Dreams, "Evolution" and Value Fulfillment, Vol. 2: A Seth Book

Customer Reviews:

Very advanced and sometimes abstract Seth knowledge.......1998-05-27

Where do we come from and why are we here. This book deals with the origin of mankind and the creation of this world in dreams. I'd not recommend it if you do not know other Seth books, and also not if you are looking of ways of how to improve your life situation (get Nature of Personal Reality in that case). However, it's excellent if you enjoyed Seth Speaks and Unknown Reality.

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One of the important books no one reads
OK but who's going to read this ?
New ways of thinking about Biology
jump starting a revolutiion
Developmental plasticity and evolution

Developmental Plasticity and Evolution
Mary Jane West-Eberhard
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0195122356

Book Description

The first comprehensive synthesis on development and evolution: it applies to all aspects of development, at all levels of organization and in all organisms, taking advantage of modern findings on behavior, genetics, endocrinology, molecular biology, evolutionary theory and phylogenetics to show the connections between developmental mechanisms and evolutionary change. This book solves key problems that have impeded a definitive synthesis in the past. It uses new concepts and specific examples to show how to relate environmentally sensitive development to the genetic theory of adaptive evolution and to explain major patterns of change. In this book development includes not only embryology and the ontogeny of morphology, sometimes portrayed inadequately as governed by "regulatory genes," but also behavioral development and physiological adaptation, where plasticity is mediated by genetically complex mechanisms like hormones and learning. The book shows how the universal qualities of phenotypes--modular organization and plasticity--facilitate both integration and change. Here you will learn why it is wrong to describe organisms as genetically programmed; why environmental induction is likely to be more important in evolution than random mutation; and why it is crucial to consider both selection and developmental mechanism in explanations of adaptive evolution. This book satisfies the need for a truly general book on development, plasticity and evolution that applies to living organisms in all of their life stages and environments. Using an immense compendium of examples on many kinds of organisms, from viruses and bacteria to higher plants and animals, it shows how the phenotype is reorganized during evolution to produce novelties, and how alternative phenotypes occupy a pivotal role as a phase of evolution that fosters diversification and speeds change. The arguments of this book call for a new view of the major themes of evolutionary biology, as shown in chapters on gradualism, homology, environmental induction, speciation, radiation, macroevolution, punctuation, and the maintenance of sex. No other treatment of development and evolution since Darwin's offers such a comprehensive and critical discussion of the relevant issues. Developmental Plasticity and Evolution is designed for biologists interested in the development and evolution of behavior, life-history patterns, ecology, physiology, morphology and speciation. It will also appeal to evolutionary paleontologists, anthropologists, psychologists, and teachers of general biology.

Customer Reviews:

One of the important books no one reads.......2007-03-17

There seems to be a consensus in evolutionary biology that this is an important book representing a major advance in our understanding. However, most of the biologists saying this haven't read the book; or have, perhaps, skimmed a chapter or two. The reason for this is simple: this book is far too long, far too dense, and far too abstruse. There is a lot of potential here; rewritten as a 150-200 page book with a good editor, it could have been an excellent and influential book. At 640 pages of text with constant grammatical & spelling errors (Lamarck only has his "c" about half the time) and writing that is, even by academic standards, hopelessly tangled, this is bound to be only an excellent decoration for the academic bookshelf.

Nonetheless, for those willing to take the long slog through there really is a lot of value here. There are just so many more enjoyable ways to spend one's time...

OK but who's going to read this ?.......2006-07-29

I have a PhD in biochemistry (meaning I can understand a reasonable amount of jargon) and hoped that with this book I'd be able to understand what modern developmental biology (in particular developmental genetics, "evo-devo", etc.) is about, but this book bored me to death. There is no continuum, no logical progression in the teaching. When you reach the end of a chapter you've forgotten what it was about. I admire the central concept and the work but, frankly, as a book it's completely missed. It is not a textbook, it is not a popularization book, it's a 600+pages small print dissertation. Who wants to read that ? Who has the time to go to the library and check the details of any of the hundreds of referenced articles (all of them are treated only superficially) ? Not students, not professional scientists (their time would be better spent reading review articles), not laypersons. Who then ?

