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Mind Of The Market Paperback – January 6, 2009

by Michael Shermer (Author)

22

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"[A] captivating raconteur of all the greatest hits of behavioral, evolutionary and neuropsychology . . . Fascinating."―Los Angeles Times Book Review

How did we make the leap from ancient hunter-gatherers to modern consumers, and why do people get so emotional about financial decisions? The national bestseller The Mind of the Market uncovers the evolutionary roots of our economic behavior.

Drawing on the new field of neuroeconomics, psychologist Michael Shermer investigates what brain scans reveal about bargaining, snap purchases, and establishing trust in business. He scrutinizes experiments in behavioral economics to understand why people hang on to losing stocks and why negotiations disintegrate into tit-for-tat disputes. He brings together findings from psychology and biology to describe how our tribal ancestry makes us suckers for brands, why researchers believe cooperation feels (biochemically) like sex, and how even capuchin monkeys get indignant if they don't get a fair reward for their work.

Entertaining and eye-opening, The Mind of the Market explains the real science of economics.

Print length

336 pages
Language

English
Publication date

January 6, 2009
Dimensions

5.25 x 0.84 x 8 inches
ISBN-10

0805089160
ISBN-13

978-0805089165
See all details

Michael Shermer
84
Hardcover
61 offers from $13.31

Editorial Reviews

Review

“[A] captivating raconteur of all the greatest hits of behavioral, evolutionary and neuropsychology, [and] provider of wonderful cocktail party material... Fascinating.” ―Los Angeles Times Book Review

“The book has no end of conversation starters, from capitalism as modern Darwinism to neuroeconomics that show that--biochemically, at least--a human brain is shockingly similar during smooth business deals and sex.” ―Boston Globe

“Have you ever wondered how people develop trust and live together peacefully? Michael Shermer's new book uses psychology and evolution to examine the root of these human achievements… [He] has earned the right to our attention.” ―Washington Post

“Drawing from research, and injecting his own wit, Shermer explains why people make bad decisions about money, why wealth can't buy you happiness, and why we love cooperating.” ―Psychology Today

“Compelling… Take[s] us on an intimate tour of the best of the last half-century's work in behavioral economics and neuroscience.” ―New York Post

“Entertaining… a fascinating tour d'horizon of discoveries in several of today's cutting-edge sciences.” ―The Globe and Mail (Toronto)

“Well-written [and] highly entertaining…. Replete with thought-provoking examples and solid references, the book will start as many debates as it will end.” ―Choice

“[The Mind of the Market] provides a thorough account of what's going on in a branch of psychology dedicated to understanding the natural origins of economic decisions.” ―Science News

“Pure entertainment… Some of the most interesting economic research being undertaken these days draws on the disciplines of cognitive science and psychology, and [The Mind of the Market is a] highly readable contribution.” ―The Business Economist

“Eye-opening … [The Mind of the Market] recounts truly fascinating experiments and discoveries regarding physiological components of our market decisions…. Filled with fun analogies and a smattering of funny lines.” ―Humanist

“Thoughtful and complete…You're certain to learn something new when you read it.” ―WestWord

“[Shermer] does a bang-up job knitting together the complexities of science and the frail psychology of human beings to explain the unpredictable postmodern world of trade and finance…. An informative, inventive, broad-spectrum analysis of what makes modern man tick, starting with his wallet.” ―Kirkus Reviews

“Using fascinating examples… Shermer explores the evolutionary roots of our sense of fairness and justice, and shows how this rationale extends to the market…. Offers much insight into human behavior and rationales regarding money.” ―Publishers Weekly

“The Ripley's Believe It or Not of behavioral economics, or why people act the way they do in a capitalistic marketplace…. Shermer applies his wide-ranging knowledge of science and its rigorous investigatory discipline to uncover the answers and make connections between trade and emotion--in essence, popularizing neuron-economics.” ―Booklist

“Extremely interesting… Shermer is a fantastic presenter.” ―Steven D. Levitt, The New York Times Freakonomics Blog

“Michael Shermer brilliantly shows that the real experts of Homo economicus are often found in psychology, biology, even primatology.” ―Frans de Waal, author of Our Inner Ape

“Written with his customary verve and flair, The Mind of the Market is Michael Shermer at his best.” ―Dinesh D'Souza, author of What's So Great About America

“Economists who understand Charles Darwin are almost as rare as biologists who understand Adam Smith. Yet the two were essentially saying the same thing--that order emerges unordained from competition and innovation. Michael Shermer brilliantly brings the two insights together to explain how the human mind creates the human market.” ―Matt Ridley, author of The Origins of Virtue

About the Author

Michael Shermer is the author of The Believing Brain, Why People Believe Weird Things, The Science of Good and Evil, The Mind Of The Market, Why Darwin Matters, Science Friction, How We Believe and other books on the evolution of human beliefs and behavior. He is the founding publisher of Skeptic magazine, the editor of Skeptic.com, a monthly columnist for Scientific American, and an adjunct professor at Claremont Graduate University. He lives in Southern California.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Griffin; First Edition (January 6, 2009)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 336 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0805089160
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0805089165
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.4 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.25 x 0.84 x 8 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #912,771 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #858 in Theory of Economics
- #2,630 in Evolution (Books)
- #3,568 in Cultural Anthropology (Books)

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Michael Shermer

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Dr. Michael Shermer is the Founding Publisher of Skeptic magazine, the host of the Science Salon Podcast, and a Presidential Fellow at Chapman University where he teaches Skepticism 101. For 18 years he was a monthly columnist for Scientific American. He is the author of New York Times bestsellers Why People Believe Weird Things and The Believing Brain, Why Darwin Matters, The Science of Good and Evil, The Moral Arc, and Heavens on Earth. His new book is Giving the Devil His Due: Reflections of a Scientific Humanist.

