Customer Reviews

The Origin Of Humankind (Science Masters Series)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book focuses more on how the fossil and cultural (i.e., tool-making) evidence for early human ancestors illuminates various aspects of human nature and what it truly means to be human, rather than on the technical details and comparative anatomy of the different pre-homonid and homonid evolutionary lines. Leakey does spend some time discussing the fossils and anatomy, though, which would be almost impossible to avoid in a book on physical anthropology, of course, but it's not the main emphasis of the book. He's mainly interested in showing how the fossil record illuminates the important physical and cultural changes that occurred during our long evolution, and what that says about how early humans lived.

For example, Leakey discusses how the anatomical changes from early Australopithecus (Lucy) to Homo erectus suggest profound differences in the physiology and life style of our earliest ancestors versus the first and later homonids. During this evolutionary transition, all the following changes occurred: the prolonged, more helpless infancy of humans; our ability to be more active and athletic, more delayed sexual maturity; the ability to make and use finer tools; the ability to hunt and kill larger game, along with a more omnivorous diet; a more complex and sophisticated social structure; and finally, the development of true language. Leakey includes separate chapters on 'The Art of Language," "The Language of Art," and "The Origins of Mind," in which he discusses the evidence for these higher-level and more advanced cognitive processes. Leakey is also careful to discuss investigations ranging from traditional comparative anatomy to high-tech approaches using DNA techniques, microanatomy (such as tooth lines), and CAT scans.

Another important topic he discusses is how the fossil evidence has forced modifications in the conception of our evolutionary tree. Since I was last reading up on the subject, the tree has become much less linear and far more "bushy." Another hallowed and traditional idea that had to be abandoned was Darwin's own theory of primitive man being "special" and highly evolved even from the very beginning. As the fossil record has demonstrated, our evolution was far more gradual, with many intermediate homonids known for both H. sapiens and Neanderthal, such as the Sima de los Huesos and Petrolonas finds, which show that there were primitive, archaic Neanderthals in Europe who eventually evolved into the more modern types such as those found at Steinheim and Arago. For the pre-Homonids we now have Australopithecus afarensis, A. africanus, A. aethiopicus, A. robustus, and Australopithecus boiseii, as well as possibly two or different kinds of H. habilis, and so on. As I mentioned earlier, this has provided powerful support for a "bushier" family tree for human origins.

I only have one complaint, which is that the book, being now almost 10 years old, doesn't include the more recent finds of Ardipithecus ramidus and Sahelanthropus tchadensis, which together push our origins back several million years further even than "Lucy," at 3.6 million years, or Australopithicus afarensis.

Overall, however, a nice little introduction to the subject and the issues relating to our earliest origins, and I would give it four and a half stars if I could. After this book, you should have the background to tackle more technical books on the subject. If you decide to do this, I would recommend reading Richard Klein's book, The Dawn of Human Culture, next. It was published this year (2002), and discusses all the more recent finds in some detail. Klein's book is also probably the most readable and well-written account on the subject I've ever read, despite it's being at a fairly good technical level.

After you've finished with Klein's book, I would read Ian Tattarsal's Extinct Humans next, which is notable for the beautiful, high-gloss, color photographs of all the skulls, which is a great feature for comparing the descriptions of the comparative anatomy in the text to the actual specimens. It's also very well written, like Klein's book. In fact, the entire book is printed on very nice, high-gloss paper. The only downside is that this makes the book somewhat pricey compared to the other books here.

I have one more recommendation, which is that you could follow Klein's book with Neanderthal, by Paul Jordan. It's the only book I've seen covering the one genus, although Jordan includes chapters discussing the earlier and later homonids, too, but the emphasis is definitely on all the Neanderthal finds and their significance. It makes for more technical and somewhat dry reading, but does cover the subject in a more detailed way than any of the other books I've seen.

After reading these four books, you'll have covered the best current writing out there on the subject, along with all the major fossil finds. As I said, the only one missing from these books is the M. Brunet expedition's discovery of Sahelanthropus tchadensis, and you could just look up some online articles about it to get the scoop on that. Also, Time magazine had a major article on it in the July 22, 2002 issue, so you could try looking up that, too, at which point, you'd have covered everything.

Hope my little comparson review of these books helps. Good luck and happy reading!

If I were an expert on anthropology and human evolution I probably wouldn't be reading a book on it from the Science Masters Series. This is really something of a primer on human evolution for people like me (I'm a Sociology graduate student) that are interested in the topic but really have very little background in biology or anthropology. Admittedly, I did find some of his topics overly interesting because of their apparent relationship to topics addressed by Sociology. One of these was the notion of consciousness. He attributes the idea of the Inner Eye/Inner 'I' to Humphrey, 1986. Perhaps Humphrey pulled a fast one on anthropologists because his interpretation is a rehash of George Herbert Mead's Symbolic Interactionism and his conceptions of consciousness and the 'I' and the 'Me'.

