Sapolsky's Spiders and Teletubbies
The brilliant neuroscientist is about to drop his version of the behavior bible. Revisiting his last work is a mind-bending but necessary pre-show readers won't regret.
In 2017, author and neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky stepped into the fray with Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst.
I remember listening to the audiobook around the time it came out. It is a heavy read or listen but required for anyone interested in human behavior and keen to meet frisson.
In advance of Sapolsky’s upcoming release, a manifesto on free will aptly titled Determined, I’ve gone back to rediscover his 2017 contribution.
The main takeaways are expertly squeezed into a lecture available on YouTube and delivered at Sapolsky’s academic home base, Stanford University.
When it comes to the topic of behavior, a clever quip forwarded by another of Sapolsky’s ilk comes to mind and fits quite nicely actually. If you asked the experts who the authoritative expert was, when it came to behavior, half would say Sapolsky, and the other half wouldn’t appreciate the premise of the question.
Beyond the deep understanding of the concrete sciences of behavior, Sapolsky has already burned through the memoir phase, having reflected with a book focused on his post-graduate studies of baboons in Kenya. He tells in one interview of the struggles he suffered after a number of the apes, many with whom he’d bonded, died during a tragic tuberculosis outbreak. His openness about his own struggles with mental illness adds to the unique nature of his commentaries and to the earnestness of the enterprise.
“If I had to define a major depression in a single sentence, I would describe it as a "genetic/neurochemical disorder requiring a strong environmental trigger whose characteristic manifestation is an inability to appreciate sunsets.”
―Robert M. Sapolsky, Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers
There’s more to say about Sapolsky. His lecture on Schizophrenia is among the best any undergraduate could hope to see on the topic. Sure, psychiatrists may have lots to say about it, but like in all other fields, we often fail to see the wider picture, at times almost seeming intent on doing so. His focus on the phenomena as opposed to say, the medication management, was refreshing and serves as more required reading (watching). On this point, any self-respecting student of psychology ought to the prioritize the obligation to listen to him here, I think.
A few points below from Sapolsky’s lecture on behavior that I found important.
Biological superpower chemicals like oxytocin and testosterone are wildly and widely misunderstood. Simplistic definitions often rule the day during those relatively rare academic clinical discussions on the chemicals at issue. As Sapolsky describes, context matters. Testosterone as violent, and oxytocin as loving, just betrays the facts of the matter, because this understanding leaves out context, and is therefore wholly ignorant. Testosterone is well associated with what we might be tempted to call good behavior. Likewise, oxytocin is associated with bad behavior, again, in some contexts. The key is focusing on degree. These neurotransmitters tend to propel and promote existing tendencies, as opposed to summoning evil from whole cloth, for example.
Sapolsky makes the brilliant point that in the great nature versus nurture arguments, we often skate past an obvious opportunity for reconciliation. The frontal lobes being the last to develop mean they are beholden to genetics the least among all of the scientifically catalogued cerebral real estate. Therefore, this formidable and consequential area of the brain is most prone to social influences (but don’t go and get confused by the big quote in the middle of this text). In other words, nature and nurture bob and weave, depending on context. The point here cannot be understated, given the importance of this brain area to, well, yes, behavior.
Sapolsky beautifully summarizes the thinking many hold on the topic of free will, the subject of the upcoming book. At the time of the lecture, he asserted his long held view that he had absolutely no problem accepting that free will does not exist. He did, at the time, admit his having a major problem with how we are supposed to react to this information. He points to the criminal justice system as an opening project and readers can probably expect more of that in his manifesto, given how effortlessly he’s wandered into those waters over the years. The lecture was delivered five years ago, by the way, so it will be interesting to see how far his assertions travel in the book.
Sapolsky makes easy work of knowing when to say what to say. Reaching further than the position of the hard science, he asserts that the criminal justice system of today is built upon a mid-19th century understanding of neuroscience, adding “and that’s appalling”. He effortlessly ushers loud laughter with another unrelated response within 30 seconds, symbolic of his grand agility and rare knowing the audience understanding. The same is true of his books despite what you might think.
Spiders, Teletubbies, and phobias. “We are predisposed towards making some associations more readily than others.” Prepared learning, he calls it. There is more, of course, but a concept too often forgotten, indeed.
In a mesmerizing response during the Q&A, he talks about how we sometimes water down the us and them. You’ll really have to go watch.
Sapolsky rightly takes a swipe at the oh, so important neuroimaging techniques and studies. Well at least that is my perception of his commentary late in the Q&A. He refers to it tangentially, whilst making another point on transcranial magnetic stimulation, calling the imaging studies correlative. Hopefully there is more truth-telling in the new book on this topic. fMRI being the modality most in need of concept clarification. That is to say, a better uncovering of what we should rationally conclude about the research to date. There is a magnetic attraction to simplistic thinking here, incidentally.
He maintains intellectual integrity when facing the opposition of those who forward frictions related to decision-making and choice when flossing or choosing dessert. This adds to the credibility, but also to how morally he’s considering the topic. Delineating this and that type of free will, as he points out, still doesn’t work, but there may be more to say on the topic of practicality. We are, after all, arguing about behavior.
Sapolsky spoke to the APA in 2021, which is itself a foreshadowing to change in psychiatry. The insistent march of progress will make way for Sapolsky’s work, and does call to mind the if, not when sentiment. His take on the biopsychosocial model, if you will, is fascinating to ponder.
“Those who don't study the history and science of human change are destined not to be able to repeat it.”
It is slightly amusing watching the press creep on this work. The free will debates are sometimes sloppily given this mystique-in-identity sort of characterization. Sapolsky’s philosophizing will no doubt be different, given its heavy reliance on a relatively updated biological understanding. He may not be the only expert, but he seems pretty keen to contextualize the findings for the rest of us. The level of domain expertise he holds on the science, should we accept and assert such a thing exists and matters, gives him another gear to slip into, one that other public intellectuals simply do not have at their disposal. At least not in the same way. The roll out and the reception will be interesting. Specifically, reaction in honest-to-goodness philosophical academies will be very interesting. Sapolsky is no fool.
Finally, choice. This most mesmerizing and complicated part of the free will argument often resists resolution in discussion and clarification by so-called thought leaders of the day. Sapolsky, in the lecture above, rubs up against choice with his wise words on change. One is left hoping he gives the devil his due, as the devil, here too, is in the details.
Here is the lecture.