Impulse: Why We Do What We Do Without Knowing Why We Do It

333 Pages·2013·1.24 MB·English

by  Dr. David Lewis

IMPULSE

david lewis
Impulse
Why We Do What We Do
Without Knowing Why We Do It
The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Cambridge, Massachusetts
2013
Copyright © David Lewis, 2013
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America

First published in Great Britain in 2013 by Random House Books

First Harvard University Press edition, 2013

Typeset by Palimpsest Book Production Limited, Falkirk, Stirlingshire

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Lewis, David, 1942–
Impulse : why we do what we do without knowing why we do it /
David Lewis. — First Harvard University Press edition.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-674-72549-2 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Impulse. I. Title.
BF575.I46L49 2013
153.4—dc23 2013012499
To S. M. with my love and gratitude

Contents
Acknowledgements xi
Introduction xiii
Chapter 1 The Impulse That Saved My Life 1
Chapter 2 Impulses and Your Zombie Brain 11
Chapter 3 Inside the Impulsive Brain 27
Chapter 4 The Teenage Brain – A Work in Progress 43
Chapter 5 Impulse and the Senses 56
Chapter 6 The Power of the Visual 72
Chapter 7 Impulses and the Risk-Taking Personality 88
Chapter 8 The Love Impulse – ‘It Only Takes a Moment’ 109
Chapter 9 T he Overeating Impulse – Digging Our Graves 132
with Our Teeth
Chapter 10 The Buying Impulse – The How and Why of 149
What We Buy
Chapter 11 The Imitation Impulse – ‘A Beautiful Place 162
to Die’
Chapter 12 Deplete Us Not Into Temptation 179
Afterword Free Will Is a Grand Illusion 198
Notes and References 205
Bibliography 249
Index 297

‘Instinct leads, intelligence does but follow.’
William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience:
A Study in Human Nature, 1902.