Showing titles in Evolution

Twelve renowned scientists and theologians offer penetrating insights into the evolution dialogue in The Deep Structure of Biology. Each considers whether the orthodox model of evolution is sufficient and offers his/her own perspective on evolution and biology. The discussion of biology and evolution in these essays broadens the scope of the traditional evolution discussion as it aims to stimulate the development of further research programs. Scholars in the science and religion field will find this book a valuable resource.

Among scientists who write, no one illuminates as well as Stephen Jay Gould does the wonderful workings of the natural world. Now in a new volume of collected essays—his sixth since Ever Since Darwin—Gould speaks of the importance of unbroken connections within our own lives and to our ancestral generations. Along with way, he opens to us the mysteries of fish tails, frog calls, and other matters, and shows once and for all why we must take notice when a seemingly insignificant creature is threatened, like the land snail Partula from Moorea, whose extinction he movingly relates.

Over a century after Darwin published the Origin of Species, Darwinian theory is in a "vibrantly healthy state," writes Stephen Jay Gould, its most engaging and illuminating exponent. Exploring the "peculiar and mysterious particulars of nature," Gould introduces the listener to some of the many and wonderful manifestations of evolutionary biology.

As biologist Jeremy Griffith explains in The Interview (which psychiatrist Professor Harry Prosen described as the most important interview of all time), while we humans lacked the explanation for our 2-million-year corrupted human condition we had no choice but to deny that our distant ape ancestors lived in a state of cooperative and loving innocence.

It was the most radical human-breeding experiment in American history, and no one knew how it turned out. The Repository for Germinal Choice, nicknamed the Nobel Prize sperm bank, opened to notorious fanfare in 1980, and for two decades, women flocked to it from all over the country to choose a sperm donor from its roster of Nobel-laureate scientists, mathematical prodigies, successful businessmen, and star athletes.

În Bonobo și ateul, Frans de Waal folosește cunoștințele dobândite în zeci de ani de cercetare a primatelor, și a speciei bonobo în particular, pentru a aprofunda cu ochiul fin al eseistului cultural, versat în istoria artei și în filozofie, probleme fundamentale ale naturii umane. Care este izvorul moralității și ce transformări a suferit aceasta pe parcursul evoluției? Putem fi buni și altruiști și în lipsa constrângerilor religiei? Este simțul moral apanajul omului, sau e prezent şi la speciile de maimuțe cu care ne înrudim?

With its rich biodiversity, astounding wildlife, and breathtaking animal migrations, Serengeti is like no other ecosystem on the planet. A Place Like No Other is Anthony Sinclair's firsthand account of how he and other scientists discovered the biological principles that regulate life in Serengeti and how they rule all of the natural world.

For more than 150 years, continuous debate has swirled around the topic of evolution. From Darwin to Dawkins, extensive scientific evidence has been presented for evolution, yet almost half of contemporary society still isn’t convinced. The Scientific Approach to Evolution provides a rational new perspective on this debate.

Impossible Monsters reveals the central role of dinosaurs and their discovery in toppling traditional religious authority, and in changing perceptions about the Bible, history, and mankind's place in the world.

For millennia plant and animal species have received little sustained attention as subjects of Christian theology and ethics in their own right. Focused on the human dilemma of sin and redemptive grace, theology has considered the doctrine of creation to be mainly an overture to the main drama of human being`s relationship to God. What value does the natural world have within the framework of religious belief?

Adam Decoded involves the listener to participate in solving the age-long question of man's origin. Who are we? Where are we from? Who really were Adam and Eve, and where is the Garden of Eden? This book, the long-awaited sequel to Adam = Alien, helps to decode the past using credible photographic and written texts.

Nature is rife with cheating. Possums play possum, feigning death to cheat predators. Crows cry wolf to scare off rivals. Amphibians and reptiles are inveterate impostors. Even genes and cells cheat. The Liars of Nature and the Nature of Liars explores the evolution of cheating in the natural world, revealing how dishonesty has given rise to wondrous diversity.

What do computers, cells, and brains have in common? Computers are electronic devices designed by humans; cells are biological entities crafted by evolution; brains are the containers and creators of our minds. But all are, in one way or another, information-processing devices. The power of the human brain is, so far, unequaled by any existing machine or known living being. Our brains have even allowed us to develop computers that are almost as powerful as the human brain itself. Arlindo Oliveira describes how advances in science and technology could enable us to create digital minds.

Dive into Evolutionary History, a mesmerizing journey through time, tracing the origins and development of all living beings. From the earliest single-celled organisms to the rise of Homo sapiens, this audiobook unravels the intricate tapestry of evolution with clarity and passion. Explore the wonders of life’s evolution across geological epochs, uncovering the secrets of adaptation, survival, and the remarkable journey of our ancestors.

When did the human species turn against the planet that we depend on for survival? Human industry and consumption of resources have altered the climate, polluted the water and soil, destroyed ecosystems, and rendered many species extinct, vastly increasing the likelihood of an ecological catastrophe. How did humankind come to rule nature to such an extent? To regard the planet's resources and creatures as ours for the taking? To find ourselves on a seemingly relentless path toward ecocide?

Drawing on insights from across the social, behavioral, and natural sciences, Michelle Baddeley explores contexts in which behavior is driven by the herd. She analyzes the rational vs nonrational and cognitive vs emotional forces involved, and she investigates why herding only sometimes works out well. With new perspectives on followers, leaders, and the pros and cons of herd behavior, Baddeley shines vivid light on human behavior in the context of our ever-more-connected world.

In this book, evolutionary psychologist Dennis Krebs explains how virtuous behaviors such as altruism, justice, honesty, loyalty, self-control, purity, and respect for authority, have evolved in humans and other species. He argues that the key to solving puzzles of morality—such as what it is, how we acquire moral traits, why we sometimes behave badly, and how we make moral decisions—lies in figuring out what adaptive functions moral traits served in early human environments and how they are influenced by social learning, culture, and strategic social interactions in the modern world.

Etwas stimmt mit dem Leben nicht. Jeder kennt das Gefühl. Depressionen und Angststörungen grassieren. Krisen, Kriege und Katastrophen dominieren die Nachrichten. Die längste Zeit redete die Kirche uns ein, es läge an der menschlichen Sündhaftigkeit. Heute hält uns eine ganze Ratgeberindustrie auf der Anklagebank und verordnet Selbstoptimierung, Achtsamkeit und Resilienztraining. Höchste Zeit für eine evolutionäre Aufklärung. Wir sind nicht schuld. Wir müssen uns nur endlich selbst verstehen.

KI wird unseren Arbeitsmarkt verändern, doch das ist nicht das Problem: Unser Sozialleben macht uns zum Menschen. Doch wenn unser bester Freund eine KI ist – haben wir dann noch eins? Karsten Brensing wirft einen Blick auf den Einzug von KI in die Mitte unserer Gesellschaft. Die Veränderungen werden vor allem auch unser Sozialleben betreffen. Tierisch glücklich sein in einer komplexen Welt. Trotz seiner mentalen Leistungsfähigkeit und des technischen Fortschritts ist der Mensch im Laufe der Evolution nicht gleichsam zufriedener geworden.

In The Genial Gene, Joan Roughgarden forcefully rejects ideas that have come to dominate the study of animal evolution. Building on her brilliant and innovative book Evolution's Rainbow, in which she challenged accepted wisdom about gender identity and sexual orientation, Roughgarden upends the notion of the selfish gene and the theory of sexual selection and develops a compelling and controversial alternative theory called social selection.