Aside from that criticism, I found the book to be a very enjoyable read. I have something of a background in biology (no expert by any stretch), but with what little background I do have the concepts discussed were not over my head. For individuals that have a good high school and perhaps college education, this book shouldn't be too difficult to digest and should be rather informative. I think I was most intrigued by the discussion of the human mind and consciousness, but the entire book was interesting (in a positive way) to me and I would highly recommend it.

There was one quote from Richard Dawkins in the book that I found particularly insightful (whether true or not, I don't claim to know), "Perhaps consciousness arises when the brain's simulation of the world becomes so complete that it must include a model of itself." (p. 142).

And another quote which isn't so much the quote but the content, "Skilled players of the game-those equipped with a more acute mental model, a sharper consciousness-would have enjoyed greater social and reproductive success. This is grist for natural selection, which would have raised consciousness to higher and higher levels. This gradually unfolding consciousness changed us into a new kind of animal. It transformed us into an animal who sets arbitrary standards of behavior based on what is considered to be right and wrong." (p. 154).

Overall, there are undoubtedly other books out there with more up-to-date information. The presentation of the material in this book also reveals that with every passing year the information in the book will become more and more outdated - so it is with science. But for an introduction to human evolution, I very much enjoyed it.

There are other books on the subject (including Leakey's own, Origins Reconsidered) that survey the subject with more completeness, fuller explanation, and greater literary color. This is a very slim volume. Besides the restricted length (and thus restricted discussion), the two primary weaknesses with this book are its author's occasionally unrigorous opinions and flights of fancy (see the part about cave art and shamans). With respect to his dismissive opinions, Leakey is not alone among paleoanthropologists; but read the argument against Owen Lovejoy's theory of bipedalism and see if you think it holds up. (Mind you, it is difficult to see clearly the flaws in Leakey's arguments precisely because there is so little space to go into detail.) Second, there is nothing wrong with imagination in the sciences, provided scientists know what to do with it; but scientists sometimes impose their wishes and daydreams on the facts--and the two get muddled in the public's mind, because the "information" is coming from scientists (the true "priests" of our age). Leakey is better able than some to rein in this fancifulness, but it's still there---and, especially in a book this size, there just isn't room for it.

This is a good introduction to our distant past and ancestors for beginners in the subject. Leakey writes very well and explains things quite concisely. He gives an overview of the major theories, but due to the shortness of the book (only 171 pages including index) he only fleshes out his own theories. I am not an expert in anthropology so I don't know if he is grasping at straws or not. He gives a pretty good bibliography in the back for further reading. There are some problems with the book. First, it is very short, so the author does not have time to really delve into the different theories as much as you may wish he would. Second, this book was written almost ten years ago. There has been more discoveries since then, including the 6 million year old hominid fossils in Chad, which I wish he addressed in an epilogue or an updated version of the book. I would recommend this if you have no background in anthropology and then do some extra research on the web to get up to date with new findings.

This is Richard Leakey's Contribution to the "Science Masters Series." It is the rather incredible story of his finding of an intact almost four million year old skeletal fossil, in the Turkana region of Kenya. The details of which are like a juicy detective story: as full of twists and turns, dead-ends and reversals, as a Sherlock Holmes mystery.

What is most curious about this story, however, is the analytical mystery that lies exposed in its subtext. Reading between (and above) the lines, it is easy enough for the reader to see the utter poverty of the Archaeologist's inductive methodology, which even in this magnificent instance seems to have been severely tested and exposed as being analytically impoverished.

Respectfully, as much as I wish to avoid doing so, one nevertheless has to pose some embarrassingly obvious questions about the modern Archaeologist's methodology. For instance: Is weaving a theory of discovery based solely on areas where fossils are found, not unlike searching for the lost origins of man under the nearest lamppost? Are we to assume that since no fossils are found in regions less hospitable to fossil preservation, that none ever existed there? And in this same vein, is it not entirely possible that the oldest and more impressive finds are yet to be found, or indeed may never be found?

Even though I realize that the Archaeologist's quest always amounts to trying to prove a negative, and that they are almost always accompanied by a suite of elaborately constructed collateral checks and balances, this is not the only question the Leakey methodology raises: What, for instance, are we to do about the long time gaps that exist between archaeological finds, some of which are long enough for undetected species to have evolved, lived, and then become extinct and traces of them to have disappeared, several times over? Are we to assume in such instances, that since we have discovered no empirical evidence of the existence of these unknown species that they in fact never existed?

