The Essential Difference by Simon Baron-Cohen, Allen Lane/The Penguin Press, £16.99, ISBN 0713996714 Reviewed by Michael Bond
SIMON Baron-Cohen helpfully sums up his thesis on page one of The Essential Difference: “The female brain is predominantly hard-wired for empathy. The male brain is predominantly hard-wired for understanding and building systems.” Clearly, this takes some standing up, and by the end he has only partly succeeded. More convincing is his assertion that autism is a result of the extreme male brain. A thought-provoking take on the minds of men and women.
