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Product Description
Dr. Carl Sagan takes us on a great reading adventure, offering his vivid and startling insight into the brain of man and beast, the origin of human intelligence, the function of our most haunting legends--and their amazing links to recent discoveries.
"A history of the human brain from the big bang, fifteen billion years ago, to the day before yesterday...It's a delight."
THE NEW YORK TIMES
"A history of the human brain from the big bang, fifteen billion years ago, to the day before yesterday...It's a delight."
THE NEW YORK TIMES
Ingram
The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Broca's Brain and Cosmos takes us on a powerful and compelling voyage to the inner space between our ears, offering his vivid insight into the brain of man and beast, the origins of human intelligence, the function of our most haunting legends--and their amazing links to recent discoveries. Illustrations and photos.
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First Sentence
THE WORLD is very old, and human beings are very young. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
THE WORLD is very old, and human beings are very young. Read the first page
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Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good but overreaching,
By A Customer
This review is from: Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence (Mass Market Paperback)
This book reveals many facinating new discoveries about the human brain. At the time of it's writing (1977) brain research was in a ferment. Many of the discoveries of that time still stand. Sagan's use of the english language makes it easy to read, and sometimes too easy. The reader might miss a key point.The problem is Sagan's desire to turn recent brain science into a simplistic attempt to explain the origin of myth and religious feeling. This is in line with Sagan's own views on religion. Sagan carefully uses speculative language, which means he stands behind nothing in the book. Let the reader beware that Sagan has a philosophy to sell as well as science.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Turn your Thinking about Thinking Upsidedown.,
By
This review is from: Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence (Mass Market Paperback)
I had certainly heard of Carl Sagan, but only in terms of cosmology. I had no idea that he wrote extensively on the field of evolutionary biology-stimulated by his wife, the biologist Ann Druyan. My field is not science, so The Dragon's of Eden was my first encounter with the idea of the tripartite brain. The idea does not originate with Sagan, as he himself points out, but this slender volume makes the idea quite assessable for the lay person and, more importantly, it creatively explores the idea's possible implications. Although I read this book years ago, I have thought of it several times a week since then, as I speculate upon some of the biological causes of human behavior. Newer models of the brain have already proved some of the basic ideas in this book as a bit oversimplified, but if you are looking for an introduction to speculating about how the brain's evolution may shape human behaviors, this is great place to start. I found the book a "mind blower"-and I always pick it up used when I see it to give to friends. Prepare to have your perception of perception itself turned upside down.
5.0 out of 5 stars
In a league of his own,
By Daniel Grossberg (Louisville, KY United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence (Mass Market Paperback)
Carl Sagan is one of the select few prolific non-fiction writers who can manage to create a masterpiece each time. While much of _Dragons of Eden_ is dated, the book was way ahead of its time and probably remains on the cutting edge of theory in the evolution of human intellegence (at least in the popular realm).Those areas in which the book is clearly a generation old (Sagan predicts that someday computers will have television like interfaces, that regular people may have access to them and that they someday may exist in peoples' homes), are endearing, yet they also exemplify Sagan's foresight and wisdom. Predictions like these, and others (such as the then-absurd notion that genetic engineering may someday become science fact), are what sets him apart. As a scientist, he is a skeptic in the purest sense, but that doesn't mean he lost his imagination and ambition. He was not a cynic. I recommend this book to just about anyone who is a Sagan fan. However, it isn't his best work. I would certainly place either _The Demon Haunted World_ and _Billions and Billions_ above this.
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