Thinking Big How The Evolution Of Social Life Shaped The Human Mind

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Thinking Big: How the Evolution of Social Life Shaped the Human Mind

Robin Dunbar,Clive Gamble,John Gowlett
Thinking Big How the Evolution of Social Life Shaped the Human Mind Book PDF

Author : Robin Dunbar,Clive Gamble,John Gowlett
Publisher : Thames & Hudson
Page : 224 pages
File Size : 40,7 Mb
Release : 2014-06-17
Category : History
ISBN : 9780500772140

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Thinking Big: How the Evolution of Social Life Shaped the Human Mind by Robin Dunbar,Clive Gamble,John Gowlett Pdf

A closer look at genealogy, incorporating how biological, anthropological, and technical factors can influence human lives We are at a pivotal moment in understanding our remote ancestry and its implications for how we live today. The barriers to what we can know about our distant relatives have been falling as a result of scientific advance, such as decoding the genomes of humans and Neanderthals, and bringing together different perspectives to answer common questions. These collaborations have brought new knowledge and suggested fresh concepts to examine. The results have shaken the old certainties. The results are profound; not just for the study of the past but for appreciating why we conduct our social lives in ways, and at scales, that are familiar to all of us. But such basic familiarity raises a dilemma. When surrounded by the myriad technical and cultural innovations that support our global, urbanized lifestyles we can lose sight of the small social worlds we actually inhabit and that can be traced deep into our ancestry. So why do we need art, religion, music, kinship, myths, and all the other facets of our over-active imaginations if the reality of our effective social worlds is set by a limit of some one hundred and fifty partners (Dunbar’s number) made of family, friends, and useful acquaintances? How could such a social community lead to a city the size of London or a country as large as China? Do we really carry our hominin past into our human present? It is these small worlds, and the link they allow to the study of the past that forms the central point in this book.

Thinking Big

Clive Gamble,John Gowlett,Robin Dunbar
Thinking Big Book PDF

Author : Clive Gamble,John Gowlett,Robin Dunbar
Publisher : National Geographic Books
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 42,5 Mb
Release : 2018-03-20
Category : History
ISBN : 9780500293829

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Thinking Big by Clive Gamble,John Gowlett,Robin Dunbar Pdf

A closer look at social history and the growth of the human brain When and how did the brains of our hominin ancestors become human minds? When and why did our capacity for language, art, music and dance evolve? This pathbreaking book proposes that it was the need for early humans to live in ever-larger social groups over greater distances—the ability to “think big”—that drove the enlargement of the human brain and the development of the human mind. This social brain hypothesis, put forward by evolutionary psychologists such as Robin Dunbar, can be tested against archaeological and fossil evidence. The conclusions here—the fruits of over seven years of research—build on the insight that modern humans live in effective social groups of about 150 (so-called “Dunbar’s number”), some three times the size of those of apes and our early ancestors. We live in a world dominated by social networking. Yet our virtual contact lists, whether on Facebook or Twitter, are on average no bigger than Dunbar’s number.

Evolutionary Processes in the Natural History of Religion

Hansjörg Hemminger
Evolutionary Processes in the Natural History of Religion Book PDF

Author : Hansjörg Hemminger
Publisher : Springer Nature
Page : 209 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 2021-09-22
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9783030704087

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Evolutionary Processes in the Natural History of Religion by Hansjörg Hemminger Pdf

