Marlene Zuk
autor
Dancing Cockatoos and the Dead Man Test
It's time to leave behind the tired nature-versus-nurture debate. In Dancing Cockatoos and the Dead Man Test , Marlene Zuk asks a more fascinating question: How does behaviour evolve, and how is that process similar-and different-in people and animals?
Drawing from a wealth of research, including her own on insects, she explores how genes and the environment work together to produce cockatoos that dance to rock music and ants that heal their injured companions. She follows the different paths cats and dogs took to living with humans and asks whether bees are domestic animals. In exploring intelligence, mating behaviour and fighting disease, Zuk turns to smart spiders, silent crickets and crafty crows. She shows how neither our behaviour nor that of other animals is dictated solely by genes, and that animal behaviour can be remarkably similar to human behaviour-and wonderfully complicated in its own right.
Paleofantasy
Theories about how our ancestors lived - and why we should emulate them - are often based on pseudoscience and speculation rather than actual research. Taking us to the cutting edge of biology, Marlene Zuk explains that evolution can work faster than was previously realised, meaning that we are not biologically the same as our caveman ancestors. Zuk shows how our visions of an ideal evolutionary past in which we ate, lived and reproduced as we were "meant to" can lead us astray and distract us from more interesting considerations of how we differ from our forebears. Along the way, she debunks the caveman diet, discusses whether we're really designed to run barefoot and considers modern-day courtship and child-rearing practices in the context of how our ancestors lived.
Vypredané
12,30 €
12,95 €
