The Ape That Spoke: Language and the Evolution of the Human Mind [Paperback]

John McCrone (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This exciting evolutionary odyssey, which was a BOMC and History Book Club selection in cloth, interweaves recent advances in linguistics and anthropology and controversially concludes that imagination and higher emotions are language-driven extensions of the animal mind.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Avon Books (P) (April 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0380713993
• ISBN-13: 978-0380713998
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #599,397 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyable, lucid survey with misleading oversimplifications, March 23, 2003

By 

D. Cloyce Smith (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Ape That Spoke: Language and the Evolution of the Human Mind (Paperback)

Even 12 years after it was published, McCrone's first book remains a lucid introduction to the workings of the human brain, the history of its evolution, and the role of language in the development of self-consciousness and intelligence. He discusses how the brain evolved over millions of years, then he narrows his focus to examine how, during the last 40,000 years, language and self-awareness enhanced the brain's capabilities (through a process he calls "cultural evolution"). With its lack of jargon, "The Ape That Spoke" could be read by non-scientists interested in pursuing the far more exhaustive (and perhaps intimidating) studies by the likes of Steven Pinker or Antonio R. Damasio.

The reader should be aware, however, that McCrone's survey is occasionally reductive or misleading. Its most noticeable shortcoming, as the author himself admits on his own Web site, is that the book is "pretty sketchy on the neurological underpinnings of consciousness." (His later books attempt to address this disparity.) Second, readers must be very attentive to the endnotes in order to differentiate between scientific findings and McCrone's frequent speculation. Third, the book often presents tentative scientific conclusions as established fact and skirts the heated debates among scientists regarding language, consciousness, and intelligence. (His neglect of neurological studies only exacerbates this weakness.)

Finally, and perhaps most important, McCrone repeatedly uses the concept of "evolution" when he means "progress," "change," or "development." (Two examples selected from dozens: "Language gave early man just such a way to evolve and pass on complex ideas." "But now technology is starting to open the door to rapid mental evolution.") Even McCrone acknowledges that such oversimplification is not always useful when talking about something as complex as evolution, "where an effect can be its own cause and . . . where stable patterns emerge as what works outlasts what does not." Yet he nevertheless persists in using "evolution" in its metaphorical sense. Such vagueness may be appropriate for some topics, but it is certainly confusing in a book on evolution and language. In particular, as Stephen Jay Gould notes in "Full House," the term "cultural evolution" should be abandoned altogether, since societal transformation, unlike evolutionary change, can occur--and regress--both rapidly and deterministically (e.g., humans can easily and radically influence the direction of their culture and still remain human, but they cannot alter the genetic makeup they collectively inherited from evolutionary processes!).

Keeping in mind these caveats and shortcomings, diligent readers might still find McCrone's survey a useful introduction to more accurate and complex works on the topic.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book makes anthropology more gripping than fiction, January 8, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Silicon Valley, California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Ape That Spoke: Language and the Evolution of the Human Mind (Paperback)

I picked up my copy of "The Ape That Spoke" in the overstock bins at my local bookstore, so who could have imagined that it would be one of the most engaging books I had ever picked up? Like the PBS series "Connections", the author weaves disparate threads of topics into an easily understood foundation for social fabric. "The Ape That Spoke" reveals current theories about why intelligence was a successful factor in human evolution. It relates the power of speech with self expression then with social interaction. The ability to formulate complex expression is then shown in the contexts of prehistoric man as well as modern life. The viability of these theories is backed by a description of the data from experimentation. This helps ground the theories so that it is easy to follow the conclusions made by the anthropologists whose work is represented by the book's author. I'd encourage the reading of this book for anyone with a curiosity about the workings of the mind, and further would suggest it as a required reading for a college philosophy course.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars College students, March 12, 2003

By 

Melissa Szueber (Riverside, Ca United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Ape That Spoke: Language and the Evolution of the Human Mind (Hardcover)

I read this book for a book review I had to do for my "Mind Brain and Behavior" class in college. It was a very simple book to read and understand. I dont neccessarily agree with all McCrone has to say, but he does do an excellent job at making his ideas clear to the reader. I also enjoyed the fact that he had stories, etc. to help the average reader understand it more.