The larger point is of course that this lack of closure in the finds of the Archaeologist's empirical but nevertheless inductive method, points directly to the logical hole that lies embarrassingly at the center of this method. And while indirect evidence of the existence of a species is useful, and indeed unfortunately is all we have, it is hardly ever the full story. The fact that in the end, we know "that we do not know the full story," is more reason for modesty than for making lavish claims about finds, which, however impressive, we all know in the end, are profoundly meager.

While we must be eternally grateful to the Leakey family for it's many important finds over several generations, the utter meagerness of these finds must always remain at the forefront of our minds. To use an inept and perhaps an inappropriate metaphor: we have not yet even scratched the surface of uncovering the origins of mankind.

Five stars

Very interesting synopsis of many aspects of human evolution. Discussion of the evolution of bipedal locomotion is particularly interesting. Also, of note, Leakey explains the hypothesized explanations for slow growth and development of human children compared to their primate counterparts. I guess more than explanations for the mechanisms of evolution of human growth and development patterns, he does a good job of illustrating how such slow growth and development of human children provide survival and innovation superiority over other species. Very interesting book; however, much of what Leakey elaborates on does not rest on hard evidence (in my OPINION). Many explanations provided are based on logical conjecture. This in no way detracts from the thought provoking nature of the book. Great book for the interested non-anthropologist. As a scientist in a different discipline, I found the book to be very easy to read and assimilate, as Leakey writes to a lay audience.

My book group just read and discussed this book. All regarded it as the best book they have seen about the evolution of hominids. The right amount of details are given without unnecessary jargon. Use of the latest molecular biology and physics technology to discover details about human evolution are explained clearly. Good charts and pictures add to the clarity of the exposition. This is an excellent book for those who want to learn the latest knowledge and theories of human evolution.

This book was extremely interesting and far easier to understand than I first expected. It's well laid out and not overly wordy. Even those with little to no science background will find this book very readable and thought-provoking. Definitely one of the best science texts I've read in a long time!

Book Review: The Origin of Humankind, by Richard Leaky. 1994.
171 pp. Perseus Book Group.

Tags: Leakey, archeology, human origins, bipedalism, Australopithecines.

When I saw this book among the list produced by E.R. Hamilton Book Sellers I knew it would be good because I knew the name of Leakey as being a family of archeologists who had made pioneering discoveries of fossil humans. This small, inexpensive book (ca. $5.) is special because it explains how archeologists think about their discoveries of skeletons, tools, drawings, etc. and what they tell us about the history and development of Homo sapiens. Leaky has the great ability to tell the story without loosing the interest of the reader, even though the subject is complex. His enthusiasm for his subject is contagious.

One of the great things about this book is opposite the credit page - a diagram that synopsizes the main events in the origin story starting in Africa at 10 to 5 million years back. I wish I had this drawing when reading the books by Fagan about early human archeology, e.g., CroMagnon). Between 10-5 mya was a time when we became bipedal. Bipedalism was a response to the change in Africa that went from almost total forest to savannah. Bipedalism means a greater home range as a two legged animal can run faster and longer than a four legged animal. This was a necessary step in leaving trees and Africa.

The synoptic diagram covers up to the current time which is labeled as the "technological revolution". The evidence as we progress through the different species and tool makers is presented to the reader for examination. The story starts as what maybe the earliest known fossil primate/Homo sp?, called Australopithecus afarensis, on the line to H. sapiens. But see the book "The Link" which carries the story much further back to about 70 million years ago. Leakey's story is about how we became who we are, particularly as tool makers, artists and organisms that speak, and evolve social civilizations.

Even though this book is over 15 years old Leakey's presentation brings a clarity because it has maps, diagrams of skulls and skeletons for comparisons, family trees, photographs of tools, special bones with the signs of butchery, but above all his clarity of thought. As someone presenting scientific ideas the reader can judge for themselves based on the evidence which Leaky presents.

What seems so odd is that so many people today do not know this story and seem to work hard to avoid learning about where they came from. Will further evolution of humans lead to a variety of humans who do not think rationally; and then a new species of irrationals? Or has that always been the case? But as more and more humans learn more and more will this mounting irrationality finally stop? Maybe it's not just the amount of learning but the type of learning. Let's hope the latter is the case as we are now in a race to catch up to an environment we have created that threatens our existence. Big changes ahead no matter what future awaits.

Clearly Aliens are the creators of the human race. They maded us and all the trees and birds and furry things and babies and wombats. Ask the silly Greek guy from the history channel.