3 Favorite Books on My Shelf (and why)

TL;DR

A critical thinking educator shares three favorite books on neuroethics, human rights theory, and computational modeling of cognition.

Key Points

• 1.The Ethical Brain by Michael Gazzaniga argues ethics cannot be reduced to neuroscience alone. Gazzaniga, a world-renowned neuroscientist, contends that ethics is an emergent property of interactions between brains, not something locatable inside a single brain.
• 2.Benjamin Libet's readiness potential experiments suggest we have 'free won't' rather than free will. In a 100-millisecond gap between stimulus and reaction, the brain can interrupt an automatic response — implying moral responsibility lies in vetoing impulses, not initiating them.
• 3.Gazzaniga aligns with compatibilism, not hard determinism. Like philosopher Daniel Dennett, he holds that being part of automatic behavioral systems does not eliminate moral responsibility — a nuanced position the host endorses.
• 4.The Dialectical Necessity of Morality by Derek Beyleveld defends Alan Gewirth's a priori proof of human rights. Gewirth's argument in Reason and Morality uses deductive logic — akin to a geometric proof — to establish that all purposive agents must rationally acknowledge universal rights to freedom and well-being.
• 5.Gewirth's argument proceeds through 13 premises showing every agent must grant rights to all other agents. Since any agent acting voluntarily claims freedom and well-being as necessary goods, logical consistency requires extending that same moral claim to every other agent.
• 6.Beyleveld's book compiles and replies to every major scholarly objection to Gewirth's argument. It makes reading Gewirth's original Reason and Morality optional, as all counterarguments and rejoinders — including replies to replies — are systematically addressed.
• 7.Computational Modeling of Cognition and Behavior is valued for its coverage of Bayesian hierarchical and structural equation modeling. The host recommends a statistics 101 foundation first, then uses this book to critically evaluate model assumptions, predictive aims, and limits — especially as applied to contested concepts like intelligence.
• 8.Heritability scores and polygenic correlations do not imply genetic causation, a point many commentators miss. The host recommends Causal Inference: The Mixtape as a companion resource for learning how to draw reasonable causal inferences from non-experimental population data.