How Culture Makes Us Human
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Author |
: Dwight W Read |
Publisher |
: Routledge |
Total Pages |
: 284 |
Release |
: 2016-05-23 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9781315427232 |
ISBN-13 |
: 1315427230 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (32 Downloads) |
Synopsis How Culture Makes Us Human by : Dwight W Read
What separates modern humans from our primate cousins—are we a mere blink in the march of evolution, or does human culture represent the definitive evolutionary turn? Dwight Read explores the dilemma in this engaging, thought-provoking book, taking readers through an evolutionary odyssey from our primate beginnings through the development of culture and social organization. He assesses the two major trends in this field: one that sees us as a logical culmination of primate evolution, arguing that the rudiments of culture exist in primates and even magpies, and another that views the human transition as so radical that the primate model provides no foundation for understanding human dynamics. Expertly synthesizing a wide body of evidence from the anthropological and life sciences in accessible prose, Read’s book will interest a broad readership from experts to undergraduate students and the general public.
Author |
: Joseph Henrich |
Publisher |
: Princeton University Press |
Total Pages |
: 464 |
Release |
: 2017-10-17 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9780691178431 |
ISBN-13 |
: 0691178437 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (31 Downloads) |
Synopsis The Secret of Our Success by : Joseph Henrich
How our collective intelligence has helped us to evolve and prosper Humans are a puzzling species. On the one hand, we struggle to survive on our own in the wild, often failing to overcome even basic challenges, like obtaining food, building shelters, or avoiding predators. On the other hand, human groups have produced ingenious technologies, sophisticated languages, and complex institutions that have permitted us to successfully expand into a vast range of diverse environments. What has enabled us to dominate the globe, more than any other species, while remaining virtually helpless as lone individuals? This book shows that the secret of our success lies not in our innate intelligence, but in our collective brains—on the ability of human groups to socially interconnect and learn from one another over generations. Drawing insights from lost European explorers, clever chimpanzees, mobile hunter-gatherers, neuroscientific findings, ancient bones, and the human genome, Joseph Henrich demonstrates how our collective brains have propelled our species' genetic evolution and shaped our biology. Our early capacities for learning from others produced many cultural innovations, such as fire, cooking, water containers, plant knowledge, and projectile weapons, which in turn drove the expansion of our brains and altered our physiology, anatomy, and psychology in crucial ways. Later on, some collective brains generated and recombined powerful concepts, such as the lever, wheel, screw, and writing, while also creating the institutions that continue to alter our motivations and perceptions. Henrich shows how our genetics and biology are inextricably interwoven with cultural evolution, and how culture-gene interactions launched our species on an extraordinary evolutionary trajectory. Tracking clues from our ancient past to the present, The Secret of Our Success explores how the evolution of both our cultural and social natures produce a collective intelligence that explains both our species' immense success and the origins of human uniqueness.
Author |
: National Academy of Sciences |
Publisher |
: |
Total Pages |
: 388 |
Release |
: 2007 |
ISBN-10 |
: UOM:39015073872999 |
ISBN-13 |
: |
Rating |
: 4/5 (99 Downloads) |
Synopsis In the Light of Evolution by : National Academy of Sciences
The Arthur M. Sackler Colloquia of the National Academy of Sciences address scientific topics of broad and current interest, cutting across the boundaries of traditional disciplines. Each year, four or five such colloquia are scheduled, typically two days in length and international in scope. Colloquia are organized by a member of the Academy, often with the assistance of an organizing committee, and feature presentations by leading scientists in the field and discussions with a hundred or more researchers with an interest in the topic. Colloquia presentations are recorded and posted on the National Academy of Sciences Sackler colloquia website and published on CD-ROM. These Colloquia are made possible by a generous gift from Mrs. Jill Sackler, in memory of her husband, Arthur M. Sackler.
Author |
: Mark Pagel |
Publisher |
: W. W. Norton & Company |
Total Pages |
: 431 |
Release |
: 2012-02-07 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9780393065879 |
ISBN-13 |
: 0393065871 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (79 Downloads) |
Synopsis Wired for Culture: Origins of the Human Social Mind by : Mark Pagel
A fascinating, far-reaching study of how our species' innate capacity for culture altered the course of our social and evolutionary history. A unique trait of the human species is that our personalities, lifestyles, and worldviews are shaped by an accident of birth—namely, the culture into which we are born. It is our cultures and not our genes that determine which foods we eat, which languages we speak, which people we love and marry, and which people we kill in war. But how did our species develop a mind that is hardwired for culture—and why? Evolutionary biologist Mark Pagel tracks this intriguing question through the last 80,000 years of human evolution, revealing how an innate propensity to contribute and conform to the culture of our birth not only enabled human survival and progress in the past but also continues to influence our behavior today. Shedding light on our species’ defining attributes—from art, morality, and altruism to self-interest, deception, and prejudice—Wired for Culture offers surprising new insights into what it means to be human.
