Reticulate Evolution and Humans is the first book to describe the effect of genetic exchange on the origin and evolution of our own species as well as those species with which we have and continue to interact closely, both evolutionarily and culturally. After demonstrating how genetic exchange has affected H. Sapiens, the book goes on to describe how the same processes have structured the evolution of organisms on which the human species depends for shelter, sustenance and companionship. It also considers the "dark-side" of gene transfer as it pertains to the evolution and adaptation of human disease vectors and diseases.
The development of the central thesis of this book - that reticulate evolution via introgressive hybridization and lateral gene transfer has been a pervasive factor in the evolution and cultural development of H. sapiens, its ancestors, sister taxa and associated organisms - reveals the extent of these processes across the widest of taxonomic, temporal and spatial bounds. We cannot escape the conclusion that we are constantly fed, entertained, sheltered, attacked and killed by organisms that possess mosaic genomes reflective of widespread genetic exchange during evolutionary diversification.

Communication is essential for all forms of social interaction, from parental care to mate choice and cooperation. This is evident for human societies but less obvious for bacterial biofilms, ant colonies or flocks of birds. The major disciplines of communication research have tried to identify common core principles, but syntheses have been few because historical barriers have limited interaction between different research fields.
Sociobiology of Communication is a timely and novel synthesis. It bridges many of the gaps between proximate and ultimate levels of analysis, between empirical model systems, and between biology and the humanities. The book offers the complementary approaches of a distinguished group of authors spanning a large diversity of research programs, addressing, for example, the genetic basis of bacterial communication, dishonest communication in insect societies, sexual selection and network communication among colonial vertebrates. Other chapters explore the role of communication in genomic conflict and self-organisation, and how linguistics, psychology and philosophy may ultimately contribute to a biological understanding of human mate choice and the evolution of human societies.
This highly interdisciplinary book highlights key examples of modern research to explore the genetic, neurobiological, physiological, chemical and behavioural basis of social communication. It identifies where consensus on the general principles is emerging and where the major future challenges are to be found. The book is therefore suitable for both for graduate students and professionals in evolutionary biology and behavioural ecology seeking novel inspiration, and for a wideracademic audience, including social and medical scientists who would like to explore what evolutionary approaches can offer to their fields.

Communication is essential for all forms of social interaction, from parental care to mate choice and cooperation. This is evident for human societies but less obvious for bacterial biofilms, ant colonies or flocks of birds. The major disciplines of communication research have tried to identify common core principles, but syntheses have been few because historical barriers have limited interaction between different research fields.
Sociobiology of Communication is a timely and novel synthesis. It bridges many of the gaps between proximate and ultimate levels of analysis, between empirical model systems, and between biology and the humanities. The book offers the complementary approaches of a distinguished group of authors spanning a large diversity of research programs, addressing, for example, the genetic basis of bacterial communication, dishonest communication in insect societies, sexual selection and network communication among colonial vertebrates. Other chapters explore the role of communication in genomic conflict and self-organisation, and how linguistics, psychology and philosophy may ultimately contribute to a biological understanding of human mate choice and the evolution of human societies.
This highly interdisciplinary book highlights key examples of modern research to explore the genetic, neurobiological, physiological, chemical and behavioural basis of social communication. It identifies where consensus on the general principles is emerging and where the major future challenges are to be found. The book is therefore suitable for both for graduate students and professionals in evolutionary biology and behavioural ecology seeking novel inspiration, and for a wideracademic audience, including social and medical scientists who would like to explore what evolutionary approaches can offer to their fields.

How universal are our moral obligations? Should we attempt to communicate with life beyond our planet? What is "life"? Social and Conceptual Issues in Astrobiology explores the most important questions related to the field of astrobiology, and the resulting book is the most comprehensive, interdisciplinary approach focused on the humanistic issues of the multidisciplinary science of astrobiology to date. Questions surrounding life on other planets have troubled humankind for centuries; this volume outlines the questions for the next decade of research in the field of astrobiology. Kelly C. Smith and Carlos Mariscal have assembled the top scholars from fields spanning history, communication, philosophy, law, and theology to consider the implications of life elsewhere. The perspectives supplied by this expansive group of contributors have never before been collected in book a book focused on astrobiology. This book sets a benchmark for future work in astrobiology, giving readers the groundwork from which to base the continuous scholarship coming from this ever-growing scientific field.

