Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will

by Robert M. Sapolsky

The execution, which took place in a public square in Paris on March 28, 1757, was well documented. Damiens’s feet were first crushed with a torture device called the “boot.” The offending hand with which he had held the knife was then scorched with burning pincers; a mixture of molten lead, boiling oil, burning resin, wax, and sulfur was then poured on his wounds. He was then castrated and the burning mixture applied there as well. These actions, along with Damiens’s wailing and begging for death, provoked cheers from the massive crowd that filled the square, as well as from the apartments above (which had been rented out to the wealthy as box seats at exorbitant prices[*7]). But these tortures were merely the warm-up act for the main event, which was the “quartering”—each of a victim’s limbs would be tied to a horse, and the four horses would be led off in opposing directions, tearing off the person’s limbs.