New ways of thinking about Biology.......2006-03-09

I think that Mary Jane West-Eberhard is trying to formulate a new Shyntesis in Biology, she is trying to include Development in Neo-Darwinism. Her book makes the difference in the role that gives to phenotype, every biologist needs to read it to express his/her own opinions. Really deserves to be read.

jump starting a revolutiion.......2006-01-04

Darwin developed his theory of evolution without knowing much about the mechanisms of heredity. These mechanisms were rediscovered in the 1900's as part of the science of genetics. By the 1930's a school of evolutionary thinkers came to the realization that Darwin's theory could be further developed by recasting it in terms of population genetics. The resulting synthetic theory of evolution has ruled mainstream biology ever since. But genetics has not stood still in the meantime. The rise of molecular biology has made possible a new discipline, evo-devo which seeks to explain how the genes control development. Evo-devo has developed a new approach to evolution. While the synthetic theory tended to see evolution as a matter of the loss of old genes within a population or the fixation of new ones, evo-devo has found that large parts of the genome are conserved over vast periods of time and shared by widely divergent phyla. Evolution has produced diversity by modifying the mechanisms which control the expression of these ancient genes. New ideas are now required to explain how this kind of diversity evolves. West-Eberhard proposes that genetic control mechanisms can be exposed to selection by the phenotypic adaptation of organisms to new kinds of environmemt. This phenotypic adaptation ultimately drives evolution. The germ of this idea had been put forward by J. Baldwim more than one hundred years ago but neither Baldwin or anybody else knew about evo-devo and the idea had little influence. Now its time may have come.

Developmental plasticity and evolution.......2005-06-15

Being unfamilar with the jargon of her field, I had difficulty in following her arguments. Exacerbating the problem was scholarly syntax that packed sentences with so many clauses that I had to parce them to locate subjects and verbs.

From what I could glean from graphics and summaries, she has made a major contribution to our understanding of the process of evolution. A follow-up book on 'evolution for dummies' should enhance the public's understanding of evolution.

Performance and Evolution in the Age of Darwin: Out of the Natural Order

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Performance and Evolution in the Age of Darwin: Out of the Natural Order
Jane Goodall
Manufacturer: Routledge
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0415243777

Book Description

Performance and Evolution in the Age of Darwin reveals the ways in which the major themes of evolution wre taken up in the performing arts during Darwin's adult lifetime and in the generation after his death.
The period 1830-1900 was the formative period for evolutionary ideas. While scientists and theorists investigated the law and order of nature, show business was more concerned with what was out of the natural order. Missing links and throwbacks, freak taxonomies and exotic races were favorite subject matter for the burgeoning variety theatre movement. Focusing on popular theatre forms in London, New York and Paris, Jane Goodall shows how they were interwoven with the developing debate about human evolution.
With this book, Goodall contributes an important new angle to the debates surrounding the history of evolution. She reveals that, far from creating widespread culture shock, Darwinian theory tapped into some of the long-standing themes of popular performance and was a source for diverse and sometimes hilarious explorations.

From Embryology to Evo-Devo: A History of Developmental Evolution (Dibner Institute Studies in the History of Science and Technology)

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From Embryology to Evo-Devo: A History of Developmental Evolution (Dibner Institute Studies in the History of Science and Technology)

Manufacturer: The MIT Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0262122839

Book Description

Although we now know that ontogeny (individual development) does not actually recapitulate phylogeny (evolutionary transformation), contrary to Ernst Haeckel's famous dictum, the relationship between embryological development and evolution remains the subject of intense scientific interest. In the 1990s a new field, evolutionary developmental biology (or Evo-Devo), was hailed as the synthesis of developmental and evolutionary biology. In From Embryology to Evo-Devo, historians, philosophers, sociologists, and biologists offer diverse perspectives on the history of efforts to understand the links between development and evolution.

After examining events in the history of early twentieth-century embryology and developmental genetics--including the fate of Haeckel's law and its various reformulations, the ideas of William Bateson, and Richard Goldschmidt's idiosyncratic synthesis of ontogeny and phylogeny--the contributors explore additional topics ranging from the history of comparative embryology in America to a philosophical-historical analysis of different research styles. Finally, three major figures in theoretical biology--Brian Hall, Gerd Müller, and Günter Wagner--reflect on the past and future of Evo-Devo, particularly on the interdisciplinary nature of the field. The sum is an exciting interdisciplinary exploration of developmental evolution.