Kinship ties-the close relationships found within the family-have been a central focus of evolutionary biological analyses of social behavior ever since biologist William Hamilton extended the concept of Darwinian fitness to include an individual's actions benefiting not only his own offspring, but also collateral kin. Evolutionary biologists consider organisms not only reproductive strategists, but also nepotistic strategists. If a person's genes are just as likely to be reproduced in her sister as in her daughter, then we should expect the evolution of sororal investment in the same way as one expects maternal investment. This concept has revolutionized biologists' understanding of social interaction and developmental psychologists' understanding of the family. However, kinship ties have largely been ignored in other areas of psychology, particularly social psychology.
Family Relationships brings together leading theorists and researchers from evolutionary psychology and related disciplines to illustrate the ways in which an evolutionary perspective can inform our study and understanding of family relationships. The contributors argue that family psychology is relationship specific: the relationship between mother and daughter is different from that between father and daughter or that between brother and sister or sister and sister. In other words, humans have evolved specialized mechanisms for processing information and motivating behavior that deal with the distinct demands of being a mate, father, mother, sibling, child, or grandparent. Such an evolutionary perspective on family dynamics provides a unique insight into human behavior.
This volume will be an indispensableresource for psychologists, sociologists, and anthropologists, as well scholars of family, marriage, and animal behavior.

The study of the genetic basis for evolution has flourished in this century, as well as our understanding of the evolvability and programmability of biological systems. Genetic algorithms meanwhile grew out of the realization that a computer program could use the biologically-inspired processes of mutation, recombination, and selection to solve hard optimization problems. Genetic and evolutionary programming provide further approaches to a wide variety of computational problems. A synthesis of these experiences reveals fundamental insights into both the computational nature of biological evolution and processes of importance to computer science. Topics include biological models of nucleic acid information processing and genome evolution; molecules, cells, and metabolic circuits that compute logical relationships; the origin and evolution of the genetic code; and the interface with genetic algorithms and genetic and evolutionary programming.

This book addresses multiple aspects of biological clocks in prokaryotes. The first part of the book deals with the circadian clock system in cyanobacteria, i.e. the pioneer of bacterial clocks. Starting with the history and background of cyanobacteria and circadian rhythms in microorganisms, the topics range from the molecular basis, structure and evolution of the circadian clock to modelling approaches, Kai systems in cyanobacteria and biotechnological applications. In the second part, emergent timekeeping properties of bacteria in microbiomes and bacteria other than cyanobacteria are discussed. Since the discovery of circadian rhythms in cyanobacteria in the late 1980s, the field has exploded with new information. The cyanobacterial model system for studying circadian rhythms (Synechococcus elongatus), has allowed a detailed genetic dissection of the bacterial clock due to state-of-the-art methods in molecular, structural, and evolutionary biology. Cutting-edge research spanning from cyanobacteria and circadian phenomena in other kinds of bacteria, to microbiomes has now given the field another major boost. This book is aimed at junior and senior researchers alike. Students or researchers new to the field of biological clocks in prokaryotes will get a comprehensive overview, while more experienced researchers will get an update on the latest developments.

This book adopts an experimental approach to understanding the mechanisms of evolution and the nature of evolutionary processes, with examples drawn from microbial, plant and animal systems. It incorporates insights from remarkable recent advances in theoretical modeling, and the fields of molecular genetics and environmental genomics.
Adaptation is caused by selection continually winnowing the genetic variation created by mutation. In the last decade, our knowledge of how selection operates on populations in the field and in the laboratory has increased enormously, and the principal aim of this book is to provide an up-to-date account of selection as the principal agent of evolution. In the classical Fisherian model, weak selection acting on many genes of small effect over long periods of time is responsible for driving slow and gradual change. However, it is now clear that adaptation in laboratory populations often involves strong selection acting on a few genes of large effect, while in the wild selection is often strong and highly variable in space and time. Indeed these results are changing our perception of how evolutionary change takes place. This book summarizes our current understanding of the causes and consequences of selection, with an emphasis on quantitative and experimental studies. It includes the latest research into experimental evolution, natural selection in the wild, artificial selection, selfish genetic elements, selection in social contexts, sexual selection, and speciation.
Selection: The Mechanism of Evolution is an advanced textbook suitable for senior undergraduate and graduate students taking courses in evolutionary biology, ecology, populationgenetics, and experimental evolution. It will also be a valuable reference tool for those professional researchers in these fields requiring an authoritative and up-to-date overview of the topic, as well as providing an accessible treatment of evolutionary mechanisms for molecular and cellular biologists.

