From Scientific American
The notion that the brain and central nervous system are made of circuits that process stimuli and evoke bodily responses is a founding principle of neuroscience. And we humans believe that once we understand every neural pathway, we will be able to predict a motor response to every sensory input—from feeling the tug of a fish on a hook to catching your spouse in bed with someone else. All we have to do is build the right deterministic model of the brain. In Decisions, Uncertainty, and the Brain: The Science of Neuroeconomics, Paul W. Glimcher, an associate professor of neural science and psychology at New York University, recounts how the history of neuroscience has brought humankind to this reflex-based model—and then explains why it is insufficient. Simple behaviors might arise from stimulus-response rules, he allows, but complex behaviors are far less predictable. For example, the brain can weigh value and risk, even with incomplete or uncertain information. But how? Fortunately, Glimcher points out, there is already a science to answer that question: economics, particularly game theory. Other scientists have tapped economic theory to explain the natural world. In the 1960s certain ecologists used the discipline to model how animals forage for food and choose a mate. Glimcher makes a case that "neuroeconomics" can complete our understanding of our brains. He cites his own experiments on humans and monkeys to show how economic principles can accurately represent intricate thought processes, in situations rife with competing values and interests. As the book proceeds, the going can get tough, but the historical insight is worth the trip. Readers may feel a bit unsatisfied when Glimcher notes that a unified theory of neuroeconomics has yet to be written and then admits that he doesn’t know what this theory would look like. Yet he rises to the occasion by suggesting how scientists could begin to apply neuroeconomics to define the optimal course of action that a person might select and by providing a mathematical route for deriving that solution. In this way, Glimcher says, scientists can devise a better understanding of how the brain makes complex decisions in an uncertain world.
Dennis Watkins --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
Review
"Decisions, Uncertainty, and the Brain is a worthwhile book."
-- William H. Redmond, Journal of Economic Issues
"The book is an absorbing introduction to the emerging field of neuroeconomics."
-- Kenneth Silber, Tech Central Station
"The book presents an extraordinary, thought-provoking, challenging, and immensely charming account of present and future neuroscience."
-- Wolfram Schultz, Science
"This book will surely ignite discussion and soul searching among serious neuroscientists..."
-- P. Read Montague, Nature
"Glimcher has achieved an extraordinary synthesis of perspectives that have remained isolated for far too long. He views the brain as a system designed to maximize neither pleasure nor social or economic success, but biological fitness instead. He goes on to show why this matters in fields as disparate as psychology, economics, and his own field of neurobiology. This is an impressive and highly readable journey through vast areas of scientific and philosophical knowledge."
--Alex Kacelnik, Professor of Behavioural Ecology, Oxford University
"Glimcher's seminal book is a must-read in the emerging field of neuroeconomics. His analysis of the biological foundations of economic behavior makes for exciting reading for economists and neuroscientists alike, who will be fascinated by his insightful research connecting neuronal firing and economic decision making."
--Kevin A. McCabe, Professor of Economics and Law, and Director of the Neuroeconomics Laboratory at the Interdisciplinary Center for Economic Science, George Mason University
"Glimcher does extraordinary neuroscience and relates it to the most fundamental of all questions: how the brain makes decisions. His use of game theory to characterize decision making in both humans and monkeys under conditions of strategic conflict is unique. What could be more important than studying the neurobiological basis of volitional choice in earnest? The implications and applications of his work are singular."
--Michael S. Gazzaniga, Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, Dartmouth College

A new academic field, neuroeconomics, has emerged at the border of the social and natural sciences. In Foundations of Neuroeconomic Analysis, Paul Glimcher argues that a meaningful interdisciplinary synthesis of the study of human and animal choice is not only desirable, but also well underway, and so it is time to formally develop a foundational approach for the field. He does so by laying the philosophical and empirical groundwork and integrating the theory of choice and valuation with the relevant physical constraints and mechanisms.
While there has been an intense debate about the value and prospects of neuroeconomics, Glimcher argues that existing data from neuroeconomics' three parent fields, neuroscience, psychology and economics, already specify the basic features of the primate choice mechanism at all three levels of analysis. His central argument is that combining these three disciplines gives us enough insight to define many of the fundamental features of decision making that have previously eluded scholars working within each individual field.
With this in mind, Glimcher provides a comprehensive overview of the neuroscience, psychology, and economics of choice behavior, which will help readers from many disciplines to grasp the rich interconnections between these fields and see how their data and theory can interact to produce new insights, constraints, and questions. The book is divided into four main sections that address key barriers to interdisciplinary cohesion. The first section defines the central philosophical issues that neuroeconomics must engage. The theory of knowledge already tells us much about how different disciplines interact, and in this section, Glimcher reviews those constraints and lays a philosophical foundation for future neuroeconomic discourse. This section concludes with both a defense of neoclassical economics and a spirited attack on Milton Friedman's insistence that economics must not be constrained by the study of mechanism. Glimcher argues instead for the development of "hard-economic theories", which postulate that choosers behave the way they do because of the underlying representations that occur in their brains.
The second section describes what is known about the primate choice mechanism-the physical structures in our brains that actively select among the options available to the chooser. By reviewing and integrating economic theory of choice, neurobiological studies of the frontal and parietal cortices, and psychological models of selection, Glimcher creates an interdisciplinary structure for understanding how we choose. This interdisciplinary synthesis leads to several novel insights into the causes of human irrational behavior and recasts many of these so-called irrationalities as neurobiological optimizations in the face of physical constraints.
The third section describes the neural circuits for valuation-the physical mechanisms by which we learn, store, and represent the values of the many options from which we choose. In this section, Glimcher combines studies from computer science and neuroscience with representational frameworks from economics to provide novel assessments of both the strengths and weaknesses of modern economic theory. The section ends with a discussion of behavioral neuroeconomics and the ultimate limits of the neoclassical economic program.
The book concludes with a description of a new model for human choice behavior that harvests constraints from each of neuroeconomics' parent disciplines and encapsulates the key insights from current research, as well as a review of the major accomplishments and opportunities that await the new field of neuroeconomics.