Facts101 is your complete guide to Anthropology, What Does It Mean to Be Human?. In this book, you will learn topics such as What Can Evolutionary Theory Tell Us about Human Variation, What Can the Study of Primates Tell Us about Human Beings, What Can the Fossil Record Tell Us about Human origins, and How Do We Know about the Human Past plus much more. With key features such as key terms, people and places, Facts101 gives you all the information you need to prepare for your next exam. Our practice tests are specific to the textbook and we have designed tools to make the most of your limited study time.
Author: Steven Pinker
Publisher: S. Fischer Verlag
Release Date: 2017-11-23
Genre: Social Science
Mit einem aktuellen Vorwort zur Neuausgabe! Auf John Locke geht die Vorstellung zurück, der Mensch sei ein leeres Blatt, auf dem im Verlauf des Lebens die persönlichen Erfahrungen eingetragen werden. In seinem mittlerweile klassischen Buch »Das unbeschriebene Blatt. Die moderne Leugnung der menschlichen Natur« bezieht Bestseller-Autor Steven Pinker ganz die Gegenposition: Mit Witz, Brillanz und Gelehrsamkeit analysiert er die Geschichte dieser Idee und zeigt, wie falsch sie ist – mit allen kruden Auswirkungen auf Vorstellungen von Sexualität, Rasse, Kindererziehung, Intelligenz usw. Die Rolle der Gene wird systematisch unterschätzt; aber das bedeutet nicht, dass wir ihnen völlig ausgeliefert sind. Pinker zeigt nämlich auch, wie befreiend diese Sichtweise sein kann. Ein unterhaltsames und anschauliches Buch zur Natur des Menschen, ein echter Lesegenuss.
Author: Yuval Noah Harari
Release Date: 2013-09-02
Krone der Schöpfung? Vor 100 000 Jahren war der Homo sapiens noch ein unbedeutendes Tier, das unauffällig in einem abgelegenen Winkel des afrikanischen Kontinents lebte. Unsere Vorfahren teilten sich den Planeten mit mindestens fünf weiteren menschlichen Spezies, und die Rolle, die sie im Ökosystem spielten, war nicht größer als die von Gorillas, Libellen oder Quallen. Vor 70 000 Jahren dann vollzog sich ein mysteriöser und rascher Wandel mit dem Homo sapiens, und es war vor allem die Beschaffenheit seines Gehirns, die ihn zum Herren des Planeten und zum Schrecken des Ökosystems werden ließ. Bis heute hat sich diese Vorherrschaft stetig zugespitzt: Der Mensch hat die Fähigkeit zu schöpferischem und zu zerstörerischem Handeln wie kein anderes Lebewesen. Anschaulich, unterhaltsam und stellenweise hochkomisch zeichnet Yuval Harari die Geschichte des Menschen nach und zeigt alle großen, aber auch alle ambivalenten Momente unserer Menschwerdung.
Author: Richard Potts
Publisher: National Geographic Books
Release Date: 2010
This generously illustrated book tells the story of the human family, showing how our species’ physical traits and behaviors evolved over millions of years as our ancestors adapted to dramatic environmental changes. In What Does It Means to Be Human? Rick Potts, director of the Smithsonian’s Human Origins Program, and Chris Sloan, National Geographic’s paleoanthropolgy expert, delve into our distant past to explain when, why, and how we acquired the unique biological and cultural qualities that govern our most fundamental connections and interactions with other people and with the natural world. Drawing on the latest research, they conclude that we are the last survivors of a once-diverse family tree, and that our evolution was shaped by one of the most unstable eras in Earth’s environmental history. The book presents a wealth of attractive new material especially developed for the Hall’s displays, from life-like reconstructions of our ancestors sculpted by the acclaimed John Gurche to photographs from National Geographic and Smithsonian archives, along with informative graphics and illustrations. In coordination with the exhibit opening, the PBS program NOVA will present a related three-part television series, and the museum will launch a website expected to draw 40 million visitors.
Author: Thomas R. Cole
Publisher: Duke University Press
Release Date: 1987-08-01
Genre: Social Science
In What Does It Mean to Grow Old? essayists come to grips as best they can with the phenomenon of an America that is about to become the Old Country. They have been drawn from every relevant discipline—gerontology, social medicine, politics, health, anthropology, ethics, law—and asked to speak their mind. Most of them write extremely well [and their] sharply individual voices are heard.
