Facing Suicide: Understanding Why People Kill Themselves and How We Can Stop Them

by James Barrat

A deep dive into a national catastrophe that examines how and why suicide happens so that we can prevent it.Suicide in America has become a public health crisis.  Now this insightful book sheds much needed light on the many risk factors that combine to drive suicide forward so that we can try to identify and stop them.    On average about 45,000 people in America die by suicide each year, a death toll higher than car accidents or homicides. For every person who dies there were are about 10 ten unsuccessful attempts. And every day some 15 million Americans endure suicidal persistent, agonizing thoughts about taking their lives.    Profiling suicide survivors, their families, and experts in the field, Barrat begins to assemble a fuller portrait of suicide, examing such risk factors as genetics, means, mental health, and history.  He specifically looks at the longterm affects of racial trauma, bullying, financial stress, and even reveals that the suicidal brain has a characteristic signature.   Perhaps most important, Barrat finds that 100% of the people he interviews who attempted suicide are happy they got help and are alive today.  Their message is one of hope and possibility.  We may never be able to stop all suicide attempts, but with better understanding, we can stop many more.

Genres: Nonfiction, Mental Health, Psychology, Death

288 pages, Hardcover

Published September 3, 2024

About the author

The Intelligence Explosion by James Barrat cuts through the noise surrounding artificial intelligence, offering a sober analysis where both doomsayers and techno-optimists fall short. As generative AI transforms our world at breakneck speed, Barrat—a veteran technology journalist—provides the critical framework we urgently need to assess its true implications.

Drawing on exclusive interviews with leading AI researchers and ethicists, Barrat reveals how even the architects of today's most powerful systems struggle to understand their creations' capabilities and limitations. The book meticulously documents how major tech companies have repeatedly deployed systems that produce convincing but factually incorrect outputs, amid many other errors, raising profound questions about reliability and control.

What distinguishes this work is Barrat's nuanced exploration of AI's dual nature: its potential to address humanity's greatest challenges alongside its capacity for unprecedented harm. Neither alarmist nor naively optimistic, The Intelligence Explosion delivers the intellectual clarity essential for citizens, policymakers, and technologists navigating this pivotal moment in human history.

PRAISE FOR THE INTELLIGENCE EXPLOSION
“AGI maybe years or even decades (and not just months) away, but James Barrat is right; we are not prepared. And as Barrat says here, in The Intelligence Explosion, "generative AI carries risks that are unlike anything we’ve faced before". The time to act is now.
— Dr. Gary Marcus, NYU Professor Emeritus, and author of Taming Silicon Valley

"James Barrat pulls no punches in his powerful new book The Intelligence Explosion. He deftly explores the many perspectives on the AI tsunami about to crash into humanity. I believe there are solutions to the problems he describes, and I am hopeful his book will help wake up us all to the urgency of taking action. Read the book and share it for the good of humankind, but keep your support network close as it can be quite disturbing."
— Steve Omohundro, Founder/CEO at Possibility Research and Chief Scientist at AI Brain

"A great tension exists currently where people in AI or AGI labs understand that they are putting the rest of society at risk, yet the rest of society doesn’t realize what is going on. James Barrat’s work is important to help address this great disequilibrium."
— Jaan Tallinn, founding engineer of Skype and Kazaa and a co-founder of the Cambridge Centre for the Study of Existential Risk and the Future of Life Institute

"With snappy writing and entertaining anecdotes, The Intelligence Explosion unpacks the powerful cultural narrative that advanced AI poses an existential risk to humanity’s continued dominion over our fragile planet. James Barrat is among those whose investigations lead him to conclude that the threat is real, and to date attempts to control or ensure advanced AI will be safe and benign have yielded no fruit."
— Wendell Wallach, author of A Dangerous Master

“James Barrat’s The Intelligence Explosion offers a comprehensive examination of the potential for recursive self-improvement in artificial intelligence systems. The book methodically outlines scenarios in which AI systems could rapidly exceed human cognitive capacities through iterative enhancements, presenting detailed analyses of the technical challenges and risks associated with such developments. From my perspective as an AI safety researcher, the work provides a rigorous and systematic assessment of both the transformative potential and the significant safety concerns inherent in the pursuit of advanced AI technologies.”
- Professor Roman Yampolskiy, author of AI: Unexplainable, Unpredictable, Uncontrollable

"When the machines outthink us, will they outmaneuver us? Barrat’s The Intelligence Explosion is a wake-up call we can’t afford to ignore."
-Adam A. Ford, Futurologist, Data Architect, M.IT

“Is Big Tech gradually automating away all our jobs? And

Reviews

[Malola · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting book on suicide.
The examples were on point, but I think I would have preferred more science than personal stories.
I understand that this is from the US perspective, but I would have liked more statistics from all over the world than just US, and a couple of first world country.

