Tony McCaffrey offers a whirlwind tour of the many ways people solve everyday problems: insightful and eye-opening while stressing each individual’s special abilities.

Frans de Waal, Emory University and author of Mama's Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves

This book offers accessible, coherent and important insights into the remarkable, and complex, world of human cognition. Tony McCaffrey uses clear and effective examples to illustrate why, and how, human language matters in understanding our cognitive process. By illustrating the overlaps and differences between human and other primate neurobiologies McCaffrey weaves a robust narrative of how we think and why that matters.

Agustín Fuentes, The Edmund P. Joyce C.S.C. Professor of Anthropology, University of Notre Dame; author of "The Creative Spark: How Imagination Made Humans Exceptional" (Dutton, 2017)

Dr. McCaffrey uses research, practice, observations, experience, thought, wonder, and synthesis to explore the challenge of using contemporary cognitive neuroscience to develop a system to better detect many of the hidden talents in our youth. Through a fascinating prosaic journey, he elucidates the connections between language, cognition, perspective, and ultimately the need to examine these more deeply as we begin to use scientific advances to delve into the human brain to access the human mind and how we learn. Using increasingly complex puzzles to identify talents, Dr. McCaffrey’s case studies demonstrate the power of puzzles to recognize diverse strengths we normally would miss.

Gerald Fussell, Principal, Lake Trail Middle School, Comox Valley School District.

This book revives a tradition of general theories of how the mind works. McCaffrey draws together attention, language, learning, memory, perception and puzzle-solving in stunningly integrative fashion, drawing on comparative psychology, neuroscience, human development, and even anthropology. His concept of “blend” goes well beyond simple association or Chomsky’s “merge” to account for the diversity and creativity of human thought and action.

Michael Corballis, author of “The Truth About Language: What It Is and Where It Came From” (University of Chicago Press, 2017) and "The Recursive Mind: The Origins of Human Language, Thought, and Civilization" (Princeton University Press, 2014)