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ethanjarrell's review against another edition
4.0
I'm about 1/3 of the way into this book. I really like it, but it is written at a pretty technical level. A lot of it goes over my head if I don't have time to really pay attention closely to what I'm reading, and my ability to retain much information is probably low, since it's been years since I've taken any biology, and don't have a good frame of reference for much of the material. That being said, the content of the book is easy to follow, it's well researched, and interesting throughout.
I read this book after reading "The righteous mind", "The widsom of psychopaths" and a couple of other psychology based books. This made me appreciate the psychological sections of this book more, and gave me a little more foundation in those areas.
If I had one recommendation to any readers, it would be either to read the appendixes of this book first to get a foundation of the material. Or take a quick refresher in human biology before starting this book so that you can appreciate it more fully.
After the first 5 or 6 chapters, the author gets into the evolution of behavior and becomes less bogged down in the details of the biology of the human body, neurons and hormones. For me, the book moved at a faster pace at this point, and was easier to follow, and slightly more enjoyable than the first half.
I thoroughly enjoyed the last half of the book. Especially the final 2 or 3 chapters, which were a combination of emotional, gut wrenching and optimistically hopeful. I would highly recommend this book to anyone. The author is also well read, and referenced almost all of my favorite books. I went back and wrote down all the books he referenced that I hadn't read to add to my reading list.
I read this book after reading "The righteous mind", "The widsom of psychopaths" and a couple of other psychology based books. This made me appreciate the psychological sections of this book more, and gave me a little more foundation in those areas.
If I had one recommendation to any readers, it would be either to read the appendixes of this book first to get a foundation of the material. Or take a quick refresher in human biology before starting this book so that you can appreciate it more fully.
After the first 5 or 6 chapters, the author gets into the evolution of behavior and becomes less bogged down in the details of the biology of the human body, neurons and hormones. For me, the book moved at a faster pace at this point, and was easier to follow, and slightly more enjoyable than the first half.
I thoroughly enjoyed the last half of the book. Especially the final 2 or 3 chapters, which were a combination of emotional, gut wrenching and optimistically hopeful. I would highly recommend this book to anyone. The author is also well read, and referenced almost all of my favorite books. I went back and wrote down all the books he referenced that I hadn't read to add to my reading list.
careycarpenter's review against another edition
1.0
I could not finish this book. Well I could’ve but I chose not to because though the subject is interesting the writing is TERRIBLE!!! Maybe this 800 page book or whatever it is would be interesting to someone trained in neuropsychology but I just gave up halfway through. I can’t even listen to it as I fall asleep anymore because it’s just so bad. It’s way too dense and way too detailed. Was there an editor hired to review this thing? I tried really hard but am now moving on to something that evokes any kind of emotion besides indifference.
loladanger's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
3.0
Interesting, but a little too technical for me.
wadezone's review against another edition
3.0
He is right about it being a long book. I found this to be very interesting and learned some things for somone who isn't into biology. This is definitely perfect for someone who is in pyshocology or behavioral sciences.
quigonchuy's review against another edition
informative
slow-paced
3.75
Part of me wants to give this a lower rating mostly because I really feel like this did NOT need to be so long (almost 800 pages / 26+ hr audiobook). If I had to summarize this book, it's this: "In human behavior, as in biology, things are complicated and it's almost impossible to assign a single cause to things. If you hear a neat little tidbit with a simple cause and effect regarding human behavior, it's almost certainly either wrong, flawed, or overly simplified. There's just too much going on to really be sure at our current level of knowledge. Here's a quadrillion examples of what I mean."