Daniel Z. Lieberman

A rather interesting book all about dopamine, and how it controls us and shapes our world.

Me thinks everyone should read all the books they can about neurotransmitters, this being a fairly good one.

The annoying thing to me is that while there's quite a lot of discussion on how our genetics affect out dopamine levels and responses, there is a complete lack of discussion on epigenetics, as though they have no influence whatsoever.   There's also a complete lack on how diet and lifestyle show more affects dopamine and other neurotransmitters.   So while this is a fairly good look at dopamine in general, i wouldn't take it all at face value because there's simply too much left out, IMHO.

But lots of people just want to blame the genes they were given and take the "It's not my fault" path, so maybe this book is written for them.

Bye for now. show less

With brilliant insights such as "The important thing to remember is that liberals want to help people become better, conservatives want to let people be happy, and politicians want power," all of which is apparently determined by their respective levels of dopamine, this book gets three stars for neuroscience and one star for political science.

Mixed feelings about this book - I feel like I learned a lot but the science was dumbed down a little too much for my liking and the disclaimer in the beginning about how the science is murky in some areas made question the accuracy of what I was reading. An enjoyable read nonetheless.

A lot of after the fact explanations that could be stretched to prove whatever the world turned up. Of course there is a lot of merit to this and it's solid science but this book stretches it to the point of horoscope level explanatory power. Show us prediction, not after the fact explanations on why Americans are awesome because they got all the adventure seeking genomes. Cherry picking examples aplenty here.