Contributors:
Garland Allen, Fred Churchill, Elihu Gerson, Scott Gilbert, James Griesemer, Brian K. Hall, Manfred D. Laubichler, Alan C. Love, Jane Maienschein, Gerd B. Müller, Stuart A. Newman, Marsha L. Richmond, Günter P. Wagner, William C. Wimsatt, and John Wourms

Dreams, "Evolution," and Value Fulfillment, Vol. 1: A Seth Book

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Darwin had it wrong, and the Creationists also have it wrong
Too much verbiage that isn't Seth
Dreams, 'Evolution', and Value Fulfillment: A Seth Book
Seth's masterwork
Very advanced and theoretical Seth material

Dreams, "Evolution," and Value Fulfillment, Vol. 1: A Seth Book
Jane Roberts
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 013219452X

Customer Reviews:

Darwin had it wrong, and the Creationists also have it wrong.......2005-09-01

Well, perhaps "wrong" is too strong a word, since there are truths embedded in each of the belief systems (or theories, if you'd like). But Seth's more all-encompassing explanation -- best read if you've started out with other Seth books first like "Seth Speaks" -- is shattering in its implications. Once you get your mind around the entire framework of it, it's also absolutely the most logical explanation, too, in my opinion.

Both Darwin and the literal Bible interpreters (Creationists) were/are working through a set of filters and by default, a more limited awareness of the true nature of reality. Seth's explanation, even if you don't buy into it 100% on the first read, is nonetheless extremely fascinating.

Also a comment on the excess verbiage by Robert Butts: Yes, sometimes he goes on too long with details such as, "Jane woke from trance a bit groggy." But all of Butts' comments are in italics, and I've learned from reading the other Seth books to just fast-forward over the italics. It's not that big of a deal once you program yourself to do that.

Too much verbiage that isn't Seth.......2003-08-30

All the Seth books are worthwhile, arguably profound and life-changing, and this is no exception. At times Seth takes wing and, as usual, presents very original arguments ...at times with a concision and eloquence that itself suggests that Seth is an essence from another dimension (as he says he is). But the book suffers from too much comment (in footnotes and an epistle of an introduction) by Robert Butts, the husband of Jane Roberts and the person who actually produced the text dictated by Jane. Robert Butts seems not to realise that what he has to say is infinitely inferior to what Seth says...and yet Butts goes on at far too great length. Stick to Seth if you want the essence of these books.

Dreams, 'Evolution', and Value Fulfillment: A Seth Book.......2002-10-14

Having read hundreds of books on the qualities of consciousness, there are NONE superior to Seth's. My first book on the subject back in the 1970's was Seth and still, though many are fabulous, none compare to the DEPTH of Seth.

Seth's masterwork.......1999-06-02

Seth at one point referred to this book as his masterpeice, the one that all of the others have been building up to. The concepts that he tries to get across here are actually pretty simple once you get your mind to thinking that way--it's a way of viewing oneself, the planet, and the interconnectedness of all relationships (sentiant and otherwise). All of his books are profound, so it would be redundant to say this one is too (but it is). A story within the book is Jane's rapid and dramatic physical deterioration, and Seth's dictation at times takes a back seat to Rob's records of her physical and mental state, and his notes about Three Mile Island and the Iran hostage crisis. When I reread, I will probably skip the notes and just read the dictation, if only to get a clearer flow.

Very advanced and theoretical Seth material.......1998-05-27

The Alfred Russel Wallace Reader: A Selection of Writings from the Field (Center Books in Natural History)

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Historic Justice for A.R. Wallace
a Wallace reader for the layperson

The Alfred Russel Wallace Reader: A Selection of Writings from the Field (Center Books in Natural History)

Manufacturer: The Johns Hopkins University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0801867894

Book Description

Long overshadowed by his contemporaries Charles Darwin and Thomas H. Huxley, Alfred Russel Wallace was an English naturalist and pioneer evolutionist who researched biological diversity through extensive exploration and travel. Independent of Darwin, Wallace developed a theory of evolution through natural selection, which ultimately spurred Darwin to complete and publish his own Origin of Species. Famous for drawing "Wallace's Line," the boundary line separating the Asian and Australian zoological regions, Wallace's studies of the distribution of plants and animals pioneered an evolutionary approach to global and island biogeography. The Alfred Russel Wallace Reader: A Selection of Writings from the Field is the first book to reintroduce Wallace to a general readership beyond the cadre of scientists and historians familiar with his work.

