Tag: Robert Sapolsky

Review – Behave

Posted August 17, 2021 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Behave by Robert M. SapolskyBehave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst, Robert Sapolsky

There isn’t much new in Behave if you’ve read a few different books about human behaviour, though he does have a very clear way of explaining some basic biological concepts that I initially found really engaging (despite my own familiarity with them). In general, he uses and discusses the same studies and anecdata that everyone uses to explain various aspects of human behaviour, and mostly this book pulls it all together to make some general statements about human behaviour and what causes it. The main takeaway, of course, is “it’s complicated” — but he does a good job of picking things apart, relating them to each other, and putting forward his views.

Personally, I find this kind of book (and this book specifically) challenging because I would love to believe I have free will, and not just in choosing what colour my socks are. Sometimes I get a really good example of how I don’t (PTSD and other anxiety disorders can really demonstrate that), and I don’t like it… and this book is just such an experience. As a scientist, there’s just no room left for what Sapolsky calls the ‘homunculus’ that can pilot you, unaffected by hormones and past experiences and the size of your hippocampus.

And… in the end, for me, it felt like Sapolsky was reiterating a lot of stuff I already knew, at very great length. So if it’s something you haven’t read about or looked into before, I think it’d be a good place to start. The basics are really well laid out! But if you’ve been there and read that, then maybe give it a miss.

Rating: 3/5

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WWW Wednesday

Posted July 21, 2021 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

It’s Wednesday again already! How does that keep happening? And do I make the same joke too often? It’s too warm to think of a new one.

Cover of Black Water Sister by Zen ChoWhat are you currently reading?

A couple of things at once, as usual! I’m most of the way through Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass, which is more autobiographical than I had been led to expect, and which just doesn’t quite work for me in its outlook. I’m also still working on Behave, by Robert Sapolsky; he seems to be taking an awful long time to say nothing new.

In fiction news, I finally started Zen Cho’s Black Water Sister, which I’m enjoying but not getting super into — partly because I haven’t had much brain for reading with how warm it is.

Cover of The Fabric of Civilization by Virginia PostrelWhat have you recently finished reading?

Virginia Postrel’s The Fabric of Civilization, which I enjoyed quite a lot. I think I’d have got more out of it if I had a visual imagination, though: when she described how to weave, for instance, it just meant nothing to me.

What will you be reading next?

Don’t know! I really need to get to Slippery Creatures (K.J. Charles), but who knows?

Alright, your turn!

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WWW Wednesday

Posted June 3, 2021 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

Technically it’s still Wednesday, right? I haven’t slept yet, so it must be.

Anyway, I’m all done with writing the reviews I had in my backlog, and I’m all done with my exams… so it’s time to start queueing them up to post! …Tomorrow.

What are you currently reading?

Cover of Phoenix Extravagant by Yoon Ha LeeFiction: A whooole bunch of things, as ever! More every day, it feels like. Two-Way Murder by E.C.R. Lorac was a definite “my brain is a potato” choice; her Golden Age crime mysteries always work very well for me in terms of evoking a place/community and a detective who is not a douchecanoe. Also still reading Phoenix Extravagant and Plain Bad Heroines, neither of which are quite grabbing me lately. This is certainly in part because my brain is a potato.

Non-fiction: I just picked up Beating Back the Devil, by Maryn McKenna — you’d think I’d hate reading about epidemiology since that was my exam topic, but actually it kinda reminds me what I’m here for in the first place. Not that the Epidemic Intelligence Service is my idea of a fun time, since they have to get very hands-on at times, but… broadly speaking, figuring out that one specific batch of a specific manufacturer’s vaccine is causing an outbreak of polio is exactly what I sometimes think I’d like to do.

I’m also still reading Food: The History of Taste, which I think I was reading last week and which is very slow, and Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs, which is slowly beginning to get to the point. I also picked up Robert Sapolsky’s Behave, partly as a comfort while I was waiting for my exam to be available for download.

What have you recently finished reading?

Finishing books? What’s finishing books, precious?

More seriously, I did recently finish reading The Cheltenham Square Murder (John Bude), which was fun enough but not a standout — a very typical Golden Age crime novel, without Lorac’s fine touch, basically.

What will you be reading next?

Well, I need to get round to What It Means When A Man Falls from the Sky, by Lesley Nneka Arimah, so that’s high on the list. I think The Story of Silence by Alex Myers is starting to wiggle to the top of my list, too; I like the original medieval poem, and I’m curious what this modern retelling does with it.

What’re you currently reading?

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