The study of religion by the humanities and social sciences has become receptive for an evolutionary perspective. Some proposals model the evolution of religion in Darwinian terms, or construct a synergy between biological and non-Darwinian processes. The results, however, have not yet become truly interdisciplinary. The biological theory of evolution in form of the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (EES) is only sparsely represented in theories published so far by scholars of religion. Therefore this book reverses the line of view and asks how their results assort with evolutionary biology: How can the subject area “religion” integrated into behavioral biology? How is theory building affected by the asymmetry between the scarce empirical knowledge of prehistoric religion, and the body of knowledge about extant and historic religions? How does hominin evolution in general relate to the evolution of religion? Are there evolutionary pre-adaptations? Subsequent versions of evolutionary biology from the original Darwinism to EES are used in interdisciplinary constructs. Can they be integrated into a comprehensive theory? The biological concept most often used is co-evolution, in form of a gene-culture co-evolution. However, the term denotes a process different from biological co-evolution. Important EES concepts do not appear in present models of religious evolution: e.g. neutral evolution, evolutionary drift, evolutionary constraints etc. How to include them into an interdisciplinary approach? Does the cognitive science of religion (CSR) harmonize with behavioral biology and the brain sciences? Religion as part of human culture is supported by a complex, multi-level behavioral system. How can it be modeled scientifically? The book addresses graduate students and researchers concerned about the scientific study of religion, and biologist interested in interdisciplinary theory building in the field.

Handbook of Evolutionary Research in Archaeology

Anna Marie Prentiss
Handbook of Evolutionary Research in Archaeology Book PDF

Author : Anna Marie Prentiss
Publisher : Springer
Page : 443 pages
File Size : 53,9 Mb
Release : 2019-06-03
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9783030111175

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Handbook of Evolutionary Research in Archaeology by Anna Marie Prentiss Pdf

Evolutionary Research in Archaeology seeks to provide a comprehensive overview of contemporary evolutionary research in archaeology. The book will provide a single source for introduction and overview of basic and advanced evolutionary concepts and research programs in archaeology. Content will be organized around four areas of critical research including microevolutionary and macroevolutionary process, human ecology studies (evolutionary ecology, demography, and niche construction), and evolutionary cognitive archaeology. Authors of individual chapters will address theoretical foundations, history of research, contemporary contributions and debates, and implications for the future for their respective topics. As appropriate, authors present or discuss short empirical case studies to illustrate key arguments. ​

Oxford Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution

Nathalie Gontier,Andy Lock,Chris Sinha
Oxford Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution Book PDF

Author : Nathalie Gontier,Andy Lock,Chris Sinha
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 1185 pages
File Size : 47,8 Mb
Release : 2024-02-01
Category : Psychology
ISBN : 9780192543516

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Oxford Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution by Nathalie Gontier,Andy Lock,Chris Sinha Pdf

The biological and neurological capacity to symbolize, and the products of behavioral, cognitive, sociocultural, linguistic, and technological uses of symbols (symbolism), are fundamental to every aspect of human life. The Oxford Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution explores the origins of our characteristically human abilities - our ability to speak, create images, play music, and read and write. The book investigates how symbolization evolved in human evolution and how symbolism is expressed across the various areas of human life. The field is intrinsically interdisciplinary - considering findings from fossil studies, scientific research from primatology, developmental psychology, and of course linguistics. Written by world leading experts, thirty-eight topical chapters are grouped into six thematic parts that respectively focus on epistemological, psychological, anthropological, ethological, linguistic, and social-technological aspects of human symbolic evolution. The handbook presents an in-depth but comprehensive and interdisciplinary overview of the of the state of the art in the science of human symbolic evolution. This work will be of interest to academics and students active in all fields contributing to the study of human evolution.

Lucy to Language

Robin Ian MacDonald Dunbar,R. I. M. Dunbar,Clive Gamble,J. A. J. Gowlett
Lucy to Language Book PDF

Author : Robin Ian MacDonald Dunbar,R. I. M. Dunbar,Clive Gamble,J. A. J. Gowlett
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 531 pages
File Size : 55,6 Mb
Release : 2014-02
Category : Psychology
ISBN : 9780199652594

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Lucy to Language by Robin Ian MacDonald Dunbar,R. I. M. Dunbar,Clive Gamble,J. A. J. Gowlett Pdf

This volume readdresses the past contribution from archaeology towards the study of evolutionary issues, and ties evolutionary psychology into the extensive historical data from the past, allowing us to escape the confined timeframe of the comparatively recent human mind and explore the question of just what it is that makes us so different.

