A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future Read Online Free PDF

comfortable with holistic, intuitive, and nonlinear reasoning. They tend to become inventors, entertainers, and counselors. And these individual inclinations go on to shape families, institutions, and societies.
    Call the first approach L-Directed Thinking. It is a form of thinking and an attitude to life that is characteristic of the left hemisphere of the brain—sequential, literal, functional, textual, and analytic. Ascendant in the Information Age, exemplified by computer programmers, prized by hardheaded organizations, and emphasized in schools, this approach is directed by left-brain attributes, toward left-brain results. Call the other approach R-Directed Thinking. It is a form of thinking and an attitude to life that is characteristic of the right hemisphere of the brain—simultaneous, metaphorical, aesthetic, contextual, and synthetic. Underemphasized in the Information Age, exemplified by creators and caregivers, shortchanged by organizations, and neglected in schools, this approach is directed by right-brain attributes, toward right-brain results. *
    Of course, we need both approaches in order to craft fulfilling lives and build productive, just societies. But the mere fact that I feel obliged to underscore that obvious point is perhaps further indication of how much we’ve been in the thrall of reductionist, binary thinking. Despite those who have deified the right brain beyond all scientific evidence, there remains a strong tilt toward the left. Our broader culture tends to prize L-Directed Thinking more highly than its counterpart, taking this approach more seriously and viewing the alternative as useful but secondary.
    But this is changing—and it will dramatically reshape our lives. Left-brain-style thinking used to be the driver and right-brain-style thinking the passenger. Now, R-Directed Thinking is suddenly grabbing the wheel, stepping on the gas, and determining where we’re going and how we’ll get there. L-Directed aptitudes—the sorts of things measured by the SAT and deployed by CPAs—are still necessary. But they’re no longer sufficient. Instead, the R-Directed aptitudes so often disdained and dismissed—artistry, empathy, taking the long view, pursuing the transcendent—will increasingly determine who soars and who stumbles. It’s a dizzying—but ultimately inspiring—change. And in the next chapter, I’ll explore the reasons why it’s happening.
    *The photos I saw during this phase of the research came from a standard set of images called the International Affective Picture System (IAPS). The creator and owner of the IAPS, Professor Peter J. Lang of the University of Florida, requested that I not reproduce any of these images in this book. “Making these materials familiar to the general public can seriously compromise their value as stimuli in many research projects,” he explained. The image I’ve reprinted, therefore, is not from the actual IAPS collection. But it is similar in subject, tone, and composition to the photos in this experiment.
    *Because very few things human beings do are governed exclusively by one hemisphere or the other, I’ve chosen the terms “L-Directed” and “R-Directed” instead of the more convenient “left-brain thinking” and “right-brain thinking.” This is not a book about neuroscience, of course. It’s a book that uses neuroscience to create a metaphor. But even (perhaps especially) in the realm of metaphor, it’s important to be true to the science.

Three
    HIGH CONCEPT,
    HIGH TOUCH
    T hink of the last 150 years as a three-act drama.
In Act I, the Industrial Age, massive factories and efficient assembly lines powered the economy. The lead character in this act was the mass production worker, whose cardinal traits were physical strength and personal fortitude.
    In Act II, the Information Age, the United States and other nations began to evolve. Mass production faded into the background, while information and knowledge fueled the