Barber has made some of the most significant contributions to our knowledge of the mind. While others were making extravagant claims about the powers of the mind, Barber was testing what people could actually do in altered states like Yoga and hypnosis and under the influence of LSD, and using techniques like biofeedback.

This is one of his most important works, where he reviews research that tests what happens during hypnosis. Can a suggestion cause a blister to raise ? Can someone's heart be stopped by a suggestion ? Do people really believe they are someone else in a stage hypnosis show ? Barber made some of the most careful tests of these claims and his results are documented in this book. He also introduces his original model for testing hypnosis, the task motivation protocol, where results are compared for people who are motivated to produce results vs. hypnotized to produce results.

Barber came out of all of this with the remarkable conclusion that many of the effects claimed for hypnosis were real, but that they don't require hypnosis ! He found remarkable powers of mind, but at the same time stripped away much of the mystique of "trance."

This book is a great classic of behavioral science, a must for anyone interested in hypnosis or suggestion from any perspective. It joins Hilgard's "Hypnotic Susceptibility," as one of the small handful of essential classics of hypnosis and suggestion research. It was republished in 1995, but quickly sold out of stock. If you can find a copy, grab it.

Barber gives many examples of bird behaviour that he calls intelligent. The major problem with this book lies in his definition of intelligence. Basically, he calls anything intelligent that is more than the kind of automatic reaction that an animal could acquire through stimulus-response associations. As far as I can tell, he claims that anything more than an automatic response shows intelligence essentially equivalent to that of humans. However, it has been known for decades that most animals can do more than automatically perform actions that were rewarded in the past and avoid those that were punished, without knowledge of what they are doing. Some of these extra capacities are not what most people would call intelligent, others look much more impressive, yet the animal's known behavioural capacities still fall short of what humans can do. Barber ignores all that. For a solidly scientific account of a grey parrott's achievements, read Irene Pepperberg's "The Alex Studies". For a somewhat easier read, try Bernd Heinrich's "The Mind of the Raven".

I could almost hear the sniggers after reading this book and was not surpised to find the lead review here disclaiming this work as 'simplistic.' Actually, biology is simplistic. Mammals are evolved from a recent common ancestor and built around a pretty homogenious genetic bluprint. Biotech is taking advantage of this simple fact; a company in California has engineered a lab mouse possessing the entire human immune system: humans and mice are simply that closely related functionally and genetically. Birds are not mammals, but they are vertebrates. The brainiest vertebrates besides mammals in fact. Some of the more highly developed birds (parrots) indeed possess more neural and cognitve fire power than the least developed mammals (small shrews). This book is important in that it challenges some long held false dogmas of standard biology going back to the dark ages, namely that humans and animals are distinct. Reality check: humans ARE animals. By and large mammals are variations on an homologous theme. Birds, being vertebrates, are highly analogous with, if not homologous in that they are vertebrates with mammals, which are, you guessed it, vertebrates; mammals and birds, two very brainy vertebrates. What does it mean to be a brainy vertebrate? The dogma Dr. Barber imposes on here is that to anthropomorphize is a scientific sin. To anthropomorphize is to assume that one brainy vertebrate could possibly have similar cognitive and emotional experiences as another. Mammals have large brains and can cognize, birds have large brains and can cognize. This isn't an oversimplifying anthropomorphization, it's a fact, it's the scientific identification of a universal. Not only do mammals as a class possess practically identical adreno/hypothalamic hormones and neuropeptides (what defines soul? ask an endocrinologist), but so does the lowly vertebrate the hagfish. No one said it better than the cantankerous genious Schopenhauer, "No one who himself has any intelligence will doubt its existence in the higher animals." After perusing the experimental evidence of the likes of Dr. Pepperberg's Alex, one can hardly doubt the higher intelligence of birds as rivals in neural processing capacity with mammals in the phylum chordata. Let's face it people, intelligence is a function of brains and birds have some significant gray matter relative to the animal kingdom at large. Biologically in fact we may anthropomorphize over the common terms of the subphylum vertebrata and that consciousness derives from brains. Facts long eschewed by anthropocentric metaphysicians, but long overdue in biology as a science. Kudos to Dr. Barber for his bold illumination of these simple biological facts. A helpful reference work for those pursuing cognitition as a hard science.

I can't tell you how glad I am I found this book at a bookstore. I learned so much about birds, other animals and even insects. Reading this book is the first time I really read about Alex the famous African Grey parrot, who is capable of so many things we consider human, such as counting, identifiying colors, shapes, textures, and can request what he wants with sentence as a human can. Not only African Greys are intellegent, this book discusses and gives amazing stories about so many types of birds, from pet budgies to wild birds. I learned facts about avian navigation and body language and their songs. Many facts were brought up about wild birds (and pets) that seemed so human I was amazed. I felt I was really getting an intimate look at the world of birds as I read this book. The author also included a chapter called "Are all animals intellegent?". I was very excited to read this as I learned things about gorillas, chimpanzees, dolphins, whales, and even fish, ants and honeybees that amazed me. There is a very nice set of color photographs in the middle of the book, the first one of a rosella grooming a cockatiel being my favorite. If you love animals or have a curiosity about the intellegence of animals, I highly recommend this book!