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Meaning of Life, Human Nature, and Delusions - How Tales about Love, Sex, Races, Gods and Progress Affect Our Lives and Earth's Splendor (Hardcover, 1st ed. 2022)
Loot Price: R810
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Meaning of Life, Human Nature, and Delusions - How Tales about Love, Sex, Races, Gods and Progress Affect Our Lives and Earth's Splendor (Hardcover, 1st ed. 2022)
Expected to ship within 10 - 15 working days
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Whatever are your beliefs, background, education, political views
or interests, one thing is sure: this book will engage you, teach
you something new, and more importantly make you to re-think deeply
about critical aspects of your daily-life, including sex, love,
food, physical activities, diseases, work and stress, and how you
see and deal with other people, other animals, and the planet in
general. Indeed, it focuses on topics that have fascinated people
from all places and historical periods since times immemorial: Why
are we here? What is the meaning of life? Are we progressing, and
will we thrive? It does this by integrating in a unique fashion
information from ancient Greek, Sumerian, Hindu, Jewish, Buddhist,
Christian and Muslim texts to high-tech brain research, facts about
near-death experiences, Covid-19, QAnon conspiracies, virtual
reality and dating aps; from Adam and Eve to the rise of misogyny
and racism to Black Lives Matter, Me-Too, Hollywood romantic movies
and Disney fairy-tales. Contrary to notions about 'human progress'
and 'Homo Deus' defended by authors such as Harari, Pinker and
Dawkins, it shows that human history instead involves the
repetition of similar imaginary tales created by a combination of
traits found in other animals and the uniquely human obsession
about 'cosmic purpose' stories related to our awareness of death's
inevitability. Organized religions appeared later, chiefly during
the rise of agriculture and 'civilizations'. Diogo navigates
mesmerizing untold stories revealing a paradox: these events and
the industrial 'revolution' increased inequality, oppression,
slavery, subjugation of women, famines, plagues, 'work', stress,
and suicides. Data from psychology, biology, neurobiology, and
cross-cultural studies of hunter-gatherers and so-called
'developed' societies reveal an even more profound paradox: within
all forms of life, the 'sapient being' is the one immersed in
Neverland's world of unreality - truly a Homo irrationalis, fictus
and socialis believing in fictional tales about cosmic 'duties',
'romantic meant to be', demons, inferior 'races' and 'genders',
conspiracies, and 'justified' slavery, warfare, genocides, and
animal abuses. Importantly, such tales play, on the other hand,
crucial functions such as help coping with death and a plethora of
societal troubles, decreasing stress, or preventing drug and
alcohol abuse. An optimist and passionate wondered and wanderer,
Diogo provides enthralling details about the history of religion,
discrimination, romantic love, warfare, diseases and Earth's
biodiversity illustrating how 'virtue is in the middle' and that we
- with our intriguing combination of beliefs, bodily needs and
desires, artistic abilities, and mismatches between our senses'
illusions and the cosmos' reality - are not 'better' or 'worse'
than the other millions of captivating living species. This
powerful and urgently needed message has critical repercussions for
how we understand, care about, and mindfully enjoy living in this
splendid planet, in the reality of here and now. Pre-publication
comments: "I applaud the enormous work that Diogo has invested in
this follow-up to his widely acclaimed Evolution driven by
organismal behavior book, and the challenge of getting people to
think beyond and outside of our usual set of definitions and
expectations. The case-studies provided in the book are fascinating
and insightful" (Drew Noden, Award-winning Emeritus Professor,
Cornell University) "Rui Diogo is becoming the Slavoj Zizek of
evolutionary biology" (Marcelo Sanchez-Villagra, Director of the
Paleontological Institute and Museum of the University of Zurich)
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