Author |
: Peter J. Richerson |
Publisher |
: University of Chicago Press |
Total Pages |
: 343 |
Release |
: 2008-06-20 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9780226712130 |
ISBN-13 |
: 0226712133 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (30 Downloads) |
Synopsis Not By Genes Alone by : Peter J. Richerson
Humans are a striking anomaly in the natural world. While we are similar to other mammals in many ways, our behavior sets us apart. Our unparalleled ability to adapt has allowed us to occupy virtually every habitat on earth using an incredible variety of tools and subsistence techniques. Our societies are larger, more complex, and more cooperative than any other mammal's. In this stunning exploration of human adaptation, Peter J. Richerson and Robert Boyd argue that only a Darwinian theory of cultural evolution can explain these unique characteristics. Not by Genes Alone offers a radical interpretation of human evolution, arguing that our ecological dominance and our singular social systems stem from a psychology uniquely adapted to create complex culture. Richerson and Boyd illustrate here that culture is neither superorganic nor the handmaiden of the genes. Rather, it is essential to human adaptation, as much a part of human biology as bipedal locomotion. Drawing on work in the fields of anthropology, political science, sociology, and economics—and building their case with such fascinating examples as kayaks, corporations, clever knots, and yams that require twelve men to carry them—Richerson and Boyd convincingly demonstrate that culture and biology are inextricably linked, and they show us how to think about their interaction in a way that yields a richer understanding of human nature. In abandoning the nature-versus-nurture debate as fundamentally misconceived, Not by Genes Alone is a truly original and groundbreaking theory of the role of culture in evolution and a book to be reckoned with for generations to come. “I continue to be surprised by the number of educated people (many of them biologists) who think that offering explanations for human behavior in terms of culture somehow disproves the suggestion that human behavior can be explained in Darwinian evolutionary terms. Fortunately, we now have a book to which they may be directed for enlightenment . . . . It is a book full of good sense and the kinds of intellectual rigor and clarity of writing that we have come to expect from the Boyd/Richerson stable.”—Robin Dunbar, Nature “Not by Genes Alone is a valuable and very readable synthesis of a still embryonic but very important subject straddling the sciences and humanities.”—E. O. Wilson, Harvard University
Author |
: Jeroen C. J. M. van den Bergh |
Publisher |
: Cambridge University Press |
Total Pages |
: 575 |
Release |
: 2018-10-18 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9781108470971 |
ISBN-13 |
: 1108470971 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (71 Downloads) |
Synopsis Human Evolution Beyond Biology and Culture by : Jeroen C. J. M. van den Bergh
A complete account of evolutionary thought in the social, environmental and policy sciences, creating bridges with biology.
Author |
: Richard G. Klein |
Publisher |
: Turner Publishing Company |
Total Pages |
: 331 |
Release |
: 2007-08-15 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9780470250716 |
ISBN-13 |
: 0470250712 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (16 Downloads) |
Synopsis The Dawn of Human Culture by : Richard G. Klein
A bold new theory on what sparked the "big bang" of human culture The abrupt emergence of human culture over a stunningly short period continues to be one of the great enigmas of human evolution. This compelling book introduces a bold new theory on this unsolved mystery. Author Richard Klein reexamines the archaeological evidence and brings in new discoveries in the study of the human brain. These studies detail the changes that enabled humans to think and behave in far more sophisticated ways than before, resulting in the incredibly rapid evolution of new skills. Richard Klein has been described as "the premier anthropologist in the country today" by Evolutionary Anthropology. Here, he and coauthor Blake Edgar shed new light on the full story of a truly fascinating period of evolution. Richard G. Klein, PhD (Palo Alto, CA), is a Professor of Anthropology at Stanford University. He is the author of the definitive academic book on the subject of the origins of human culture, The Human Career. Blake Edgar (San Francisco, CA) is the coauthor of the very successful From Lucy to Language, with Dr. Donald Johanson. He has written extensively for Discover, GEO, and numerous other magazines.
Author |
: Alex Mesoudi |
Publisher |
: University of Chicago Press |
Total Pages |
: 281 |
Release |
: 2011-07-30 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9780226520452 |
ISBN-13 |
: 0226520455 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (52 Downloads) |
Synopsis Cultural Evolution by : Alex Mesoudi
Charles Darwin changed the course of scientific thinking by showing how evolution accounts for the stunning diversity and biological complexity of life on earth. Recently, there has also been increased interest in the social sciences in how Darwinian theory can explain human culture. Covering a wide range of topics, including fads, public policy, the spread of religion, and herd behavior in markets, Alex Mesoudi shows that human culture is itself an evolutionary process that exhibits the key Darwinian mechanisms of variation, competition, and inheritance. This cross-disciplinary volume focuses on the ways cultural phenomena can be studied scientifically—from theoretical modeling to lab experiments, archaeological fieldwork to ethnographic studies—and shows how apparently disparate methods can complement one another to the mutual benefit of the various social science disciplines. Along the way, the book reveals how new insights arise from looking at culture from an evolutionary angle. Cultural Evolution provides a thought-provoking argument that Darwinian evolutionary theory can both unify different branches of inquiry and enhance understanding of human behavior.
Author |
: Dwight W Read |
Publisher |
: Routledge |
Total Pages |
: 238 |
Release |
: 2016-05-23 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9781315427249 |
ISBN-13 |
: 1315427249 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (49 Downloads) |
Synopsis How Culture Makes Us Human by : Dwight W Read
In this engaging, thought-provoking book, Dwight Read explores the fundamental scientific debate about how culture and social organization separate humans from our primate cousins.
Author |
: Luci Attala |
Publisher |
: University of Wales Press |
Total Pages |
: 206 |
Release |
: 2019-04-01 |
ISBN-10 |
: 9781786834133 |
ISBN-13 |
: 1786834138 |
Rating |
: 4/5 (33 Downloads) |
Synopsis How Water Makes Us Human by : Luci Attala
This book provides a novel cross-disciplinary approach to water, demonstrating the role water plays in shaping human lives. It uses anthropological information about water in Kenya, Wales and Spain to show how what water does in those areas has influenced the way that people can be with it.