Even before the publication of Darwin's Origin of Species, the perception of evolutionary change has been a tree-like pattern of diversification - with divergent branches spreading further and further from the trunk. In the only illustration of Darwin's treatise, branches large and small never reconnect. However, it is now evident that this view does not adequately encompass the richness of evolutionary pattern and process. Instead, the evolution of species from microbes to mammals builds like a web that crosses and re-crosses through genetic exchange, even as it grows outward from a point of origin. Some of the avenues for genetic exchange, for example introgression through sexual recombination versus lateral gene transfer mediated by transposable elements, are based on definably different molecular mechanisms. However, even such widely different genetic processes may result in similar effects on adaptations (either new or transferred), genome evolution, population genetics, and the evolutionary/ecological trajectory of organisms. For example, the evolution of novel adaptations (resulting from lateral gene transfer) leading to the flea-borne, deadly, causative agent of plague from a rarely-fatal, orally-transmitted, bacterial species is quite similar to the adaptations accrued from natural hybridization between annual sunflower species resulting in the formation of several new species. Thus, more and more data indicate that evolution has resulted in lineages consisting of mosaics of genes derived from different ancestors. It is therefore becoming increasingly clear that the tree is an inadequate metaphor of evolutionary change. In this book, Arnold promotes the 'web-of-life' metaphoras a more appropriate representation of evolutionary change in all lifeforms.

Leading researchers in the area of the origin and evolution of life in the universe contributed to Chemical Evolution: Physics of the Origin and Evolution of Life. This volume provides a review of this interdisciplinary field. In 35 chapters many aspects of the origin of life are discussed by 90 authors, with particular emphasis on the early paleontological record: physical, chemical, biological, and informational aspects of life's origin, instrumentation in exobiology and system exploration; the search for habitable planets and extraterrestrial intelligent radio signals. This book contains the proceedings of the Fourth Trieste Conference on Chemical Evolution that took place in September 1995, in which scientists from a wide geographical distribution joined in a Memorial to Cyril Ponnamperuma, who was a pioneer in the field of chemical evolution, the origin of life, and exobiology, and also initiated the Trieste Conferences on Chemical Evolution and the Origin of Life. This fourth Conference was therefore dedicated to his memory. Audience: Graduate students and researchers in the many areas of basic, earth, and life sciences that contribute to the study of chemical evolution and the origin of life.

Understanding of animal social and sexual evolution has seen a renaissance in recent years with discoveries of frequent infidelity in apparently monogamous species, the importance of sperm competition, active female mate choice, and eusocial behavior in animals outside the traditional social insect groups. Each of these findings has raised new questions, and suggested new answers, about the evolution of behavioral interactions among animals. This volume synthesizes recent research on the sexual and social biology of the Crustacea, one of the dominant invertebrate groups on earth. Its staggering diversity includes ecologically important inhabitants of nearly every environment from deep-sea trenches, through headwater streams, to desert soils. The wide range of crustacean phenotypes and environments is accompanied by a comparable diversity of behavioral and social systems, including the elaborate courtship and wildly exaggerated morphologies of fiddler crabs, the mysterious queuing behavior of migrating spiny lobsters, and even eusociality in coral-reef shrimps. This diversity makes crustaceans particularly valuable for exploring the comparative evolution of sexual and social systems. Despite exciting recent advances, however, general recognition of the value of Crustacea as models has lagged behind that of the better studied insects and vertebrates. This book synthesizes the state of the field in crustacean behavior and sociobiology and places it in a conceptually based, comparative framework that will be valuable to active researchers and students in animal behavior, ecology, and evolutionary biology. It brings together a group of internationally recognized and rising experts in fields related to crustacean behavioral ecology, ranging from physiology and functional morphology, through mating and social behavior, to ecology and phylogeny. Each chapter makes connections to other, non-crustacean taxa, and the volume closes with a summary section that synthesizes the contributions, discusses anthropogenic impacts, highlights unanswered questions, and provides a vision for profitable future research.

