Adam's Ancestors: Race, Religion, and the Politics of Human Origins (Medicine, Science, and Religion in Historical Context) (Hardcover)

by David N. Livingstone (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A great piece of scholarship and an equally great read. Particularly instructive is Livingstone's discussion of monogenism, polygenism, and the various ways these theories of human origins were used in the social and political arena. This is a substantial contribution to the history of anthropology, of evolution theory, of race and racialist thought, and of science and religion." -- Nicolaas Rupke, Institute for Science History, Georg-August University of Göttingen

David N. Livingstone is a professor of geography and intellectual history at the Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland, and author of several books, including Putting Science in Its Place: Geographies of Scientific Knowledge, The Geographical Tradition, and Darwin's Forgotten Defenders.

"As David Livingstone shows in this fascinating book, which carefully traces the history of speculations about Adam's ancestors, debates about human origins have always had, and continue to have, moral and political dimensions." -- Sciences Humaines

"David Livingstone traces in detail a fascinating and sometimes troubling story... A book to ponder." -- Ernan McMullin, Tablet

"The mark of the true scholar, the really inventive one, is that he or she shows us that there are problems and issues worth discussing that we simply did not know about or even speculate about... I really recommend David Livingstone's book. It informs and leaves you with more questions than when you started. What more could you ask of scholarship?" -- Michael Ruse

Product Description

"A remarkable achievement. It is a tightly organized and coherently packaged account of a set of ideas which mainstream scholarship now ignores. Controversial themes and explosive issues abound in Livingstone's work, which is important, topical, and fascinating." -- Colin Kidd, University of Glasgow

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: The Johns Hopkins University Press (April 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0801888131
• ISBN-13: 978-0801888137
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #520,114 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An outstanding survey., September 5, 2008

By	Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

ADAM'S ANCESTORS: RACE, RELIGION & THE POLITICS OF HUMAN ORIGINS provides both college-level and general-interest lending libraries with a fine history of non-Adamic humanity and the debates surrounding it, considering the alternative notion of Adam's descendants: that humans inhabited the Earth before or alongside Adam, and their descendants still occupy the planet. Religion, science and anthropological concerns are all presented in an outstanding survey.