A review by rick2
Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst by Robert M. Sapolsky
5.0
Dense, sciency, and a bit difficult. But worth every effort.
The adolescent years for me weren't great. My family moved around a bit, I did debate, forensics, and I am a bit of a loner. I may not be the greatest wordsmith, but I am sure you get the picture. Bit lonely, mix in some bullying, some adhd and cook at 325 until done.
So when I discovered Green Day at 14 my world opened up. The experience of listening to an angry Billie Joe Armstrong was cathartic. I'd play American Idiot on a CD player while biking all over Milwaukee, with the CD skipping as I bounced on the pedals to go uphill, peddling my way to buy dirt schwag downtown. I can still recite probably a third of the album by heart. And while that album (and the subsequent cover band I was a part of) is important to the person I am today, It's key importance in my life was that it led me to Green Day's album Dookie. Green Day's album Dookie takes the cake when it comes to cornerstone musical set pieces to my adolescence.
Longview's funky bass and lyrics helped me understand my body and to not feel guilt for the changes that were going on. Welcome to Paradise, Burnout, When I Come Around, all these songs represent significant portions of my teenage years. I can still pinpoint key memories to each of those songs, despite having listened to them hundreds of times.
But the song Basket Case was another level, that song was just weird enough to titillate and entertain. To open up my world in novel ways. I remember the first time smoking a joint in a friends basement and listening to Basket Case. I felt like I finally understood the world. That I had found my small place in it. There was an afternoon where the world stood still and I chased that feeling for years.
I've come a long way since then. But I feel about this book at 26 the way that I felt about Green Day when I was 16, and would equate the experience of reading this book to the same sort of naughty mischievous pleasure smoking a joint to punk rock brings. It expands my mind in ways I can't quite pin down. Multiple times throughout this book, I had to put it down and just stare at the wall. To use the vernacular of my childhood, "Ah, wait, no way, you're kidding. He didn't just say what I think he did, did he?" Sapolsky goes through our brains and behaviors from our neurons, to our gluons, photons, and Dewgongs (that last one is a Pokemon folks, keep up) trying to pin down what it means to be human.
I think as a book, this one is bit disorganized. I'm not sure even an ambitious editor could machete their way into a cleaner book. I'm not sure if they could, they should. My biggest takeaway here is that the mind is a messy place, a labyrinth with many doors. We most likely know what some doors do. But sometimes we give ourselves the creeps. Sometimes the mind plays tricks on us. But in totality, we keep researching and it all keeps adding up. We go on with the pressures of existence, and while it can be hard to keep from cracking up. We persist. In this complex web of neurons and biochemical soup, the lines seem to blur and it can be hard to tell if one is paranoid or just stoned.
The adolescent years for me weren't great. My family moved around a bit, I did debate, forensics, and I am a bit of a loner. I may not be the greatest wordsmith, but I am sure you get the picture. Bit lonely, mix in some bullying, some adhd and cook at 325 until done.
So when I discovered Green Day at 14 my world opened up. The experience of listening to an angry Billie Joe Armstrong was cathartic. I'd play American Idiot on a CD player while biking all over Milwaukee, with the CD skipping as I bounced on the pedals to go uphill, peddling my way to buy dirt schwag downtown. I can still recite probably a third of the album by heart. And while that album (and the subsequent cover band I was a part of) is important to the person I am today, It's key importance in my life was that it led me to Green Day's album Dookie. Green Day's album Dookie takes the cake when it comes to cornerstone musical set pieces to my adolescence.
Longview's funky bass and lyrics helped me understand my body and to not feel guilt for the changes that were going on. Welcome to Paradise, Burnout, When I Come Around, all these songs represent significant portions of my teenage years. I can still pinpoint key memories to each of those songs, despite having listened to them hundreds of times.
But the song Basket Case was another level, that song was just weird enough to titillate and entertain. To open up my world in novel ways. I remember the first time smoking a joint in a friends basement and listening to Basket Case. I felt like I finally understood the world. That I had found my small place in it. There was an afternoon where the world stood still and I chased that feeling for years.
I've come a long way since then. But I feel about this book at 26 the way that I felt about Green Day when I was 16, and would equate the experience of reading this book to the same sort of naughty mischievous pleasure smoking a joint to punk rock brings. It expands my mind in ways I can't quite pin down. Multiple times throughout this book, I had to put it down and just stare at the wall. To use the vernacular of my childhood, "Ah, wait, no way, you're kidding. He didn't just say what I think he did, did he?" Sapolsky goes through our brains and behaviors from our neurons, to our gluons, photons, and Dewgongs (that last one is a Pokemon folks, keep up) trying to pin down what it means to be human.
I think as a book, this one is bit disorganized. I'm not sure even an ambitious editor could machete their way into a cleaner book. I'm not sure if they could, they should. My biggest takeaway here is that the mind is a messy place, a labyrinth with many doors. We most likely know what some doors do. But sometimes we give ourselves the creeps. Sometimes the mind plays tricks on us. But in totality, we keep researching and it all keeps adding up. We go on with the pressures of existence, and while it can be hard to keep from cracking up. We persist. In this complex web of neurons and biochemical soup, the lines seem to blur and it can be hard to tell if one is paranoid or just stoned.