Can We Survive Our Origins? - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Can We Survive Our Origins? write by Pierpaolo Antonello. This book was released on 2015-01-01. Can We Survive Our Origins? available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Are religions intrinsically violent (as is strenuously argued by the ‘new atheists’)? Or, as Girard argues, have they been functionally rational instruments developed to manage and cope with the intrinsically violent runaway dynamic that characterizes human social organization in all periods of human history? Is violence decreasing in this time of secular modernity post-Christendom (as argued by Steven Pinker and others)? Or are we, rather, at increased and even apocalyptic risk from our enhanced powers of action and our decreased socio-symbolic protections? Rene Girard’s mimetic theory has been slowly but progressively recognized as one of the most striking breakthrough contributions to twentieth-century critical thinking in fundamental anthropology: in particular for its power to model and explain violent sacralities, ancient and modern. The present volume sets this power of explanation in an evolutionary and Darwinian frame. It asks: How far do cultural mechanisms of controlling violence, which allowed humankind to cross the threshold of hominization—i.e., to survive and develop in its evolutionary emergence—still represent today a default setting that threatens to destroy us? Can we transcend them and escape their field of gravity? Should we look to—or should we look beyond—Darwinian survival? What—and where (if anywhere)—is salvation?
Human Origins
Human Origins - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Human Origins write by S. Laing. This book was released on 2023-10-24. Human Origins available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. "Human Origins" by S. Laing is an intellectual voyage that delves profoundly into the intricate tapestry of human evolution and our origins. Laing's methodical scientific approach, coupled with his engaging and accessible writing style, invites readers on a captivating journey through the annals of time. Within these pages, readers embark on an exploration of our distant ancestors and the profound roots of our existence. Laing skillfully pieces together the puzzle of human origins, shedding light on the remarkable journey that has led to our present-day species. With each chapter, readers gain a deeper understanding of the interconnectedness of life on Earth and the fascinating evolutionary milestones that have shaped humanity. "Human Origins" is not just a book; it is an enlightening odyssey that fuels our curiosity, encouraging us to ponder the intricate web of life and our place within it. Laing's work is a testament to the enduring quest for knowledge and the exhilaration of discovery, making this book an essential read for anyone curious about our remarkable journey as a species.
Survival of the Friendliest
Survival of the Friendliest - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Survival of the Friendliest write by Brian Hare. This book was released on 2020-07-14. Survival of the Friendliest available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. A powerful new theory of human nature suggests that our secret to success as a species is our unique friendliness “Brilliant, eye-opening, and absolutely inspiring—and a riveting read. Hare and Woods have written the perfect book for our time.”—Cass R. Sunstein, author of How Change Happens and co-author of Nudge For most of the approximately 300,000 years that Homo sapiens have existed, we have shared the planet with at least four other types of humans. All of these were smart, strong, and inventive. But around 50,000 years ago, Homo sapiens made a cognitive leap that gave us an edge over other species. What happened? Since Charles Darwin wrote about “evolutionary fitness,” the idea of fitness has been confused with physical strength, tactical brilliance, and aggression. In fact, what made us evolutionarily fit was a remarkable kind of friendliness, a virtuosic ability to coordinate and communicate with others that allowed us to achieve all the cultural and technical marvels in human history. Advancing what they call the “self-domestication theory,” Brian Hare, professor in the department of evolutionary anthropology and the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience at Duke University and his wife, Vanessa Woods, a research scientist and award-winning journalist, shed light on the mysterious leap in human cognition that allowed Homo sapiens to thrive. But this gift for friendliness came at a cost. Just as a mother bear is most dangerous around her cubs, we are at our most dangerous when someone we love is threatened by an “outsider.” The threatening outsider is demoted to sub-human, fair game for our worst instincts. Hare’s groundbreaking research, developed in close coordination with Richard Wrangham and Michael Tomasello, giants in the field of cognitive evolution, reveals that the same traits that make us the most tolerant species on the planet also make us the cruelest. Survival of the Friendliest offers us a new way to look at our cultural as well as cognitive evolution and sends a clear message: In order to survive and even to flourish, we need to expand our definition of who belongs.
The First Humans
The First Humans - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook The First Humans write by Herbert Thomas. This book was released on 1995. The First Humans available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Who are we? Where did we come from? What makes us human? The whole puzzle of our early life on earth is gradually being pieced together from fragments of bone, skulls and primitive tools dispersed throughout the world. The trail leads back nearly five million years. Here is a history of human evolution that reveals the very latest finds and thinking - discoveries that can help us to understand our past, our present and even future.
Babies—Darwin’s Survivors as the Fittest
Babies—Darwin’s Survivors as the Fittest - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Babies—Darwin’s Survivors as the Fittest write by Louis Carini. This book was released on 2011-06-24. Babies—Darwin’s Survivors as the Fittest available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Darwin overlooked the fact that we had to originate as babies in his On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection (1859). Surely we all know that babies are in no condition to survive on their own. Babies are not “fitted” to “survive” in any “Struggle for Existence.” That means that we Homo sapiens had to have originated as the first human babies of our hominid parents. I propose that we originated on the basis of my new theory of evolution in Lectures VI and VII above. Those hominids loved us and cared for us, and that is how human babies survived. But there has never been a theory of our origins! Or at least there had been none until my The Origins of Homo Sapiens (Xlibris, 2008). In Lecture VI I newly present my theory of evolution, and in Lecture VII a theory of our special human origins. I write origins, because there must have been many small groups of hominid survivors of my proposed holocaust whose young women then gave birth to those first Homo sapiens babies. How all of this took place is the subject of those two lectures. If you wish you may go directly to them, for each lecture stands on its own. Louis Carini received his doctorate in Experimental Psychology from Clark University in 1955. He is the author of The Theory of Symbolic Transformations, Three Axioms for a Theory of Conduct, Spiritual Humanism, and The Origins of Homo Sapiens.
