Overall a good read with great implications on outlook of life, putting the past behind us, focusing on the present mindfully, and looking to the future. I do appreciate the level of detail the author goes into describing the concept of 'Afreesm', or lack of free will. Basically the 'everything is meant to be' mentality, but with a much more palatable, understandable approach and discussion.

My main criticism is towards the end, the author makes some tangential claims and discussions regarding politics, social policies, and religious ideas. I understand why these tangents were made and if this is the author's true objective, I can not argue with that. To this reader, though, these detract and distract from the overall manuscript. I believe the author has described this topic well enough that the readers can understand the implications made and apply the concepts taught themselves without having to go to this granular of detail. To me, this is ultimately the goal of the writing.

This book offers food for though. I really enjoyed reading it. Thank you to the author for the hard work and thought put into its creation..

This is an exhaustive discussion of the concept of afreeism - the theory that we have no free will. I found the topic interesting, and this book gave me a lot to think about. However, it was a bit much of a good thing. If you were taking a philosophy class and wanted to know everything there is to know about this topic, this is the book for you.

Great book! A clear, concise presentation of both the historical debate around free will and Marks' novel views on the surprisingly positive effects of accepting the afreeist position. This is one of those rare books that educates you and challenges you to think. It is an engaging read; highly recommended.

Stephen Marks, the author of "Afreeism" who teaches law at Boston University and "dabbles" in politics and philosophy, has composed a text that is not worth anyone's time reading. His three-part book begins by correctly asserting that our universe is wholly deterministic and that free will is an illusion which demonstrates that like a stopped clock Mr. Marks is right twice a day. Everything that follows in "Afreeism" is completely wrong and if the author expanded his areas of interest to include both science and economics he would recognize his many (endless?) errors.
A few examples should suffice to prove this point. If Mr. Marks read books about science he would know that since 1964 we have proven that quantum mechanics is like the rest of the universe is deterministic. Similarly, Mr. Marks cited Saez and Zucman on the question of wealth inequality but failed to note that these two scholars reported that wealth inequality in the US was much more sharply skewed in 1913 than it is today. Marks repeatedly cites Collins who is a well-known ideologue but fails to mention that while pre-tax measures of household income have been skewing since 1970 that household figures after-taxes and including government transfers have not followed suit. Ditto, for measures of consumption.
The truth is that ALL measures of inequality in America have been converging for at least the last 120 years and as the developing nations have been rejecting socialism in favor of market-driven economies that inequality has been shrinking world wide for the past 50 years.