#35: Robert M. Sapolsky - Life Without Free Will

How Humans Work with Jef Szi

In episode #35, legendary professor and author Robert M. Sapolsky joins the show for a fascinating conversation about his most recent book: Determined. At length we discuss what life looks like when we accept the premise of Determined: free will is a myth and rewarding and punishing behavior is an outdated approach to running a humane and just world. Along the way we get into strange and groovy notions like Emergent Complexity, Chaoticism (a.k.a. The Butterfly Effect), the prefrontal cortex, and my personal passion, stress.

With abundant erudition and mirth, Dr. Sapolsky makes the case several time over that a separate self with a free will apart from the biologic matrix is simply untenable. Along the way, Robert walks us through the arguments which support Determinism, starting with our inability to perceive our intentions and then showing us how brain neurons, slime molds, and ants operate without a blueprint. Overall, we get a persuasive portrait of how and why the seamless web of biology and environment have an unseen hand in how we act and think.

Best to get your thinking cap out and put it on, because this show puts all of our assumptions about how humans work on the surgical table. Whether they survive the rigor of a sage professor’s operations is the question we’re left with.

I hope you enjoy this show as much as I did!

About Robert M. Sapolsky: Dr. Sapolsky is the author of several works of nonfiction, including A Primate’s Memoir, The Trouble with Testosterone, and Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers. His most recent book, Behave, was a New York Times bestseller and named a best book of the year by The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. He is the John A. and Cynthia Fry Gunn Professor of biology, neurology and neurosurgery at Stanford University and the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant.” He and his wife live in San Francisco.