Systematics has developed rapidly during the past two decades. A multitude of new methods and contributions from a diversity of biological fields including molecular genetics and developmental biology have provided a wealth of phylogenetic hypotheses, some confirming traditional views others contradicting them. Despite such inconsistencies, it is now possible to recognize robust regions of a 'tree of life' and also to identify problematic areas which have yet to be resolved. This is the first book to apply the current state of phylogeny to an evolutionary interpretation of animal organ systems and body architecture, providing alternative theories in those cases of continuing controversy.
Organs do not appear suddenly during evolution; instead they are composed of far simpler structures. In some cases it is even possible to trace particular molecules or physiological pathways as far back as pre-animal history. What emerges is a fascinating picture, showing how animals have combined ancestral and new elements in novel ways to form constantly changing responses to environmental requirements.
The Evolution of Organ Systems starts with a general overview of current animal phylogeny, followed by review of general body organization including symmetry, anteroposterior axis, dorsoventral axis, germ layers, segmentation, and skeletons. Subsequent chapters then provide a detailed description of the individual organ systems themselves - integument, musculature, nervous system, sensory organs, body cavities, excretory system, circulatory system, respiratory system, intestinal system, gonads and gametes. Generously illustrated throughout, this accessible text is suitable for both upper levelundergraduate and graduate students taking courses in animal evolution, organogenesis, animal anatomy, zoology and systematics. It will also be a valuable reference tool for those professional researchers in these fields requiring an authoritative, balanced and up-to-date overview of the topic.

This book takes a fresh look at the work, thoughts, and life of 1956 Nobel Prize winner William B. Shockley. It reconstructs Shockley's upbringing, his patriotic achievements during World War II, his contribution to semiconductor physics - culminating with the epoch-making invention of the transistor - and his views on the social issues of his time. The author's unparalleled access to Shockley's personal documents provides insight into a colorful, yet controversial, man, and also sheds light on the attitudes of other prominent scientists of that era. Shockley was not only an outstanding scientist in his own right but also a fiercely independent thinker in perpetual search of the truth. His contributions to the field known today as microelectronics are enormous and unmatched. This book explores the critical facets of Shockley's life, replete with never-before-published photos and excerpts from his private correspondence and personal notebooks. The book also delves into Shockley's views on genetics and human intelligence. It tells the story of a man beset by an unrelenting rationality, slandered by the popular media, and ultimately alienated by his peers. It discusses his controversial, although sometimes prescient, ideas regarding human genetics, putting these into the context of modern research findings. Today, William Shockley is perhaps just as enigmatic as his work and accomplishments. The author presents a convincing argument that Shockley still has much to say about the issues of our age, and many of his ideas deserve evaluation in the public forum.

The broad arc of islands north of Australia that extends from Indonesia east towards the central Pacific is home to a set of human populations whose concentration of diversity is unequaled elsewhere. Approximately 20% of the worlds languages are spoken here, and the biological and genetic heterogeneity among the groups is extraordinary. Anthropologist W.W. Howells once declared diversity in the region so Protean as to defy analysis. However, this book can now claim considerable success in describing and understanding the origins of the genetic and linguistic variation there. In order to cut through this biological knot, the authors have applied a comprehensive battery of genetic analyses to an intensively sampled set of populations, and have subjected these and complementary linguistic data to a variety of phylogenetic analyses. This has revealed a number of heretofore unknown ancient Pleistocene genetic variants that are only found in these island populations, and has also identified the genetic footprints of more recent migrants from Southeast Asia who were the ancestors of the Polynesians. The book lays out the very complex structure of the variation within and among the islands in this relatively small region, and a number of explanatory models are tested to see which best account for the observed pattern of genetic variation here. The results suggest that a number of commonly used models of evolutionary divergence are overly simple in their assumptions, and that often human diversity has accumulated in very complex ways.

‘Steve Brusatte, the author of The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs, brings mammals out from the shadow of their more showy predecessors in a beautifully written book that . . . makes the case for them as creatures who are just as engaging as dinosaurs.’ – The Sunday Times, ‘Best Books For Summer’ 'In this terrific new book, Steve Brusatte . . . brings well-known extinct species, the sabre-toothed tigers and the woolly mammoths, thrillingly back to life' – The Times The passing of the age of the dinosaurs allowed mammals to become ascendant. But mammals have a much deeper history. They – or, more precisely, we – originated around the same time as the dinosaurs, over 200 million years ago; mammal roots lie even further back, some 325 million years. Over these immense stretches of geological time, mammals developed their trademark features: hair, keen senses of smell and hearing, big brains and sharp intelligence, fast growth and warm-blooded metabolism, a distinctive line-up of teeth (canines, incisors, premolars, molars), mammary glands that mothers use to nourish their babies with milk, qualities that have underlain their success story. Out of this long and rich evolutionary history came the mammals of today, including our own species and our closest cousins. But today’s 6,000 mammal species - the egg-laying monotremes including the platypus, marsupials such as kangaroos and koalas that raise their tiny babies in pouches, and placentals like us, who give birth to well-developed young – are simply the few survivors of a once verdant family tree, which has been pruned both by time and mass extinctions. In The Rise and Reign of the Mammals, palaeontologist Steve Brusatte weaves together the history and evolution of our mammal forebears with stories of the scientists whose fieldwork and discoveries underlie our knowledge, both of iconic mammals like the mammoths and sabre-toothed tigers of which we have all heard, and of fascinating species that few of us are aware of. For what we see today is but a very limited range of the mammals that have existed; in this fascinating and ground-breaking book, Steve Brusatte tells their – and our – story.

