Why do we keep doing things we know we shouldn’t? And is that really a failure of will? Author Meghan O’Gieblyn spent years trying to answer that question, first in response to her struggle with alcoholism and her loss of faith, and then by means of Simone Weil, William James, and Iris Murdoch, who argue that the will is powerless over the things we want to change most. Listen as she speaks with EconTalk’s Russ Roberts about her new memoir, Will and Attention, which explores why paying attention does what effort alone can’t, why we can reason ourselves into doing destructive things, and why the choices that most shape our lives are the “choices in between the choices,” or the ones we barely notice making at all.
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