The Symbolic Species Evolved

Author : Theresa Schilhab
Publisher : Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN 13 : 9400723369
Total Pages : 291 pages
Book Rating : 4.68/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Symbolic Species Evolved written by Theresa Schilhab and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-03-23 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This anthology is a compilation of the best contributions from Symbolic Species Conferences I, II (which took place in 2006, 2007). In 1997 the American anthropologist Terrence Deacon published The Symbolic Species: The Coevolution of Language and the Brain. The book is widely considered a seminal work in the subject of evolutionary cognition. However, Deacons book was the first step – further steps have had to be taken. The proposed anthology is such an important associate. The contributions are written by a wide variety of scholars each with a unique view on evolutionary cognition and the questions raised by Terrence Deacon - emergence in evolution, the origin of language, the semiotic 'missing link', Peirce's semiotics in evolution and biology, biosemiotics, evolutionary cognition, Baldwinian evolution, the neuroscience of linguistic capacities as well as phylogeny of the homo species, primatology, embodied cognition and knowledge types.

Author : Terrence W. Deacon
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN 13 : 0393343022
Total Pages : 532 pages
Book Rating : 4.21/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Symbolic Species: The Co-evolution of Language and the Brain written by Terrence W. Deacon and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 1998-04-17 with total page 532 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A work of enormous breadth, likely to pleasantly surprise both general readers and experts."—New York Times Book Review This revolutionary book provides fresh answers to long-standing questions of human origins and consciousness. Drawing on his breakthrough research in comparative neuroscience, Terrence Deacon offers a wealth of insights into the significance of symbolic thinking: from the co-evolutionary exchange between language and brains over two million years of hominid evolution to the ethical repercussions that followed man's newfound access to other people's thoughts and emotions. Informing these insights is a new understanding of how Darwinian processes underlie the brain's development and function as well as its evolution. In contrast to much contemporary neuroscience that treats the brain as no more or less than a computer, Deacon provides a new clarity of vision into the mechanism of mind. It injects a renewed sense of adventure into the experience of being human.

Author : Theresa Schilhab
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 : 9789400723375
Total Pages : 290 pages
Book Rating : 4.77/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Symbolic Species Evolved written by Theresa Schilhab and published by Springer. This book was released on 2012-03-31 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This anthology is a compilation of the best contributions from Symbolic Species Conferences I, II (which took place in 2006, 2007). In 1997 the American anthropologist Terrence Deacon published The Symbolic Species: The Coevolution of Language and the Brain. The book is widely considered a seminal work in the subject of evolutionary cognition. However, Deacons book was the first step – further steps have had to be taken. The proposed anthology is such an important associate. The contributions are written by a wide variety of scholars each with a unique view on evolutionary cognition and the questions raised by Terrence Deacon - emergence in evolution, the origin of language, the semiotic 'missing link', Peirce's semiotics in evolution and biology, biosemiotics, evolutionary cognition, Baldwinian evolution, the neuroscience of linguistic capacities as well as phylogeny of the homo species, primatology, embodied cognition and knowledge types.

Author : Terrence W. Deacon
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN 13 : 0393049914
Total Pages : 625 pages
Book Rating : 4.16/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Incomplete Nature: How Mind Emerged from Matter written by Terrence W. Deacon and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2012 with total page 625 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the emergent processes that bridge the gap between organisms that think and have consciousness and those that do not and discusses the origins of life, information, and free will.

Author : Eva Jablonka
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262525844
Total Pages : 577 pages
Book Rating : 4.48/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Evolution in Four Dimensions, revised edition written by Eva Jablonka and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2014-03-21 with total page 577 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A pioneering proposal for a pluralistic extension of evolutionary theory, now updated to reflect the most recent research. This new edition of the widely read Evolution in Four Dimensions has been revised to reflect the spate of new discoveries in biology since the book was first published in 2005, offering corrections, an updated bibliography, and a substantial new chapter. Eva Jablonka and Marion Lamb's pioneering argument proposes that there is more to heredity than genes. They describe four “dimensions” in heredity—four inheritance systems that play a role in evolution: genetic, epigenetic (or non-DNA cellular transmission of traits), behavioral, and symbolic (transmission through language and other forms of symbolic communication). These systems, they argue, can all provide variations on which natural selection can act. Jablonka and Lamb present a richer, more complex view of evolution than that offered by the gene-based Modern Synthesis, arguing that induced and acquired changes also play a role. Their lucid and accessible text is accompanied by artist-physician Anna Zeligowski's lively drawings, which humorously and effectively illustrate the authors' points. Each chapter ends with a dialogue in which the authors refine their arguments against the vigorous skepticism of the fictional “I.M.” (for Ipcha Mistabra—Aramaic for “the opposite conjecture”). The extensive new chapter, presented engagingly as a dialogue with I.M., updates the information on each of the four dimensions—with special attention to the epigenetic, where there has been an explosion of new research. Praise for the first edition “With courage and verve, and in a style accessible to general readers, Jablonka and Lamb lay out some of the exciting new pathways of Darwinian evolution that have been uncovered by contemporary research.” —Evelyn Fox Keller, MIT, author of Making Sense of Life: Explaining Biological Development with Models, Metaphors, and Machines “In their beautifully written and impressively argued new book, Jablonka and Lamb show that the evidence from more than fifty years of molecular, behavioral and linguistic studies forces us to reevaluate our inherited understanding of evolution.” —Oren Harman, The New Republic “It is not only an enjoyable read, replete with ideas and facts of interest but it does the most valuable thing a book can do—it makes you think and reexamine your premises and long-held conclusions.” —Adam Wilkins, BioEssays