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Customer reviews

3.9 out of 5

22 global ratings

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Adam Smith Expanded

Reviewed in the United States on September 3, 2010

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In The Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Adam Smith identified the selfish and selfless or altruistic components of self-interest behavior. The former is referred to in economics as crass self-interest, and the inclusion of the latter is referred to as enlightened self-interest. It is argued that just as selfishness is in a person's self-interest, so too is selflessness or altruism. Selflessness, for example, can make a person feel good about himself or herself, win the respect and admiration of others, enable a person to achieve a goal he or she could not achieve on his or her own, or permit a person to claim a deduction of a charitable contribution on his or her income tax return.

Most people are aware of the selfish component of self-interest, but recognition of the selfless component is fairly recent. In The Mind of the Market: How Biology and Psychology Shape Our Economic Lives, Michael Shermer expands Adam Smith's treatment of the latter, drawing on the disciplines of evolutionary psychology, sociology, biology, and economics. He stresses humankind's evolved capacity to cooperate as well as compete in efforts to obtain what is wanted. Accounting for both components of self-interest behavior is necessary when explaining the economic behavior of people in both private and public sector markets. The book is well-written and easily understood, much like Shermer's other publications, including his popular column in Scientific American. (This review is also published on frankzahn(dot)com.)

3 people found this helpful

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William J. Lavery

Cooperation as an evolved survival skill

Reviewed in the United States on January 30, 2010

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Michael Shermer's book is a wonderful romp through cognitive science (fMRI's et al.) & the abounding evolutionary disciplines including economics, biology and physics. Wonderland. One of its two guideslines is Spinoza's pledge not to scorn human actions but to understand them.

He explores the limits and nature of human consciousness and awareness and, as he is wont to do, bites most everyone's dog. So it helps to limber up and step back as you enter this book. And enjoy his splendid investigation of why and how we behave. The Mind of the Market: How Biology and Psychology Shape Our Economic Lives

2 people found this helpful

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BC

Sound thinking in dangerous waters

Reviewed in the United States on December 4, 2010

Michael Shermer likes to tread dangerous waters. His latest dip into challenging the received turbulance of our times is an evolutionary explanation for the state of Modern Capitalism. Politicos, religionists and the lay masses, if they actually take a gander through Shermer's The Mind of the Market: Compassionate Apes, Competitive Humans, and Other Tales from Evolutionary Economics, will likely recoil in disagreement. "You mean to say democratic life is not God-ordained?" they may gasp.

Shermer, chief evolutionist and resident skeptic at Skeptic Magazine, has long maintained the root of human behavior lies not only in our biology but in how our surroundings influence our actions. In this latest iteration, Shermer traces human evolution to explain why we are the way we are today. "If our species is about a hundred thousand years old, then 90 percent of our history has been spent in (a) state of relative economic simplicity," he writes.

It's true. The 1997 anthropological manifesto Limited Wants, Unlimited Means: A Reader On Hunter-Gatherer Economics And The Environment describes in various essays how our hunter-gatherer ancestry got along in sustainable bands and tribes. Shermer, similar to these others before him, then extrapolates the "relative state of economic simplicity" into what we are today: consumer traders.

He cogently says that "although we have legislated and educated ... ancient trial rituals out of culture, their psychological underpinnings are still buried deep in our brains, waiting to be stirred into action." Think gang skirmishes, warfare, peaceful trade and peaceful exchange. Not all good, not all bad. Put simply: we are both good and evil. And we always have been.

This reality is in concordance with the dramatic cultural shift that occurred in our history-the adoption of large-scale agriculture as the primary means of subsistence, which eventually led us into the industrial revolution. "The attendant leap in food production and population that accompanied the shift to chiefdoms and states allowed for a division of labor to develop in both the economic and social spheres," Shermer explains. The ramifications of these profound changes have been enormous.

Shermer excels in showing just how these changes manifest. He takes from the latest research developments in neuroscience, primatology, evolutionary psychology, behavioral economics and social psychology to explain how our modern ways-rooted in our hunter-gatherer psychology-are presented in behaviors such as stock market investing and making poor money decisions, such as creating credit card debt and gambling.

The Mind of the Market is a libertarian manifesto at heart, which will turn some away. Critics will have plenty to say about his end-of-book deductions, such as saying the path to freedom is through McDonald's ownership in developing countries, or equating the free-market process to evolutionary processes. These are shallow representations of what he actually says, which is, ultimately: "Given our duel disposition to be both good and evil, and the power of the environment to elicit one or the other, we much choose freedom, then create the circumstances in which it can be realized, and then defend it once it is achieved."

The strength with The Mind of the Market is Shermer's application of evolutionary and biological knowledge in explaining in depth why we are the way we are. Taking from multiple scientific disciplines and forming a reasoned argument is always bound to cause ripples. With Shermer at the helm, though, it's always a great read.

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giacomo

Ben fatto

Reviewed in Italy on January 11, 2022

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Libro con spunti interessanti, ma a volte un po’ pesante.

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Mohammed Athar

Five Stars

Reviewed in India on December 18, 2016

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V RAVICHANDRAN

it gives a good perspective of the historical and socialogical background of human ...

Reviewed in India on September 22, 2015

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The writings do not have significant background material on the Financial market. Yes, it gives a good perspective of the historical and socialogical background of human actions and expectation. OK but not great.

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