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Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human

by Richard Wrangham (Author), Kevin Pariseau (Reader)

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In Catching Fire, one of the most ambitious arguments about human evolution since Darwin’s Descent of Man, renowned primatologist Richard Wrangham makes the claim that learning to cook food was the hinge on which human evolution turned. Eating cooked food, he argues, enabled us to evolve our large brains, and cooking itself became a primary focus of human social activity—in short, cooking made us the social, intelligent, and sexual species we are today. Path-breaking and provocative, Catching Fire will fascinate anyone interested in our ancient origins—or in our modern eating habits.

"Catching Fire is convincing in argument and impressive in its explanatory power. A rich and important book.” —Michael Pollan, author of In Defense of Food and The Omnivore’s Dilemma

“This is a daringly unorthodox book, and one that might just transform the way we understand ourselves.” —Sunday Times (UK)

“The ambition of Wrangham’s theory gives it great appeal: Cooking is a powerful biological force and the universal activity around which the rest of human history—the households and tribes, the migrations and wars, the religion and science—arranged itself. But the added treat of the I-cook-therefore-I-am idea is the counterintuitive light it sheds on one of our most intense cultural preoccupations—living the right life by eating naturally." —Slate

“An exhilarating book.” —The Times (UK)

“A cogent and compelling argument.” —Washington Post

“Absolutely fascinating.” —Nigella Lawson

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About the Author

Richard Wrangham is the Ruth Moore Professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard University. He is coauthor of Demonic Males, and has been featured on NPR and in the Boston Globe, New Scientist, and Scientific American. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Product details

MP3 CD
Publisher: Brilliance Audio; Unabridged edition (April 9, 2013)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1469298708
ISBN-13: 978-1469298702
Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.5 x 6.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 3.2 ounces
Average Customer Review: 167 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,942,171 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #7318 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Social Sciences > Customs & Traditions
- #12627 in Books > History > Historical Study & Educational Resources > Archaeology
- #86899 in Books > Books on CD

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While I did enjoy reading Dr

October 11, 2016

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Dr. Richard Wrangham, renowned primatologist and Ruth B. Moore Professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard University, goes against the grain in this book with his assertion that the advent of preparing cooked meals, not merely increasing amounts of meat consumed, is the genesis of the list of extraordinary traits our ancient ancestors acquired over the last 2 million years that eventually gave rise to us, Homo sapiens.

Drawing on a number of food studies, ethnographic data, as well as his own primatological research, Dr. Wrangham argues that the transition from Homo habilis to Homo erectus would be impossible without a regular supply of cooked food. Citing the general unpalatability and undigestibility of a chimp's diet for modern humans, the seeming energy deficit seen in raw food proponents, the chemical changes that occur in foods that are cooked and the subsequent absorption of the unlocked calories, and the increasing reduction of our early ancestors' gastrointestinal tract through the millennia, he is convinced that the utilization of fire for cooking has its origins much farther in the past than the current evidence from the archaeological record tells us. The discrepancy between the archaeological record and his claim is around 1 million years, an incredibly large gap to bridge. In the latter third of the book, Wrangham makes the tangential argument that cooking is also what spurred our cultural evolution, e.g., concepts such as pair-bonding and the sexual division of labor, through the creation of a sort of "protection racket" that guards women from food thieves and ensures men a ready supply of food.

While I did enjoy reading Dr. Wrangham's book and readily admit that he makes some interesting and valid points, I am not convinced of the veracity of his hypothesis, especially in the light of more recent research on the variability and actions of the microbiome present in the digestive tracts of animals. In presenting his case for the need of cooked food for an increased energy supply in late habilines/early erectus, he ignores the fact that much of the successive change in the musculoskeletal morphology leading to our species had the effect of allowing us to conserve energy through increased efficiency of movement.

This does not necessarily mean that Dr. Wrangham is incorrect. However, the gaps in his arguments, coupled with the gaps in our own knowledge, have effectively rendered the cooking hypothesis unfalsifiable. There very well may come a time when the available physical evidence supports his position, but for now the only appropriate response is one of interest, skepticism, and further research.

16 people found this helpful

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Patrick L. Boyle

Another great book from Wrangham

June 17, 2015

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

This guy Wrangham is a serious scholar. He muster's a good deal of evidence for his thesis and presents it well. At one point in the early part of the book he casually mentions how a number of different African fruits taste. These are fruits not eaten by people but by chimpanzees. Apparently chimps relish fruits that humans detest. It's always nice to read a book by someone with real expertise. Who else can comment intelligently on chimp fruit?

Wrangham does not specifically state this but he implies it strongly. The Atwater system of calorie counting is wrong. That's the system that tells us that protein and carbohydrates yield 4 kilocalories per gram and fat 9. It also leads to the conclusion that raw food and cooked food are equal in their nutrition. This is a central point in the book. Atwater in the nineteenth century devised the procedure by which we measure the caloric value of a food article by burning it in a bomb calorimeter. This procedure is cheap and easy whereas Wrangham has to use evidence to the contrary based on measurements taken from the contents of person's colostomy bags who have eaten supervised diets. This procedure is more adequate scientifically but expensive and difficult. If you follow the simple, cheap Atwater conventions as almost everyone does then cooking hardly seems important at all. Food is food - no matter if raw or cooked. That's why Wrangham's insights will probably strike you as new.

As a primatologist Wrangham has a number of chimp anecdotes that stick with you. He points out that chimpanzees spend at least four or five hours each day just chewing. No wonder they never got around to building a civilization. Wrangham believes that <I> Homo erectus</I> emerged when they developed cooking as a way to externalize digestion thus freeing up their time and energy. Anthropology changes all the time, his specific theory may prove to have been wrong. Cooking may have arisen earlier or later than he thinks. But whatever else is subsequently learned, this is an important book.

4 people found this helpful

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Cooking made us human? This book is convincing

April 2, 2018

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

A well thought-out and opulently referenced text that convincingly posits that the evolution of humans from over the past 500,000 years or so was driven by the nutritional benefits that can be ascribed to cooking food. If you're interested in the development of Homo sapiens and/or the core role that cooking has played in humans not only surviving but thriving, this is well worth a read. It runs to over 300 pp but well over a third is references, notes and the index. I have to say though that insight into the Inuit diet has not sold me on overwintering in the Arctic...

2 people found this helpful

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