000			02059 a2200217 4500
008			240621b |||||||| |||| 00| 0 eng d
020			_a9780141984209 (PB)
041			_aeng
080			_a316.7 _bVIN
100			_aVince, Gaia
245			_aTranscendence _b: How Humans Evolved through Fire, Language, Beauty, and Time
260			_bPenguin _c2020 _aLondon
300			_axv, 294p.
504			_aIncludes Index
520			_aIn Transcendence, scientist and anthrojournalist Gaia Vince argues that changes in our culture, not our brains, are responsible for the overwhelming sophistication of our civilization. Vince explores four factors elemental to our species' success: fire, language, art, and time. Humans now live longer and better than ever before, and we are the most populous big animal on earth. Meanwhile, our closest living relatives, the now-endangered chimpanzees, continue to live as they have for millions of years. We are not like the other animals, yet we evolved through the same process. What are we then? And now we have remade the world, what are we becoming? Setting out to answer this question, Gaia Vince retells our evolution story. Unlike any other species on earth we determine the course of our own destiny, something that she argues rests on a special relationship between our genes, environment and culture going back into deep time. It is our collective culture, rather than our individual intelligence, that makes humans unique. Vince shows how our four evolutionary drivers - Fire, Language, Beauty and Time - are further transforming our species into a superorganism: a hyper-cooperative mass of humanity that she calls Homo omnis, or 'Homni'. Drawing on cutting-edge advances in population genetics, archaeology, palaeontology and neuroscience, Transcendence compels us to reimagine ourselves, showing us to be on the brink of something grander - and potentially more destructive.
650			_aSocial history
650			_aCultural studies
650			_aSociety and Culture
690			_aGeneral
942			_cBK
999			_c60483 _d60483