Customer Reviews:

Historic Justice for A.R. Wallace.......2002-05-21

Jane Camerini has performed a great service to all who are
interested in evolutionary theory. Wallace deserves to be
regarded as the co-founder of the modern theory of evolution.
He also wrote on a wide range of scientific and social topics.
Camerini's introductory remarks to each of the essays in this
collection help put them in their context.

a Wallace reader for the layperson.......2002-03-05

Jane Camerini's slender anthology of Wallace's writings (and writings about him) is intended to provide an introduction to the great naturalist, primarily through his adventures in the field. Camerini has chosen a format for presenting this information very similar to that provided by another Wallace scholar, Barbara Beddall, whose "Wallace and Bates in the Tropics" was published way back in 1969. Camerini supplements excerpts from four books with her own introductory commentaries and a few additional Wallace essays, hoping that this will give the reader unfamiliar with his accomplishments some feel for them. I think she succeeds in this endeavor. The book is well organized and presented, including a number of interesting photos and figures, and Camerini's editorial commentaries are mostly right on target. Yet I cannot help but feel the brevity of the treatment will leave some readers puzzled. I'm not sure that the decision to include several essays of a more technical nature in a 200 page work was well advised; the gap between the fieldwork studies and Wallace's thought is considerable--not unfathomable, but not straightforward either--and the average reader may need more help than Camerini gives to appreciate the transition. Alternately, it might have been interesting to dwell strictly on the field studies--incorporating a greater diversity of excerpts--and then merely to refer to his future philosophical directions in a page or two of editorial comment at the end. Still, an interesting contribution to Wallace studies, and one which is likely to both complement and not duplicate the several others that will be appearing over the next months.

The Panda's Black Box: Opening up the Intelligent Design Controversy

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Uneven and frankly a little whiny.

The Panda's Black Box: Opening up the Intelligent Design Controversy
Scott Gilbert , Edward J. Larson , Jane Maienschein , Michael Ruse , and Robert M. Young
Manufacturer: The Johns Hopkins University Press
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 080188599X

Book Description

The debate over Intelligent Design seemingly represents an extension of the fundamental conflict between creationists and evolutionists. ID proponents, drawing on texts such as Darwin's Black Box and Of Pandas and People, urge schools to "teach the controversy" in biology class alongside evolution. The scientific mainstream has reacted with fury, branding Intelligent Design as pseudoscience and its advocates as religious fanatics.

But stridency misses the point, argues Nathaniel Comfort. In The Panda's Black Box, Comfort joins five other leading public intellectuals -- including Daniel Kevles and Pulitzer Prize winner Edward Larson -- to explain the roots of the controversy and explore the intellectual, social, and cultural factors that continue to shape it.

One of the few books on the ID issue that moves beyond mere name-calling and finger-pointing, The Panda's Black Box challenges assumptions on each side of the debate and engages both the appeal and dangers of Intelligent Design. This lively collection will appeal to anyone seeking a deeper understanding of what's really at stake in the debate over evolution.

Customer Reviews:

Uneven and frankly a little whiny........2007-08-20

My fault, maybe, for expecting something different. I am not used to reading books from biolgists and other scientists that seem so willing to give quarter to religious thinking. This is not a creationist tome by any stretch, but to pretend that our best scientific theories can in any way be reconciled with revealed religion is to perpetuate dangerously flawed and delusional thinking. Some of the information in "Panda's Box" is provocative and worthy of wider discussion, but my overall impression was disappointment that it was not made of sturdier stuff. This is not a time for science to compromise with superstitions...there's too much at stake.

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The evolution of obsession, the devolution of friendship.
The Necessity of Friendship
Well-written fable
Evolution of the Novel
provocative and quite interesting....deeper than most!

