PDF Download Origins of the Modern Mind: Three Stages in the Evolution of Culture and Cognition, by Merlin Donald
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Origins of the Modern Mind: Three Stages in the Evolution of Culture and Cognition, by Merlin Donald
PDF Download Origins of the Modern Mind: Three Stages in the Evolution of Culture and Cognition, by Merlin Donald
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From Kirkus Reviews
``The modern era, if it can be reduced to any single dimension, is especially characterized by its obsession with symbols and their management.'' So says Donald (Psychology/Queen's Univ., Kingston, Ontario), echoing the philosopher Ernst Cassirer a generation ago--with a difference. Whereas countless philosophers since Aristotle have attempted to define what is quintessentially human, Donald brings new knowledge of neuropsychology, ethology, and archaeology to propose a tripartite theory of the transition from ape to man. Using the fossil evidence of braincase size and tool-kit remains, Donald concludes that the australopithecines were limited to concrete/episodic minds: bipedal creatures able to benefit from pair-bonding, cooperative hunting, etc., but essentially of a seize-the-moment mentality. The first transition was to a ``mimetic'' culture: the era of Homo erectus in which mankind absorbed and refashioned events to create rituals, crafts, rhythms, dance, and other prelinguistic traditions. This was followed by the evolution to mythic cultures: the result of the acquisition of speech and the invention of symbols. The third transition carried oral speech to reading, writing, and an extended external memory- store seen today in computer technology. This summary, however, does not do justice to Donald's careful analysis of rival theories as well as his mining of the neuroanatomical and neurological literature, presenting, for example, evidence of the distribution of language skills across both hemispheres. He gets high marks, too, for pointing out how often cognitive theories become caught up in the trap of the homunculus--the little man in the brain who presides over all our conscious activities. Needless to say, his theory is open to challenge as well (the relation of mimesis to language; the constant reliance on computer metaphors; and, ultimately, the use of Western tradition as the paradigm of human evolution). Withal, a fine, provocative and absorbing account of what makes humans human. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
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Origins of the Modern Mind is an admirable book...Its author displays throughout an engaging enthusiasm, a fertile imagination and an impressive knowledge of his subject-matter. --Christopher Longuet-Higgins (Times Literary Supplement)A fine, provocative and absorbing account of what makes humans human. (Kirkus Reviews)Nowadays one hears...that hand-held calculators destroy young people's motivation to learn arithmetic. But not to worry, says Merlin Donald, author of this revelatory but demanding history of human consciousness. He welcomes the computer, as well as other forms of electronic storage and manipulation of data and images, including TV, as the highest stage of mental development--and perhaps the final one. --John Wilkes (Los Angeles Times)
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Product details
Hardcover: 424 pages
Publisher: Harvard University Press; First Edition edition (September 1, 1991)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0674644832
ISBN-13: 978-0674644830
Product Dimensions:
6.5 x 1.2 x 9.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
Average Customer Review:
4.3 out of 5 stars
22 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#848,247 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
I bought this book to fulfill an assignment for a class I'm taking in a doctor of liberal studies class, but I'd recommend it to anyone interested in the topic of how language was developed. It's like a good detective novel--a real page turner. Humans evolved without a language for many years. Try to imagine that if you can. Then we began to talk and tell stories, but we didn't have anything to read. Unthinkable. Alphabets, of course, are only one way of writing and reading and there are reasons why. Now we are post-lingual. We no longer have to remember everything because we have external symbolic systems to remember them for us. Fascinating stuff for anyone who might have thought we are just talking monkeys.
An important precursor to Donald's key book "A Mind So Rare". This one introduces the theory of human consciousness evolving from three stages of development involving the culture of proto-humans. A masterful idea that is the best theory we have of how our remarkable conceptual abilities have arisen so distinctly from the primates we arose from.
Well written, easy to follow and a fascinating topic. I really enjoyed this book. Might re-read it.
I work as an agricultural business consultant providing a variety of services to individual farms and various agricultural groups around the world. I find it very helpful to better understand why people think the way they do. Some times there is a cultural base for the decisions they make and sometimes there may be genetic predispositions. Donald did a very nice job of covering the state of knowledge on the evolutionary underpinnings of our cognitive processes and how they intertwine with cultures. Even though it is a bit dated it provides a great framework to build on.
excellent!
Excellent! A joy to read.
good read
Provided quality background information about understanding people.
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