[Star Kitten · Rating 3 out of 5]

"There is no book so comprehensive, insightful, humane, and helpful about suicide since Kay Redfield Jamison's Night Falls Fast", reads one of the recommendations on the back cover of Facing Suicide. Having read both books, this is--emphatically--not the case.

Facing Suicide is structured like a documentary (and may be based on one, for all I know). There are two problems with that. One, it leans far too heavily into personal anecdotes. And two, it deals with a lot of things superficially rather than deep-dive into any of them. It's the opposite of "comprehensive", let alone "insightful" unless you count on readers to derive their own meaning from the stories of survivors.

And then, there's a third problem: as a Canadian reader, most of the groups and issues featured in this book are of no relevance to me. The author talks about suicides among Native Americans, Bible Belt farmers, African-Americans, veterans, etc., all of them caused at least in part by the prohibitive cost of healthcare and easy access to firearms. We have neither of these problems up here. The brief detour into Danish mental health institutions and suicide prevention was interesting but, again, structured like a ten-minute aside in a two-hour documentary.

The neuroscience bits were interesting but far too brief. At least Facing Suicide sent me on an interesting rabbit hole about Dr. John Mann's findings after researching over 1000 brains of people who died by suicide, which was far more "comprehensive" and "insightful" than this book.

[STEPHEN PLETKO!! · Rating 5 out of 5]

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AMERICA'S LEAST UNDERSTOOD AND MOST PAINFUL EPIDEMIC

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"This book...has three goals.

The first is to show you the signs of suicide illustrated by real-life stories of people who killed themselves but, more to the point, people who survived or were stopped in their attempt by someone who saw the signs and intervened...

[The] second goal is to give you a general background in the causes of suicide through true life stories and science...

[The] third goal is to spread hope...[This] is a book about hope in the face of suicide."

The above quote (in italics) is from this book by James Barrat. I was initially confused by who Barrat was since it says on the copyright page that he is a psychologist. but on the inside back cover it says he is an author and documentary filmmaker behind this book's PBS companion film, entitled "Facing Suicide" (2022) (which I discovered is who he really is).

This book takes an in-depth exploration of a grim and complex subject that examines how and why suicide happens so that we can take steps to prevent it.

Barrat tackles the subject with empathy and intelligence.

This is an important, well considered contribution to a critical topic.

Finally, the only problem I had with this book is that it says nothing about assisted suicide or medical assistance in dying (MAID). These are important topics and I would have liked to read his thoughts on them. However, I am not going to penalize this book for this because its overall message is so important.

In conclusion, this is an indispensable handbook on the subject of suicide in the twenty-first century!!

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(2024; 12 chapters; main narrative 230 pages; acknowledgements; appendix; notes; index)

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[Pumpkin+Bear · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book's balance of first-person testimonials with scientific studies, historical perspectives, and current practices was an interesting and effective take. It was especially effective that most of the first-person testimonials came from people in populations that are overrepresented in suicide statistics, and that they came from both survivors and the loved ones of non-survivors.

Learning about the various current best practices in suicide prevention was the most interesting part of the book, to me, although the explanations for why these best practices are thought to be effective wasn't always clear. I'm personally doubting, for instance, the "Good Behavior Game" used with young schoolchildren in Denmark--enforcing normative community behavior by punishing an entire group of children for one child's act doesn't feel like a setup for good mental health to me.

The biggest piece of information that I learned, however, is that suicidal crises come in waves, and if one can endure a crisis for 10-15 minutes, then the specific urge can diminish and the sufferer has bought themselves some time to receive care. And that's why US gun laws are correlated to high suicide statistics--one can't necessarily poison oneself within 10-15 minutes, but one can absolutely shoot themselves within that time.

988 is the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline within the US. Help is available via phone and text, in English and Spanish.

[Robert Bogue]

It started with a movie. Facing Suicide: Understanding Why People Kill Themselves and How We Can Stop Them started with James Barrat’s film of the same name (without the subtitle). The book is an expansion of the content in the video. It’s a contemporary view of suicide in America and what the experts see as opportunities to change the outcomes.

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[Rachel Schroter · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found the combination of heartfelt first-person accounts and more clinical, numbers-based views to be very effective.While a heavy book at times, I found it incredibly helpful in the immediate aftermath of my own mental health crisis. It made me feel less alone and helped me to understand my circumstances better.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was incredibly interesting. Great ressource for families and professionals

[Melissa Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

A truly important and impactful book.

[Brynn Eaton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great review of some of the risk factors, biological and genetic components, warning signs, varying interventions, and systemic factors relating to the suicide epidemic.