The Evolution Of Jane
Cathleen Schine
Manufacturer: Plume / Penguin Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: B000HWYJ94

Amazon.com

It is a truth universally acknowledged that when a Cathleen Schine heroine goes off in search of her origins, she's likely to travel farther than most--and bound to come up against more than the average obstacle. Jane Barlow Schwartz, for instance, heads not for her New England childhood home but for the consolations of the Galapagos Islands. "You're searching for your roots," her father quips. "On a dormant volcano?" And this is only one of the thousands of witticisms on offer in Cathleen Schine's novel of lost friendship, the perplexing power of the family feud, and more than one shipboard mystery. When Jane, 25 and a brand-new divorcée, arrives in Ecuador for her ecological tour, she instantly recognizes the guide as her relative and childhood best friend. Martha, the cousin in question, however, takes several beats longer--a clear signal that both still have some evolving to do. As Jane quickly reveals, Martha was the real grand passion in her life, and now she's determined to get to the bottom of her idol's disenchantment, not to mention explore the evolutionary value of friendship. Charles Darwin is definitely much in evidence in The Evolution of Jane, and Schine has some serious fun with Jane's confusion when it comes to species survival. But her fifth novel is also filled with some provocative, perfectly timed aperçus on natural, romantic, and most definitely familial selection. --Kerry Fried

Book Description

From the bestselling author of The Love Letter, comes a playful and evocative exploration of the nature of friendship

"Classy, intelligent fun." --People

Six hundred miles off the Ecuadoran mainland, just south of the equator, the Galpagos Islands are home to diverse species of exotic wildlife--and tourists of every stripe and feather. It is here that Jane Barlow Schwartz embarks on a quest as urgent as Charles Darwin's one hundred and fifty years before: to find out why her childhood friendship with her cousin and soul-mate Martha ended; and what unknown event, family feud, or unintended slight caused the happiest part of her life to become extinct. Along the way, amid blue-footed boobies, red-lipped batfish, and various species mating, squabbling, separating, and coming together again, Jane ponders the origin of her own colorful and peculiar heritage, a secret history of natural selection, and the flawed and fascinating evolutionary process that makes us all who we are.

Praise for The Evolution of Jane

"A tour de force . . . witty. Consistently amusing and provocative . . . a great pleasure to read."--The New York Times

"We should rejoice in a rare novel like The Evolution of Jane. A beautifully descriptive travelogue of the Galpagos . . . wrapped around a rollicking family saga tinged with hints of sexual intrigue. Three cheers."--Barbara Kingsolver, The New York Times Book Review

"Hilariously rendered. In her smart, funny, and moving book, Schine weaves a tight bond between natural processes and human love, and reveals to us the spiritual metamorphosis that is life itself."--San Diego Union-Tribune

Customer Reviews:

The evolution of obsession, the devolution of friendship........2007-05-17

The book centers on two cousins and childhood friends, Jane and Martha Barlow. These two become fast friends as they grow up together--almost literally, their houses are next to one another in a very small town-- in New England despite an obvious rift of significant proportions between the adults on the scene. The book opens with Jane comparing her recent divorce to her loss of her childhood friend Martha, from whom she has heard nothing for many years.

As a consolatory diversion Jane's parents send her off to the Galapagos on tour to take her mind off the divorce--though Jane is hardly torn asunder by the occurrence--only to find that Martha is the guide on the tour.

The story revolves around Jane's efforts to decipher the nature of the family feud, decipher the reasons for her split from Martha, and decipher the inner workings of Darwin's epoch theory. Intertwining these three strands of story line deftly we see the evolution of the feud and the devolution of the friendship as well as examine--through Jane's discourse of her cabin mate on the journey--the aspects of inner obsession that drive both circumstances.

Witty in a dry and droll manner, this is an exquisitely crafted story that deftly intertwines various aspects of both Darwin's life and philosophy to drive home the obsession Jane has with her circumstances.

All in all a most enjoyable read.

The Necessity of Friendship.......2001-01-29

I was surprised by some of the negative reviews Cathleen Schine's new book had the misfortune to garner. I enjoyed _The Love Letter_ very much and found _The Evolution of Jane_ to be a further evolution of the author's skill and talent. Jane's parents treat her to a trip to the Galapagos islands after her divorce is finalized. Rather than escaping from one failed relationship she is faced with another--her best friend from childhood, Martha, picks Jane and her group up at the airport and announces that she will be their tour guide. Here, where the whole concept of evolution began, Jane faces a more difficult puzzle than why "a husky is not the same species as a wolf but is the same species as a Pekingese"--why her relationship with Martha ended. It goes into a complex discussion on the nature of friendship, whether it is necessary to the human species and if it is why did Martha forget her? Jane's whininess is amusing and any one who likes Darwin will like the description of the Galapagos. A more-than-enjoyable read!

