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Evolutions
Evolutions: Fifteen Myths That Explain Our World | Oren Harman
4 posts | 2 read | 1 to read
A brilliant lyrical exploration of how modern science illuminates what it means to be human, from the award-winning author of The Price of Altruism We no longer think, like the ancient Chinese did, that the world was hatched from an egg, or, like the Maori, that it came from the tearing-apart of a love embrace. The Greeks told of a tempestuous Hera and a cunning Zeus, but we now use genes and natural selection to explain fear and desire, and physics to demystify the workings of the universe. Science is an astounding achievement, but are we really any wiser than the ancients? Has science revealed the secrets of fate and immortality? Has it provided protection from jealousy or love? There are those who believe that science has replaced faith, but must it also be a death knell for mythology? Evolutions brings to life the latest scientific thinking on the birth of the universe and the solar system, the journey from a single cell all the way to our human minds. Reawakening our sense of wonder and terror at the world around us and within us, Oren Harman uses modern science to create new and original mythologies. Here are the earth and the moon presenting a cosmological view of motherhood, a panicking mitochondrion introducing sex and death to the world, the loneliness of consciousness emerging from the memory of an octopus, and the birth of language in evolution summoning humankinds struggle with truth. Science may not solve our existential puzzles, but like the age-old legends, its magical discoveries can help us continue the never-ending search.
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quirkyreader
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This week‘s comic score and the end of the series. And yes it it corduroy weather once again. Time for all the lightweight twills to be put away until spring.

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NotCool
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I couldn‘t get past the introduction of this, I was annoyed. “We champion atheist horsemen, making heroes of those who tell us that the only mysteries worth reveling will succumb...to our inquiries.” I‘ve never heard scientists say anything like that. There was so much straw manning of science. Also, the author asks if we‘re better off now or is during Ancient Greece? Many of us couldn‘t be citizens in Ancient Greece.

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BookishMarginalia
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More #bookstoreporn from #indiebookstore #OxfordExchange in Tampa, Florida.

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tracyrowanreads
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Until about an hour ago I was completely sold on this book. It was so beautiful that it sometimes brought tears to my eyes. And now suddenly in the middle of it he's giving us a bibliography. I really don't know what's going to happen next. I hope he redeems himself.