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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. How does Eagleton support his statement about what is or is not hard wired into our brains?

2. What proved difficult in programming robots?

3. How does Eagleman compare the conscious mind to the senses in a human being?

4. What does Chapter 4 explore?

5. How does Eagleman compare thinking with seeing?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Eagleman see many of the small sub-routines of the mind and what example does he give?

2. What does Eagleman have readers consider about Whitman?

3. How does Eagleman use an example of early robotics to illustrate how the mind may be divided?

4. What does Eagleman suggest about our culpability in our actions, particularly males?

5. What does Eagleman say about a man named Alex?

6. What does Eagleman say is hard wired into our brains?

7. What does Eagleman write about Kenneth Parks?

8. How does Eagleman compare the conscious mind to our senses?

9. What example does Eagleman cite to demonstrate the difference between the rational and emotional mind?

10. What happens when the frontal cortex is damaged?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Eagleman presents the example of an experiment where men were shown photographs of the faces of several women and asked to rate their attractiveness. Photographs where the women's eyes had been dilated were consistently ranked as more attractive. When asked why they had chosen some women as more attractive than others, the subjects did not mention the dilated eyes as a factor, yet they clearly were. Eagleman adds that dilated pupils in a woman indicate a state of sexual arousal, suggesting that the subjects who found these photos more attractive were acting on a natural impulse of their unconscious minds.

1. Do you think attraction is a conscious choice or and unconscious one? Why or why not? Use examples from your own life and Incognito to support your answer.

2. Discuss one situation in which you were attracted to something, e.g. a person, a food dish, a car, etc. but were not sure why you felt the way you did and relate it to Eagleman's idea of unconscious attraction. Use examples from your own life and Incognito to support your answer.

3. If Eagleman is correct about why men might be attracted to a woman, what do you think that might mean about most marriages? Use examples from your own life and Incognito to support your answer.

Essay Topic 2

This kind of social hard-wiring affects our thinking in some interesting ways, Eagleman claims. He gives an example of a difficult logic puzzle involving colors and numbers and asks the reader to solve it. He then presents a different puzzle that has the same underlying logical solution but has been rephrased to make it about people and their ages. He claims that most people find the second puzzle easier to solve than the first, even though they are essentially the same puzzle. The reason, he argues, is that we can more easily process information if we can frame it in a social context.

1. Give an example of a problem that can be put into a social context and easily solved. Use examples from your own life and Incognito to support your answer.

2. What you think the fact that social context is more real to most humans means to us as animals? Use examples from your own life and Incognito to support your answer.

3. Discuss the idea that humans are hard wired to be social and that is why married people tend to live longer than single people. Use examples from your own life and Incognito to support your answer.

Essay Topic 3

Titles often play a vital role in making a person decide to read a particular book. Discuss the following:

1. Fully explain why you think Incognito is titled as such. Do you think it is the best title for the book? Why or why not? Can you think of a better title? Why would you choose it?

2. How important is a title in influencing you to consider reading a book? Explain your answer.

3. Do you think a title needs to have direct relevance to a book's content? Explain your answer.

4. Have you ever read a book that when you finished, you do not understand the relevance of the title? Does it discourage you from "trusting" that particular author again?

(see the answer keys)

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