Applications to Problems in Human Evolution and Prehistory
The field of evolutionary ecology, which applies Darwinian natural selection theory to the study of adaptive design in behavior, morphology, and life history, has produced substantial advances in understanding human evolution and prehistory. Editors Jack Broughton and Michael Cannon have compiled archaeological and paleoanthro- pological studies ......
We have reached a turning point in our development as a species. In the coming decades we face significant global challenges in terms of climate change, biodiversity, food and water resources and violent extremism. At the local level, these seem like crazy times, with the speed of change accelerating faster than ever. In ......
Explores DNA-based evidence of human evolution. This book discusses what DNA analysis reveals about where humans originated. It also confronts the supposed dichotomy between evolution and religion, and argues that both science and religion are complementary ways to seek truth.
Integrating comparative politics and international relations perspectives, this volume provides a critical analysis of the role of international and transnational actors in contemporary democratization processes in the Americas. It covers recent challenges to democracy in Venezuela, Haiti, and Ecuador along with current debates about election ......
Elias is one of the major figures in world sociology and social science. He is unique in having combined in his work the empirical minutiae of social life with theorizing on a grand scale. His work ranges across societies of all types and in all periods and transcends disciplinary boundaries. Among the many original features of his writings is a commitment to sociology as a historical science dealing with long-term developmental processes. His major works include "The Civilizing Process", "The Court Society" and "What Is Sociology?" In "The Symbol Theory" Elias draws together three central themes. At the first level the book is concerned with symbols in relation to language, knowing and thinking. He takes a fresh look at areas of inquiry normally associated with cultural anthropology and semiology. Secondly, Elias stresses that symbols are also tangible sound-patterns of human communication, made possible by the evolutionary biological precondition of the human vocal apparatus. At a third level, the book addresses theoretical issues about the ontological status of knowledge, moving beyond traditional philosophical dualisms such as subject/object and idealism/materialism. By weaving evolutionary biology as a human science into a more broadly conceived sociology, Elias readjusts the traditional boundary between the "Social" and the "Natural". At the same time he demonstrates the potential of sociology as a unifying human science which pulls in data from history, psychology, economics, political science and anthropology.
Focusing on the debate that centres on the teaching of Intelligent Design (ID) versus conventional evolutionary theory, this book contains articles from the proponents of both sides of this issue. It also includes a section on the origins of the debate with excerpts from the writings of Charles Darwin and William Paley.
Recent interest in new diseases, such as HIV/AIDS and Ebola, and the resurgence of older diseases like tuberculosis has fostered questions about the history of human infectious diseases. How did they evolve? Where did they originate? What natural factors have stalled the progression of diseases or made them possible? How does a microorganism ......
Written by Archbishop Jozef Zycinski of Lublin, this book offers an important and insightful examination of the basic philosophical questions involved in the relation between evolutionary theory and the Christian religion. It is made more valuable by its serious study of Pope John Paul II's message about evolution issued in 1996. The book begins ......
In the tradition of G. G. Simpson's classic work, Kenneth D. Rose's The Beginning of the Age of Mammals analyzes the events that occurred directly before and after the mysterious K-T boundary which so quickly thrust mammals from obscurity to planetary dominance. Rose surveys the evolution of mammals, beginning with their origin from cynodont ......
