expectation, but anyway I enjoyed the book. :)