How Do We Want to Live? (eBook)

Do you also ask yourself how much your thinking, feeling and behavior are determined by your genes and biology? Do you doubt that interfering with our brain chemistry will make us happier and more content people? Are you skeptical that computer algorithms can capture your essence as a human being?

This nonfiction book challenges the worldview of 'divine man' (Harari), in which humans are determined by their biology and medicine serves to optimize them. The author shows that we are the active designers of our living conditions and thus determine our own physical and mental health.

Be inspired to participate in shaping the future of a human society in which we have to decide where we live, how we live with each other, how we work, and how we educate ourselves. 

Target Audiences:

Ideal for anyone interested in the fundamentals of brain research, psychology, and psychiatry, and who is concerned about the nature of human beings and their future.

About the Author: 

Prof. Dr. Gerhard Gründer, psychiatrist and psychotherapist, is a professor at the University of Heidelberg. He heads the Department of Molecular Neuroimaging at the Central Institute of Mental Health in Mannheim. 

This book is a translation of the original German 1^st edition Wie wollen wir leben? by Gerhard Gründer, published by Springer-Verlag GmbH, DE, part of Springer Nature in 2020. The translation was done with the help of artificial intelligence (machine translation by the service DeepL.com). A subsequent human revision was done primarily in terms of content, so that the book will read stylistically differently from a conventional translation. Springer Nature works continuously to further the development of tools for the production of books and on the related technologies to support the authors.

Prof. Dr. Gerhard Gründer, psychiatrist and psychotherapist, is a professor at the Mannheim Medical Faculty of the University of Heidelberg. He heads the Department of Molecular Neuroimaging at the Central Institute of Mental Health in Mannheim. After studying medicine in Cologne and training as a specialist in psychiatry at the Psychiatric Clinic of the University of Mainz, he followed a research stay in the Department of Radiology at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, USA. Mr. Gründer habilitated in Mainz with a topic on the application of nuclear medicine imaging techniques in psychiatric research. From 2004 to 2017, he was Professor of Experimental Neuropsychiatry at RWTH Aachen University and Deputy Director of the Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics at the University Hospital Aachen. His main research interests include the neurobiology of mental disorders as well as molecular and clinical psychopharmacology. He uses functional imaging techniques, in particular positron emission tomography (PET).