Pandora's Seed: The Unforeseen Cost of Civilization by Spencer Wells: October 2010

Friday, October 29, 2010

Pandora's Seed: The Unforeseen Cost of Civilization

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Oct 29, 2010 19:34:34

In The Journey of Man, renowned geneticist and anthropologist Spencer Wells traced human evolution back to our earliest ancestors, creating a remarkable and readable map of our distant past. Now, in his thrilling new book, he examines our cultural inheritance in order to find the turning point that led us to the path we are on today, one he believes we must veer from in order to survive.

Pandora’s Seed takes us on a powerful and provocative globe-trotting tour of human history, back to a seminal event roughly ten thousand years ago, when our species made a radical shift in its way of life: We became farmers rather than hunter-gatherers, setting in motion a momentous chain of events that could not have been foreseen at the time.

Although this decision to control our own food supply is what propelled us into the modern world, Wells demonstrates—using the latest genetic and anthropological data—that such a dramatic shift in lifestyle had a downside that we’re only now beginning to recognize. Growing grain crops ultimately made humans more sedentary and unhealthy and made the planet more crowded. The expanding population and the need to apportion limited resources such as water created hierarchies and inequalities. The desire to control—and no longer cooperate with—nature altered the concept of religion, making deities fewer and more influential, foreshadowing today’s fanaticisms. The proximity of humans and animals bred diseases that metastasized over time. Freedom of movement and choice were replaced by a pressure to work that is the forebear of the anxiety and depression millions feel today. Wells offers a hopeful prescription for altering a life to which we were always ill suited, recommending that we change our priorities and self-destructive appetites before it’s too late.

A riveting and accessible scientific detective story, Pandora’s Seed is an eye-opening book for anyone fascinated by the past and concerned about the future.

!1: Best Buy If you are even remotely interested in how we (humans) arrived at our present state, this book will prove to be as fascinating as anything you have ever read. I won't go into the details other than to say that the author's ability to explain the complexities of population genetics is in large part one of the books' values. I found it worth reading several times- the first time as the MP3 audio version and then as a paper book so that I could mull over some of the more complex topics. Absolutely worth several reads and the author himself is excellent at narrating it. on Sale!

Friday, October 15, 2010

Survival of the Sickest: The Surprising Connections Between Disease and Longevity (P.S.)

!1: Now is the time Survival of the Sickest: The Surprising Connections Between Disease and Longevity (P.S.) Order Today!

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Oct 16, 2010 00:30:19

Joining the ranks of modern myth busters, Dr. Sharon Moalem turns our current understanding of illness on its head and challenges us to fundamentally change the way we think about our bodies, our health, and our relationship to just about every other living thing on earth. Through a fresh and engaging examination of our evolutionary history, Dr. Moalem reveals how many of the conditions that are diseases today actually gave our ancestors a leg up in the survival sweepstakes. But Survival of the Sickest doesn't stop there. It goes on to demonstrate just how little modern medicine really understands about human health, and offers a new way of thinking that can help all of us live longer, healthier lives.

!1: Best Buy My Opinion of Survival of the Sickest: Author: Dr. Sharon Moalem: By Carlos Topher

This book is very interesting, it is about diseases, history and the creation of life. It also explains how what we think of as sickness may have benefited our ancestors, leading us to things we can do about it. From the past to now, our genetics have been affected by diseases and the environment. This book explains some of these factors have affected our genetic history.

The Moalem says that people with diabetes can survive lower temperatures and this is because the sugar acts as an anti-freeze. During the Ice Age, people who had diabetes survived better against the cold, and this book explains the possible benefit to our ancestors.

Also, the author has a theory that humans used to live in water. He explains that water birth could be more comfortable for women. They could stand up in the water and give birth safely, by themselves with less pain. The safety he noted by the fact that babies don't breathe under the water until they feel the air on their cheeks.

To further support the theory that we once lived in water, our bodies have less hair than most other mammals. We are like dolphins in the hairlessness of our bodies and they live in water. Additionally, mammals who live in water have fat attached to their skin as we do too.

Sun light is both good and bad. It is good because your body can use it to make vitamin D. Vitamin D is necessary to construct bones and to prevent Rickets. Sun light helps to convert cholesterol into vitamin D. Too much sun light could be harmful because it could burn your skin. Melanin protects the skin from burning and gives it a darker color. The author explains why we have different skin colors, reminding us that lighter-skinned people were favored in areas where there is less sun light, and darker skinned people were favored in places where there is more sun light. Today people who find themselves in the wrong light zone can correct a vitamin D deficiency with supplements, this explains why they put vitamin D in the milk.

This book is also about the creation of life, it explains that every virus, bacteria, plant, animal and human, has to live long enough to reproduce in order for its offspring to survive. Reproduction, the author explains, is the main goal of a life form. It is even more important than the individual survival, introducing the idea that we have to die in order to allow our offspring to improve. Another reason for dying, the author explains, is that older individuals die so that their parasites die with them, to protect the young.

You might think that "Survival of the Sickest" would be a boring book, but it is not. In a fact this book is good and I recommend it. Dr. Moalem explains how diseases may have helped our ancestors get through several historical events, such as an ice age. The author introduces the idea that humans once lived in water, with evidence like our hairlessness, and I think that it is amazing. I believe that this book would help you understand the relationship between vitamin D and sun light. Additionally this book talks about the nature of life, reproduction and death. on Sale!

Friday, October 1, 2010

Pandora's Seed: The Unforeseen Cost of Civilization.(Brief article)(Book review): An article from: Science News

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Oct 02, 2010 01:51:04

This digital document is an article from Science News, published by Science Service, Inc. on July 17, 2010. The length of the article is 329 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Pandora's Seed: The Unforeseen Cost of Civilization.(Brief article)(Book review)
Author: Nathan Seppa
Publication:Science News (Magazine/Journal)
Date: July 17, 2010
Publisher: Science Service, Inc.
Volume: 178 Issue: 2 Page: 30(1)

Article Type: Book review, Brief article

Distributed by Gale, a part of Cengage Learning

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