Darwin's Unfinished Symphony: How Culture Made the Human Mind

Darwin's Unfinished Symphony: How Culture Made the Human Mind

by Kevin N. Lala
Darwin's Unfinished Symphony: How Culture Made the Human Mind

Darwin's Unfinished Symphony: How Culture Made the Human Mind

by Kevin N. Lala

Hardcover

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Overview

How culture transformed human evolution

Humans possess an extraordinary capacity for cultural production, from the arts and language to science and technology. How did the human mind—and the uniquely human ability to devise and transmit culture—evolve from its roots in animal behavior? Darwin's Unfinished Symphony presents a captivating new theory of human cognitive evolution. This compelling and accessible book reveals how culture is not just the magnificent end product of an evolutionary process that produced a species unlike all others—it is also the key driving force behind that process.

Kevin N. Lala shows how the learned and socially transmitted activities of our ancestors shaped our intellects through accelerating cycles of evolutionary feedback. The truly unique characteristics of our species—such as our intelligence, language, teaching, and cooperation—are not adaptive responses to predators, disease, or other external conditions. Rather, humans are creatures of their own making. Drawing on his own groundbreaking research, and bringing it to life with vivid natural history, Lala explains how animals imitate, innovate, and have remarkable traditions of their own. He traces our rise from scavenger apes in prehistory to modern humans able to design iPhones, dance the tango, and send astronauts into space.

This book tells the story of the painstaking fieldwork, the key experiments, the false leads, and the stunning scientific breakthroughs that led to this new understanding of how culture transformed human evolution. It is the story of how Darwin's intellectual descendants picked up where he left off and took up the challenge of providing a scientific account of the evolution of the human mind.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780691151182
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Publication date: 03/07/2017
Pages: 464
Product dimensions: 6.40(w) x 9.20(h) x 1.60(d)

About the Author

Kevin N. Lala is professor of behavioral and evolutionary biology at the University of St Andrews. His books include Social Learning: An Introduction to Mechanisms, Methods, and Models and Niche Construction: The Neglected Process in Evolution (both Princeton).

Table of Contents


Foreword ix

Part I: Foundations of Culture

1 Darwin’s Unfinished Symphony 1

2 Ubiquitous Copying 31

3 Why Copy? 50

4 A Tale of Two Fishes 77

5 The Roots of Creativity 99

Part II: The Evolution of the Mind

6 The Evolution of Intelligence 123

7 High Fidelity 150

8 Why We Alone Have Language 175

9 Gene-Culture
Coevolution 208

10 The Dawn of Civilization 234

11 Foundations of Cooperation 264

12 The Arts 283

Epilogue: Awe Without Wonder 315

Notes 323

References 385

Index 443

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Brilliant."—Judy Siegel-Itzkovich, Jerusalem Post

"Truly impressive."—Louise Barrett, author of Beyond the Brain: How Body and Environment Shape Animal and Human Minds

"Darwin would be proud."—Nicola Clayton, University of Cambridge and Scientist in Residence at Rambert, UK

"Darwin’s Unfinished Symphony makes a compelling case that elegantly seats humans within the natural world, while at the same time explaining our peculiar uniqueness."—Joseph Henrich, Science

"Under [Kevin] Lala’s sophisticated interpretation, cultural innovations did not merely respond to environmental challenges but also helped create the elaborate surroundings within which natural selection made us what we are today."—David Barash, Wall Street Journal

"The best account yet. A richly rewarding and powerfully argued book."—Steven Rose, Times Higher Education

"[A]n enjoyable and valuable place to begin or to top up your understanding of our enigmatic existence."—Mark Pagel, New Scientist

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