What does it mean to be human and to be made in the image of God? What does it mean to be a 'person'? What constitutes a human person? What does it mean to affirm that humans are free beings? And, what is gender? Marc Cortez guides the reader through the most challenging issues that face anyone attempting to deal with the subject of theological anthropology. Consequently, it addresses complexities surrounding such questions as: Each chapter explains first both why the question under consideration is important for theological anthropology and why it is also a contentious issue within the field. After this, each chapter surveys and concisely explains the main options that have been generated for resolving that particular question. Finally the author presents to the reader one way of working through the complexity. These closing sections are presented as case studies in how to work through the problems and arrive at a conclusion than as definitive answers. Nonetheless, they offer a convincing way of answering the questions raised by each chapter.
The German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously defined anthropology as the study of what it means to be a human being. Following in his footsteps "Anthropology and the Human Subject" provides a critical, comprehensive and wide-ranging investigation of conceptions of the human subject within the Western intellectual tradition, focusing specifically on the secular trends of the twentieth century. Encyclopaedic in scope, lucidly and engagingly written, the book covers the man and varied currents of thought within this tradition. Each chapter deals with a specific intellectual paradigm, ranging from Marx's historical materialism and Darwin's evolutionary naturalism, and their various off shoots, through to those currents of though that were prominent in the late twentieth century, such as, for example, existentialism, hermeneutics, phenomenology and poststructuralism. With respect to each current of thought a focus is placed on their main exemplars, outlining their biographical context, their mode of social analysis, and the "ontology of the subject" that emerges from their key texts. The book will appeal not only to anthropologists but to students and scholars within the human sciences and philosophy, as well as to any person interested in the question: What does it mean to be human? "Ambitions in scope and encyclopaedic in execution...his style is always lucid. He makes difficult work accessible. His prose conveys the unmistakable impression of a superb and meticulous lecturer at work." Anthony P Cohen Journal Royal Anthropological Institute "There is a very little I can add to the outstanding criticism Brian Morris levels at deep ecology...Insightful as well as incisive...I have found his writings an educational experience." Murray Bookchin Institute of Social Ecology
Author: Todd A. Salzman
Publisher: Georgetown University Press
Release Date: 2008-05-21
Two principles capture the essence of the official Catholic position on the morality of sexuality: first, that any human genital act must occur within the framework of heterosexual marriage; second, each and every marriage act must remain open to the transmission of life. In this comprehensive overview of Catholicism and sexuality, theologians Todd A. Salzman and Michael G. Lawler examine and challenge these principles. Remaining firmly within the Catholic tradition, they contend that the church is being inconsistent in its teaching by adopting a dynamic, historically conscious anthropology and worldview on social ethics and the interpretation of scripture while adopting a static, classicist anthropology and worldview on sexual ethics. While some documents from Vatican II, like Gaudium et spes ("the marital act promotes self-giving by which spouses enrich each other"), gave hope for a renewed understanding of sexuality, the church has not carried out the full implications of this approach. In short, say Salzman and Lawler: emphasize relationships, not acts, and recognize Christianity's historically and culturally conditioned understanding of human sexuality. The Sexual Person draws historically, methodologically, and anthropologically from the best of Catholic tradition and provides a context for current theological debates between traditionalists and revisionists regarding marriage, cohabitation, homosexuality, reproductive technologies, and what it means to be human. This daring and potentially revolutionary book will be sure to provoke constructive dialogue among theologians, and between theologians and the Magisterium.
Author: David G. Kirchhoffer
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Release Date: 2013-08-09
What does it mean to be human? The traditional answers from the past remain only theoretical possibilities unless they come to mean something to today's generation. Moreover, in light of new knowledge and circumstances, a new generation may call these old answers into question, and seek to reinterpret, or, indeed, provide alternatives to them. In the 1960s, the Catholic Church's Second Vatican Council attempted such a reinterpretation, an aggiornamento, for the post-war generation of the mid-twentieth century by proposing, in Gaudium et Spes, a theological anthropology founded upon the ideas of human dignity and the common good. Fifty years later is an appropriate time to revisit those answers, and