Book Club Potluck - Determined

Cameron will host our discussion of Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will by Robert M. Sapolsky. Eric suggested this book.

The instant New York Times bestseller

“Excellent . . . Outstanding for its breadth of research, the liveliness of the writing, and the depth of humanity it conveys.” –Wall Street Journal

One of our great behavioral scientists, the bestselling author of Behave, mounts a devastating scientific and philosophical case against free will—an argument with profound consequences

Robert Sapolsky’s Behave, his now classic account of why humans do good and why they do bad, pointed toward an unsettling conclusion: we may not grasp exactly how nature and nurture create the physics and chemistry that cause all human behavior, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. In Determined, Sapolsky takes his argument all the way, mounting a brilliant (and in his inimitable way, delightful) full-frontal assault on the pleasant fantasy that there is some separate self who tells our biology what to do.

Determined offers a marvelous synthesis of what we know about consciousness—the tight weave between reason and emotion and between stimulus and response in the moment and over a life. One by one, Sapolsky takes out all the major arguments for free will, cutting a path through the thickets of chaos theory and quantum physics. But as Sapolsky acknowledges, it’s sometimes impossible to uncouple from our zeal to judge people, including ourselves. Determined applies this new understanding to some of our most essential questions around punishment, morality, and living well together. Most of all, Sapolsky argues that while accepting the reality about free will is monumentally difficult, it will make for a much more humane world.

If you would like to host one of our events and you have a book in mind, please let me, Karl Kiefer, or Mark Hopkins know, and we will create a Meetup event for your book, assuming your suggested title qualifies as a book on philosophy in our view, and assuming that we deem you to be qualified to host. Our criteria are somewhat vague, but let's just say that we are not interested in books on the supernatural. We are interested in books that you might find in a syllabus for a college philosophy course. We are also focused on finding hosts who have demonstrated ability to direct philosophical conversation. You can always email me at camkruger@gmail.com if you have questions and/or suggestions.

As always, it's essential that everyone who comes to the meeting reads the book in its entirety and brings something for the potluck.

Happy reading!