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A review by kandicez
A Primate's Memoir: A Neuroscientist's Unconventional Life Among the Baboons by Robert M. Sapolsky
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
sad
slow-paced
5.0
I know we are only one month in, but this is my favorite book of the year so far, and I think it could last. This was at turns funny, heartbreaking, enlightening, and because it inspired a deep dive into Sapolsky in general, incredibly informative.
This outlines a few decades of Sapolsky's summers in the field studying a troop of olive baboons. He starts with his first year and ends with a tragedy. A tragedy that in hindsight is small, but as I read I was heartbroken.
Sapolsky is a neuroendocrinelogist, and believes that there is no free will. He believes that hormones, ancestry, genes, any number of things, predetermine our actions and reactions. There is a sense of comfort to be found in the theory, although I don't quite believe it myself.
This outlines a few decades of Sapolsky's summers in the field studying a troop of olive baboons. He starts with his first year and ends with a tragedy. A tragedy that in hindsight is small, but as I read I was heartbroken.
Sapolsky is a neuroendocrinelogist, and believes that there is no free will. He believes that hormones, ancestry, genes, any number of things, predetermine our actions and reactions. There is a sense of comfort to be found in the theory, although I don't quite believe it myself.