Thank you for the instructions, I’ve started writing and have some questions

Shoot! 😊

Do you think I can quote some of the old texts in the article or is that too boring?

Well, that depends. A short, punchy one-liner should be fine.

OK, here’s a few I was thinking about using:                                         

“Thoughts stand in the same relation to the brain as urine to the kidneys” (Vogt,1846)

“No thought without phosphorus” (Moleschott ,1852)                        

“The brain creates a conscious field just as the stomach and digestive tract create digestion.” (Searle ,2005)

Holy moly! Last one’s a bit long, but those are certainly fine!

Yeah, I was doubting that last one, but I wanted to show how we still think in those same terms about the brain and the mind  😊

They do sound similar, but are they really the same, more than a century later?

I found someone saying literally the same thing as Searle, but it’s in French:

“Pour se faire une idée juste des opérations de la pensée, il faut considérer le cerveau comme un organe particulier, destiné spécialement à la produire; de même que l’estomac et les intestins à faire la digestion” (Cabanis ,1802)

OK, that is too long and too French … my high school French is quite rusty, but that does sound like literally the same, yeah. 😊

Cabanis is basically saying that the brain produces though like the stomach produces digestion, so …

You could just reference it, without the whole quote.

I guess that would work too.                                                                    

Good find, those quotes are quite thought provoking. So are you arguing against progress in neuroscience?

Oh no, not at all! Just that there’s some very basic assumptions we’ve kept since the beginning. 😊

OK, even more looking forward to your draft!

Dear Sir, my professor has told me to contact you wrt an internship at your magazine

Hello Julia! Yes, Cho told me about you. Please just call me John! 😊

Hi John! So what can you tell me about the summer internship?

We have a deal with the university where you get both paid and credit for working with us

That’s great! Just what I was looking for! 😊                                          

Cho told me you wrote a great paper about Mind and Brain, and that is exactly what we are looking for.

I saw that your article referenced it, that was so cool!  😊                 

Yep, but then there’s the boring part too: we need an intern to also do some basic copyediting, fact checking, and data entry

I understand that the internship is a lot of menial work too, getting to learn the ropes etc.

Indeed, writing for a large public is different from writing essays

I look forward to your feedback and comments then!                        

Happy to oblige! Do you already have an idea for an article?

Well, I really liked the philosophy of mind class, so now I’m looking into the history and philosophy of neuroscience

I saw there was something of that in your essay already

Yes! Some of the early stuff is really fascinating and still very similar to what we do now

Sounds interesting, I’ll send you a some instructions and look forward to your draft!

That’s great!  😊