Ancestral sequence reconstruction is a technique of growing importance in molecular evolutionary biology and comparative genomics. As a powerful tool for testing evolutionary and ecological hypotheses, as well as uncovering the link between sequence and molecular phenotype, there are potential applications in a range of fields. Ancestral Sequence Reconstruction starts with a historical overview of the field, before discussing the potential applications in drug discovery and the pharmaceutical industry. This is followed by a section on computational methodology, which provides a detailed discussion of the available methods for reconstructing ancestral sequences (including their advantages, disadvantages, and potential pitfalls). Purely computational applications of the technique are then covered, including whole proteome reconstruction. Further chapters provide a detailed discussion on taking computationally reconstructed sequences and synthesizing them in the laboratory. The book concludes with a description of the scientific questions where experimental ancestral sequence reconstruction has been utilized to provide insights and inform future research. This research level text provides a first synthesis of the theories, methodologies and applications associated with ancestral sequence recognition, while simultaneously addressing many of the hot topics in the field. It will be of interest and use to both graduate students and researchers in the fields of molecular biology, molecular evolution, and evolutionary bioinformatics.

Originally published in 1920, this book contains the text of a series of lectures that were originally delivered to general audiences in Aberdeen in 1917 on the subject of the impact of humanity on the animal population of Scotland. Ritchie examines how the presence of man affected the local fauna, either through deliberate manipulation, such as domestication and hunting, or as an indirect effect of actions such as deforestation and animals conveyed to the area as parasites or hidden in imports. The text is illustrated with a number of plates showing the effects of certain types of animal life on the environment and various native Scottish animals. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in the relationship between humanity and animals and the impact of human decisions on the environment.

This is the sixth volume of a ten-volume series on The Natural History of the Crustacea. The volume synthesizes in nineteen chapters our current understanding of diverse topics in crustacean reproductive biology. In the first part of this book, the chapters address allocation strategies to reproduction, gamete production, brooding behavior, and other components of parental care in crustaceans. The second part of the volume centers on sexual systems in crustaceans. The third section of the volume covers crustacean mating systems and sexual selection. Reproductive Biology ends with three chapters covering diverse topics including reproductive rhythms, crustacean personality research, and record breaking crustaceans with respect to reproductive characters.

The present book aims to examine how sexual selection works in the human species. Almost all scholarly effort focuses on sexual selection in non-human species and extrapolates the findings to the human one. However, human mating has a unique pattern not found in any other species, namely parental influence over mate choice. Across preindustrial societies, the typical pattern of long-term mating is arranged marriage, where parents choose spouses for their children. By doing so, parents effectively become a sexual selection force. Traits that enhance an individual's chance to be selected as a son- or a daughter-in-law confer important reproductive advantages to those who are endowed with them, increasing in frequency in the population. The author has coined the term parental choice to describe the sexual selection force that arises from parental control over mating. He synthesizes extensive theoretical and empirical work in order to understand and model this force. The aim is to understand which factors give rise to parental choice and to combine these insights into constructing a more formal model. It also aims to further examine whether the predictions of the model fit the patterns of mating found across different types of human societies, and how the model can be used to understand the evolution of behavioral traits involved in mating. By synthesizing the various arguments put forward and published across the literature, the book offers a comprehensive argument and overview of an aspect of sexual selection unique to our species. Furthermore, the book revises and extends previously made arguments and models, while it provides useful insights on how the proposed revision of sexual selection theory can enable us to understand a wide range of human behavioral phenomena. It should be key reading for those interested in studying sexual selection in general and in the Homo sapiens species in particular.