Well-written fable.......2000-11-06

"The Evolution of Jane" is a novel that is at times brilliant, at times maddeningly pedestrian. The premise, of twentysomething Jane Schwartz's trip to the Galapogos after a divorce, is at once fascinating and flawed. While on the trip, Jane muses on her lost friendship with her cousin and soul mate,Martha, who just happens to be the tour guide on the trip through the Galapogos. The novel weaves back and forward between Jane and Martha's childhood in Connecticut, and their present trip together.

One of the problems with the novel is the narrator's voice. We are supposed to believe she and her cousin are currently in their mid-twenties, but I think their thoughts, behavior and values seem better aligned with characters twice that age.

Another problem is the character of Martha, who is vaguely drawn at best. Is she self-absorbed, elusive, narcissistic? We see so little of her, and yet the novel hinges on questions of her character. We are left to believe Jane's conclusion that Martha was not the friend Jane thought she was. But is this true? The ending was too vague for my taste.

The novel shines, though, when the author draw parallels between the evolution of the species and the evolution of families and individuals. I'm sure I'm not the only one who was inspired to hit the Natural History museum and to call my travel agent after reading about Jane's travels in the islands of Darwin's discoveries.

Evolution of the Novel.......2000-10-03

My book group read this book and will meet next week to discuss it. I found it to be a welcomed break-away from a conventional novel. The balance of Non-fiction/fiction was superbly crafted. Ms Shine's wit and wisdom is both provocative and entertaining. Don't we all know a Jane somewhere? Or perhaps have a little of Jane's quirky narcisism lurking in ourselves that we cringe to acknowledge? I would venture that it's this dark truth, along with the risk-taking departure from conventional format, that readers find disturbing. But if you shake off preconception, it's a terrific read. Bravo!

provocative and quite interesting....deeper than most!.......2000-09-22

I'm quite surprised by the number of negative reviews of this book, but I quite frankly found it very interesting. Jane, who is recently divorced, goes on a trip to the Galapagos where she finds that the tour guide is her distant cousin/estranged best friend from childhood. What follows is a convoluted tale of relationships, the evolution of friendship, species and families. For those who have developed a blind-sided aversion to Darwin and the theory of evolution, this is probably too much to take, but for those who enjoy the process of scientific thought and analysis and spoofs thereof, this book is a treat. But then, as a scientist by choice and vocation, I'm probably biased (grin).

Great Apes and Humans: The Ethics of Coexistence

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Great Apes and Humans: The Ethics of Coexistence
Benjamin B. Beck , Arnold Arluke , Elizabeth F. Stevens , and Jane Goodall
Manufacturer: Smithsonian
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1560989696

Book Description

The close relation of apes to humans raises important ethical questions. Are they better protected in the wild or in zoos? Should they be used in biomedical research? Should they be afforded the same legal protections as humans? In Great Apes and Humans, field biologists, academic scientists, zoo professionals, psychologists, sociologists, ethicists, and legal scholars come together to present a spectrum of viewpoints on human responsibilities toward great apes united by concern for their safety and well-being.

EVOLUTION & ECOLOGY: Essays on Social Transformation

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An excellent retrospective of Steward's work.

EVOLUTION & ECOLOGY: Essays on Social Transformation
Julian H Steward , Jane C Steward , and Robert F Murphy
Manufacturer: University of Illinois Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0252007093

Customer Reviews:

An excellent retrospective of Steward's work........1999-12-11

Largely regarded as the founder of Cultural Ecology, Julian Steward's theory strived to bridge the gap between human cultural adaptations and the physical environment. His "Essays on Social Transformation" are an essential addition to any social science library, and an intellectual touchstone for those interested in human adaptation. The editor, himself a student of Steward's, provides an insightful introduction to both Steward's life and ethnographic research, while allowing the greater corpus of the text to "speak for itself." The compilation of these essays was also aided by Steward's wife, in mindful appreciation of his work.

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