Author : Donald Loritz
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0190287985
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.86/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book How the Brain Evolved Language written by Donald Loritz and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2002-02-28 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How can an infinite number of sentences be generated from one human mind? How did language evolve in apes? In this book Donald Loritz addresses these and other fundamental and vexing questions about language, cognition, and the human brain. He starts by tracing how evolution and natural adaptation selected certain features of the brain to perform communication functions, then shows how those features developed into designs for human language. The result -- what Loritz calls an adaptive grammar -- gives a unified explanation of language in the brain and contradicts directly (and controversially) the theory of innateness proposed by, among others, Chomsky and Pinker.

Author : Jonathan Bard
Publisher : CRC Press
ISBN 13 : 1000483215
Total Pages : 534 pages
Book Rating : 4.15/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Evolution written by Jonathan Bard and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2021-12-31 with total page 534 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Evolution is the single unifying principle of biology and core to everything in the life sciences. More than a century of work by scientists from across the biological spectrum has produced a detailed history of life across the phyla and explained the mechanisms by which new species form. This textbook covers both this history and the mechanisms of speciation; it also aims to provide students with the background needed to read the research literature on evolution. Students will therefore learn about cladistics, molecular phylogenies, the molecular-genetical basis of evolutionary change including the important role of protein networks, symbionts and holobionts, together with the core principles of developmental biology. The book also includes introductory appendices that provide background knowledge on, for example, the diversity of life today, fossils, the geology of Earth and the history of evolutionary thought. Key Features Summarizes the origins of life and the evolution of the eukaryotic cell and of Urbilateria, the last common ancestor of invertebrates and vertebrates. Reviews the history of life across the phyla based on the fossil record and computational phylogenetics. Explains evo-devo and the generation of anatomical novelties. Illustrates the roles of small populations, genetic drift, mutation and selection in speciation. Documents human evolution using the fossil record and evidence of dispersal across the world leading to the emergence of modern humans.

Author : Brian Thomas Swimme
Publisher : Yale University Press
ISBN 13 : 0300171900
Total Pages : 191 pages
Book Rating : 4.07/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Journey of the Universe written by Brian Thomas Swimme and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2011-06-28 with total page 191 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The authors tell the epic story of the universe from an inspired new perspective, weaving the findings of modern science together with enduring wisdom found in the humanistic traditions of the West, China, India, and indigenous peoples. This book is part of a larger project that includes a documentary film, educational DVD series, and Web site.

Author : Denise D. Cummins
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 9780195110531
Total Pages : 284 pages
Book Rating : 4.36/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Evolution of Mind written by Denise D. Cummins and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1998 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Evolution of Mind, outstanding figures on the cutting edge of evolutionary psychology follow clues provided by current neuroscientific evidence to illuminate many puzzling questions of human cognitive evolution. With contributions from psychologists, ethologists, anthropologists, and philosophers, the book offers a broad range of approaches to explore the mysteries of the mind's evolution - from investigating the biological functions of human cognition to drawing comparisons between human and animal cognitive abilities.

Author : Guy Deutscher
Publisher : Metropolitan Books
ISBN 13 : 1466837837
Total Pages : 372 pages
Book Rating : 4.36/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Unfolding of Language written by Guy Deutscher and published by Metropolitan Books. This book was released on 2006-05-02 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Blending the spirit of Eats, Shoots & Leaves with the science of The Language Instinct, an original inquiry into the development of that most essential-and mysterious-of human creations: Language "Language is mankind's greatest invention-except, of course, that it was never invented." So begins linguist Guy Deutscher's enthralling investigation into the genesis and evolution of language. If we started off with rudimentary utterances on the level of "man throw spear," how did we end up with sophisticated grammars, enormous vocabularies, and intricately nuanced degrees of meaning? Drawing on recent groundbreaking discoveries in modern linguistics, Deutscher exposes the elusive forces of creation at work in human communication, giving us fresh insight into how language emerges, evolves, and decays. He traces the evolution of linguistic complexity from an early "Me Tarzan" stage to such elaborate single-word constructions as the Turkish sehirlilestiremediklerimizdensiniz ("you are one of those whom we couldn't turn into a town dweller"). Arguing that destruction and creation in language are intimately entwined, Deutscher shows how these processes are continuously in operation, generating new words, new structures, and new meanings. As entertaining as it is erudite, The Unfolding of Language moves nimbly from ancient Babylonian to American idiom, from the central role of metaphor to the staggering triumph of design that is the Semitic verb, to tell the dramatic story and explain the genius behind a uniquely human faculty.