Understanding Intelligence

Ken Richardson
Understanding Intelligence Book PDF

Author : Ken Richardson
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 247 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 2022-02-03
Category : Medical
ISBN : 9781108837132

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Understanding Intelligence by Ken Richardson Pdf

This accessible book explains the origins, evolution, and nature of intelligence, from single cells to human culture and cognition.

Perspectives

William F Brown
Perspectives Book PDF

Author : William F Brown
Publisher : FriesenPress
Page : 414 pages
File Size : 52,7 Mb
Release : 2016-03-04
Category : Creationism
ISBN : 9781460270301

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Perspectives by William F Brown Pdf

From the first seconds Following the Big Bang, to our best guesses for the fate of the universe and humanity, science provides stunning new perspectives about the place of humanity in the cosmos. Humans may live on one planet in one small corner of the Milky Way, itself one of billions of other galaxies, but Earth may be unique in one respect. Earth is teaming with life, one species of which, through chance and natural selection, developed an extraordinary brain, gifted with imagination, curiosity and a compulsion to understand ourselves and the universe. Perspectives is a journey through deep time, from the creation of the universe to the beginnings of life, our human origins and later the rise of culture and religion. It explores what it means to be human, and where our technology could take us in the years and centuries to come....

What We Are: The Evolutionary Roots of Our Future

Lonnie Aarssen
What We Are The Evolutionary Roots of Our Future Book PDF

Author : Lonnie Aarssen
Publisher : Springer Nature
Page : 206 pages
File Size : 48,9 Mb
Release : 2022-07-05
Category : Science
ISBN : 9783031058790

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What We Are: The Evolutionary Roots of Our Future by Lonnie Aarssen Pdf

Other animals are driven to spend essentially their whole lives just trying to get fed, stay alive, and get laid. That’s about it. The same was true for our proto-human ancestors. And modern humans of course also require a Survival Drive and a Sex Drive in order to leave descendants. But today we spend most of our lives mainly just trying to convince ourselves that our existence is not absurd. In What We Are, Queen’s University biologist, Lonnie Aarssen, traces how our biocultural evolution has shaped Homo sapiens into the only creature that refuses to be what it is — the only creature preoccupied with a deeply ingrained, and absurd sentiment: I have a distinct ‘mental life’—an ‘inner self’—that exists separately and apart from ‘material life’, and so, unlike the latter, need not come to an end. This delusion conceivably gave our distant ancestors some wishful thinking for finding some measure of relief from the terrifying, uniquely human knowledge of the eventual loss of corporeal survival. But this came with an impulsive, nagging doubt — an obsessive underlying uncertainty: ‘self-impermanence anxiety’. Biocultural evolution, however, was not finished. It also gave us two additional, uniquely human, primal drives, both serving to help quell the burden of this anxiety. Legacy Drive generates delusional cultural domains for ‘extension’ of self; and Leisure Drive generates pleasurable cultural domains for distraction – ‘escape’ – from self. Legacy Drive and Leisure Drive, Aarssen argues, represent two of the most profound consequences of human cognitive and cultural evolution. What We Are advances propositions regarding how a visceral susceptibility to self-impermanence anxiety has — paradoxically — played a pivotal role in rewarding the reproductive success of our ancestors, and has thus been a driving force in shaping fundamental motivations and cultural norms of modern humans. More than any other milestone in the evolution of human minds, self-impermanence anxiety, and its mitigating Drives for Legacy and Leisure, account for not just the advance of civilization over the past many thousands of years, but also now, its impending collapse. Effective management of this crisis, Aarssen insists, will require a deeper and more broadly public understanding of its Darwinian evolutionary roots — as laid out in What We Are.

