The Brain: Big Bangs, Behaviors, and Beliefs - Hardcover

DeSalle, Rob; Tattersall, Ian

3.77

66 ratings by Goodreads

9780300175226: The Brain: Big Bangs, Behaviors, and Beliefs

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0300175221 ISBN 13: 9780300175226

Publisher: Yale University Press, 2012

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After several million years of jostling for ecological space, only one survivor from a host of hominid species remains standing: us. Human beings are extraordinary creatures, and it is the unprecedented human brain that makes them so. In this delightfully accessible book, the authors present the first full, step-by-step account of the evolution of the brain and nervous system.Tapping the very latest findings in evolutionary biology, neuroscience, and molecular biology, Rob DeSalle and Ian Tattersall explain how the cognitive gulf that separates us from all other living creatures could have occurred. They discuss the development and uniqueness of human consciousness, how human and nonhuman brains work, the roles of different nerve cells, the importance of memory and language in brain functions, and much more. Our brains, they conclude, are the product of a lengthy and supremely untidy history€”an evolutionary process of many zigs and zags€”that has accidentally resulte

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About the Author:

Rob DeSalle is curator, Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics, American Museum of Natural History, where he has curated several special exhibitions, including Brain: The Inside Story. Ian Tattersall is curator emeritus, Division of Anthropology, American Museum of Natural History, and with DeSalle co-curated the Hall of Human Origins at AMNH. The authors live in New York City.

Review:

"An engaging and complex examination of the development of the human brain throughout its evolutionary history."—Publishers Weekly (Publishers Weekly)

Selected as a Choice Outstanding Academic 2012 Title for Psychology within the Social and Behavioral Sciences category. (Outstanding Academic Title Choice 2013-05-22)

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