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Ethical Thought in Increasingly Complex Societies: Social Structure
and Moral Development combines insights of developmental psychology
and cultural anthropology to examine the development of moral
thinking. Drawing on his extensive knowledge of small-scale
communities of hunter-gatherers and farmers in Ethiopia and Papua
New Guinea, C.R. Hallpike studies the means by which individual
thinking interacts with complex social factors to produce moral
ideas and the effects of worldview on ethical systems. This book is
recommended for scholars of psychology, anthropology, and
philosophy.
Ethical Thought in Increasingly Complex Societies: Social Structure
and Moral Development combines insights of developmental psychology
and cultural anthropology to examine the development of moral
thinking. Drawing on his extensive knowledge of small-scale
communities of hunter-gatherers and farmers in Ethiopia and Papua
New Guinea, C.R. Hallpike studies the means by which individual
thinking interacts with complex social factors to produce moral
ideas and the effects of worldview on ethical systems. This book is
recommended for scholars of psychology, anthropology, and
philosophy.
Political correctness has reduced social anthropology to a state of
terminal incoherence, and this collection of papers demolishes some
of the fashionable taboos that are involved. The ultra-Darwinism of
some sociobiologists has also degenerated into a cult which, like
political correctness, is increasingly resistant to rational
debate. As well as including some well-known classics, some new
papers have been specially written for this collection showing the
irrelevance of Darwinism to the social sciences.
Only 10,000 years ago, our ancestors were small groups of
hunter-gatherers, with bows and arrows and stone tools. Today, we
live in vast nations with all the power of modern science and
industry, and the ability to send men to the Moon and to destroy
all life on the planet. In the history of the world, 10,000 years
is the blink of an eye, yet it has seen the total transformation of
human existence. That extraordinary revolution is just as
interesting as the Big Bang, or the origin of life, and this book
is a clear and concise explanation of how it happened. Human
culture was something completely new in the history of the world,
and has evolved in a unique way. Darwin's theory of evolution can
tell us nothing at all about this very strange process, that went
far beyond any mundane struggle for physical survival by 'naked
apes'. The picture of Stonehenge, built with enormous labour for no
material reward, illustrates one of the central themes of this book
- the fundamental importance of the human imagination to the
development of science, that made possible the modern mastery of
nature.
When The Konso of Ethiopia was first published in 1972, the
American Anthropologist described it as 'a work which is destined
to become a classic'. The Konso are one of the most important
peoples of East Africa, and the author was able to revisit them in
1997. As a result he discovered large amounts of entirely new
material, and has been able to produce a completely revised edition
that takes account of all the research on the Konso of the last
thirty-five years. The result is the definitive account of a truly
fascinating people, whose traditional culture is fast disappearing.
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