Modern Humans

John F. Hoffecker
Modern Humans Book PDF

Author : John F. Hoffecker
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Page : 362 pages
File Size : 41,6 Mb
Release : 2017-10-31
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780231543743

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Modern Humans by John F. Hoffecker Pdf

Modern Humans is a vivid account of the most recent—and perhaps the most important—phase of human evolution: the appearance of anatomically modern people (Homo sapiens) in Africa less than half a million years ago and their later spread throughout the world. Leaving no stone unturned, John F. Hoffecker demonstrates that Homo sapiens represents a “major transition” in the evolution of living systems in terms of fundamental changes in the role of non-genetic information. Modern Humans synthesizes recent findings from genetics (including the rapidly growing body of ancient DNA), the human fossil record, and archaeology relating to the African origin and global dispersal of anatomically modern people. Hoffecker places humans in the broad context of the evolution of life, emphasizing the critical role of genetic and non-genetic forms of information in living systems as well as how changes in the storage, transmission, and translation of information underlie major transitions in evolution. He also draws on information and complexity theory to explain the emergence of Homo sapiens in Africa several hundred thousand years ago and the rapid and unprecedented spread of our species into a variety of environments in Australia and Eurasia, including the Arctic and Beringia, beginning between 75,000 and 60,000 years ago. This magisterial work will appeal to all with an interest in the ever-fascinating field of human evolution.

Human Origins

Camilla Power,Morna Finnegan,Hilary Callan
Human Origins Book PDF

Author : Camilla Power,Morna Finnegan,Hilary Callan
Publisher : Berghahn Books
Page : 364 pages
File Size : 55,8 Mb
Release : 2016-12-01
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781785333798

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Human Origins by Camilla Power,Morna Finnegan,Hilary Callan Pdf

Human Origins brings together new thinking by social anthropologists and other scholars on the evolution of human culture and society. No other discipline has more relevant expertise to consider the emergence of humans as the symbolic species. Yet, social anthropologists have been conspicuously absent from debates about the origins of modern humans. These contributions explore why that is, and how social anthropology can shed light on early kinship and economic relations, gender politics, ritual, cosmology, ethnobiology, medicine, and the evolution of language.

Being a Human

Charles Foster
Being a Human Book PDF

Author : Charles Foster
Publisher : Metropolitan Books
Page : 342 pages
File Size : 41,7 Mb
Release : 2021-08-31
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781250783721

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Being a Human by Charles Foster Pdf

NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE ATLANTIC, KIRKUS REVIEWS, AND NEW STATESMAN A radically immersive exploration of three pivotal moments in the evolution of human consciousness, asking what kinds of creatures humans were, are, and might yet be How did humans come to be who we are? In his marvelous, eccentric, and widely lauded book Being a Beast, legal scholar, veterinary surgeon, and naturalist extraordinaire Charles Foster set out to understand the consciousness of animal species by living as a badger, otter, fox, deer, and swift. Now, he inhabits three crucial periods of human development to understand the consciousness of perhaps the strangest animal of all—the human being. To experience the Upper Paleolithic era—a turning point when humans became behaviorally modern, painting caves and telling stories, Foster learns what it feels like to be a Cro-Magnon hunter-gatherer by living in makeshift shelters without amenities in the rural woods of England. He tests his five impoverished senses to forage for berries and roadkill and he undertakes shamanic journeys to explore the connection of wakeful dreaming to religion. For the Neolithic period, when humans stayed in one place and domesticated plants and animals, forever altering our connection to the natural world, he moves to a reconstructed Neolithic settlement. Finally, to explore the Enlightenment—the age of reason and the end of the soul—Foster inspects Oxford colleges, dissecting rooms, cafes, and art galleries. He finds his world and himself bizarre and disembodied, and he rues the atrophy of our senses, the cause for much of what ails us. Drawing on psychology, neuroscience, natural history, agriculture, medical law and ethics, Being a Human is one man’s audacious attempt to feel a connection with 45,000 years of human history. This glorious, fiercely imaginative journey from our origins to a possible future ultimately shows how we might best live on earth—and thrive.

