Determined To Care

Robert Sapolsky's Determined, A Science of Life without Free Will, makes one radical claim: you don't have free will. Every choice you make — every reaction, decision, and emotion — is the product of biology and circumstance stretching back generations. Your genes, hormones, culture, and the events that shaped your parents and grandparents all play a part in who you are and what you do today. Sapolsky doesn't mean this as doom; he means it as truth. Life is a web of cause and effect, not a story of moral fault or personal flaw.

But if you read closely, Determined ends up proving something bigger than it admits: that we are wired to survive, connect, and thrive. The same biology that "removes" choice also ensures cooperation, empathy, and adaptation — the real engines of life. Our brains evolved to protect the group, comfort, learn, and build stability. The entire system of emotions we call human nature is designed to sustain life, not destroy it.