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Books > Humanities > Philosophy > Topics in philosophy > Social & political philosophy
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Closing Human Evolution: Life in the Ultimate Age (Paperback, 1st ed. 2015)
Loot Price: R1,860
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Closing Human Evolution: Life in the Ultimate Age (Paperback, 1st ed. 2015)
Series: SpringerBriefs in Evolutionary Biology
Expected to ship within 10 - 15 working days
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This volume analyses the evolution of humankind by combining
approaches from science and the arts. It offers a novel perspective
on the evolution of life on Earth, based on a recent reformulation
of the second law of thermodynamics in terms of the "maximum
entropy production principle." In essence, the Earth is but one of
many "white holes" in the universe, where life functions as a
specific arrangement for the rapid dissipation of energy gradients
by generating self-organized structures. Evolution of life in the
universe is a creative process of increasing complexity as a
Bayesian ratchet of knowledge accumulation, advancing in an
evolutionary maze characterized by myriad blind alleys. On Earth,
the human species has progressed more than any other by creating
artefacts that have become both agents and products of in our
cumulative cultural evolution. Culture has dramatically enhanced
the rate of dissipation of energy gradients. Extrapolating from the
acceleration of cultural evolution suggests that humanity will
reach the Civilization Singularity in the middle of the 21st
century, a point in time at which the rate of changes, and hence
their unpredictability and uncontrollability, will converge to
infinity. Humankind has now entered the ultimate age, in which the
exuberance and splendour of human feats may be metaphorically
likened to fireworks. The author highlights a new role of
scientists as intellectuals who can create "music for the
fireworks" by analysing the consequences of the astounding dynamics
in order to make the closing phase of human evolution a sublime one
marked by minimal political and social tensions.
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