Does natural selection act primarily on individual organisms, on groups, on genes, or on whole species? Samir Okasha provides a comprehensive analysis of the debate in evolutionary biology over the levels of selection, focusing on conceptual, philosophical and foundational questions. A systematic framework is developed for thinking about natural selection acting at multiple levels of the biological hierarchy; the framework is then used to help resolve outstanding issues. Considerable attention is paid to the concept of causality as it relates to the levels of selection, in particular the idea that natural selection at one hierarchical level can have effects that 'filter' up or down to other levels. Unlike previous work in this area by philosophers of science, full account is taken of the recent biological literature on 'major evolutionary transitions' and the recent resurgence of interest in multi-level selection theory among biologists. Other biological topics discussed include Price's equation, kin and group selection, the gene's eye view, evolutionary game theory, outlaws and selfish genetic elements, species and clade selection, and the evolution of individuality. Philosophical topics discussed include reductionism and holism, causation and correlation, the nature of hierarchical organization, and realism and pluralism.

Evolution's Clinical Guidebook: Translating Ancient Genes into Precision Medicine demonstrates, through well-documented examples, how an understanding of the phylogenetic ancestry of humans allows us to make sense out of the flood of genetic data streaming from modern laboratories and how it can lead us to new ways to prevent, diagnose and treat diseases. Topics cover evolution and human genome, meiosis and other recombinants events, embryology, speciation, phylogeny, rare and common diseases, and the evolution of aging. This book is a valuable source for bioinformaticians and those in the biomedical field who need knowledge, down to gene level, to fully comprehend currently available data.

We are interested in the evolution of hominin diets for several reasons. One is the fundamental concern over our present-day eating habits and the consequences of our societal choices, such as obesity prevalent in some cultures and starvation in others. Another is that humans have learned to feed themselves in extremely varied environments, and these adaptations, which are fundamentally different from those of our closest biological relatives, have to have had historical roots of varying depth. The third, and the reason why most paleoanthropologists are interested in this question, is that a species' trophic level and feeding adaptations can have a strong effect on body size, locomotion, "life history strategies," geographic range, habitat choice, and social behavior.
Diet is key to understanding the ecology and evolution of our distant ancestors and their kin, the early hominins. A study of the range of foods eaten by our progenitors underscores just how unhealthy many of our diets are today. This volume brings together authorities from disparate fields to offer new insights into the diets of our ancestors. Paleontologists, archaeologists, primatologists, nutritionists and other researchers all contribute pieces to the puzzle.
This volume has at its core four main sections:
DT Reconstructed diets based on hominin fossils--tooth size, shape, structure, wear, and chemistry, mandibular biomechanics
DT Archaeological evidence of subsistence--stone tools and modified bones
DT Models of early hominin diets based on the diets of living primates--both human and non-human, paleoecology, and energetics
DT Nutritional analyses and their implications for evolutionarymedicine
New techniques for gleaning information from fossil teeth, bones, and stone tools, new theories stemming from studies of paleoecology, and new models coming from analogy with modern humans and other primates all contribute to our understanding. When these approaches are brought together, they offer an impressive glimpse into the lives of our distant ancestors. The contributions in this volume explore the frontiers of our knowledge in each of these disciplines as they address the knowns, the unknowns, and the unknowables of the evolution of hominin diets.

Why are humans everywhere prone to believe in ghosts?
How might our tendency to imitate one another be contributing to the climate catastrophe?
And does our deep evolutionary past impel us to vote for strongmen?

In 1987, Harvey Whitehouse went to live with an indigenous community deep in the Papua New Guinea rainforest. His experiences there convinced him that, far from being wildly different, humans are fundamentally alike: their beliefs and behaviours rooted in a set of evolutionary urges that can be found in any society, anywhere.

Here, Whitehouse roves across twelve millennia and five continents to uncover how these evolved urges have both shaped and been reshaped by human history. Along the way, he shows that this ancient inheritance does not just hold the key to explaining the modern world – but perhaps also to changing it.

This volume is part of the definitive edition of letters written by and to Charles Darwin, the most celebrated naturalist of the nineteenth century. Notes and appendixes put these fascinating and wide-ranging letters in context, making the letters accessible to both scholars and general readers. Darwin depended on correspondence to collect data from all over the world, and to discuss his emerging ideas with scientific colleagues, many of whom he never met in person. The letters are published chronologically: Volume 21 includes letters from 1873, the year in which Darwin received responses to his work on human and animal expression. Also in this year, Darwin continued his work on carnivorous plants and plant movement, finding unexpected similarities between the plant and animal kingdoms, raised a subscription for his friend Thomas Henry Huxley, and decided to employ a scientific secretary for the first time - his son Francis.