Extending the Evolutionary Synthesis

Axel Lange
Extending the Evolutionary Synthesis Book PDF

Author : Axel Lange
Publisher : CRC Press
Page : 379 pages
File Size : 54,6 Mb
Release : 2023-06-06
Category : Nature
ISBN : 9781000869408

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Extending the Evolutionary Synthesis by Axel Lange Pdf

The theory of evolution is itself evolving with new findings and changes in the fundamental underlying concepts. It is true that today's synthetic theory, which goes back to Darwin, is persistently successful. However, it offers no convincing explanation to many questions, some examples of which are as follows: What forms of inheritance exist besides genetics; how complex variations, especially evolutionary innovations such as bird feathers and turtle shells, arise; how the environment affects the evolution of species and is changed by them simultaneously; and why the evolution of birds, corals, and human culture is not explainable by natural selection alone. Scientific findings of the last decades require continuous rethinking and integration of new data and concepts into the theory of evolution. This comprehensibly written and excellently researched book provides exciting new insights into the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis using fascinating new examples from evolutionary biology. Key Features Comprehensively explains the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis Understandably written for a broad audience Includes interviews with world-leading evolutionary biologists Reviews the historical development of evolutionary theory with explanations of open, unanswered questions Explains the new concepts with powerful illustrations Related Titles Bard, J. Evolution: The Origins and Mechanisms of Diversity (ISBN 9781032138480) Johnson, N. Darwin’s Reach: 21st Century Applications of Evolutionary Biology (ISBN 9781138587427)

From Object to Experience

Harry Francis Mallgrave
From Object to Experience Book PDF

Author : Harry Francis Mallgrave
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 2018-06-28
Category : Architecture
ISBN : 9781350059566

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From Object to Experience by Harry Francis Mallgrave Pdf

Harry Francis Mallgrave combines a history of ideas about architectural experience with the latest insights from the fields of neuroscience, cognitive science and evolutionary biology to make a powerful argument about the nature and future of architectural design. Today, the sciences have granted us the tools to help us understand better than ever before the precise ways in which the built environment can affect the building user's individual experience. Through an understanding of these tools, architects should be able to become better designers, prioritizing the experience of space - the emotional and aesthetic responses, and the sense of homeostatic well-being, of those who will occupy any designed environment. In From Object to Experience, Mallgrave goes further, arguing that it should also be possible to build an effective new cultural ethos for architectural practice. Drawing upon a range of humanistic and biological sources, and emphasizing the far-reaching implications of new neuroscientific discoveries and models, this book brings up-to-date insights and theoretical clarity to a position that was once considered revolutionary but is fast becoming accepted in architecture.

Solving the Evolutionary Puzzle of Human Cooperation

Glenn Barenthin
Solving the Evolutionary Puzzle of Human Cooperation Book PDF

Author : Glenn Barenthin
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
Page : 248 pages
File Size : 47,9 Mb
Release : 2019-09-05
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781350106765

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Solving the Evolutionary Puzzle of Human Cooperation by Glenn Barenthin Pdf

In this book, Glenn Barenthin provides a new solution to a key question in the cognitive and evolutionary study of religion: why do humans cooperate? What led humans, uniquely among animals, to have large-scale civilizations with unprecedented cooperation? One explanation, propagated by the Big God Proponents (BGP), argues that a moralizing God is the crucial motivator for the pro-social behaviour necessary for large scale civilization. To explore this idea, Barenthin provides a critical assessment of the evidence provided by the BGP, and also discusses the place of God in our moral thinking. However, using evidence from anthropology, history, cognitive science, psychology and game theory, Barenthin presents a new theory: that the evolutionary pressures faced by our forebears paved the way for emerging humans to engage in what he terms 'thin cooperation'. This type of cooperation requires individuals to comprehend the reasons for their actions, and it is often done with others in mind. Finally, Barenthin argues that humans also have the capacity for 'thick cooperation', which is made possible by those fighting for the rights of strangers in an attempt to make the world a fairer place for a greater number of people.