The Evolution of Violence

The Evolution of Violence
Author: Todd K. Shackelford
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 250
Release: 2013-11-09
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 1461493145

This volume is an interdisciplinary exploration of our understanding of the causes and consequences of violence. Represented in its chapters are noted scholars from a variety of fields including psychology, anthropology, law, and literature. The contributions reflect a broad scope of inquiry and diverse levels of analysis. With an underlying evolutionary theme each of the contributors invoke their separate areas of expertise, offering empirical and theoretical insights to this complex subject. The multi-faceted aspect of the book is meant to engender new perspectives that will synthesize current knowledge and lead to a more nuanced understanding of an ever timely issue in human behavior. Of additional interest, is a foreword written by world renowned psychologist, Steven Pinker, and an afterword by noted evolutionary scholar, Richard Dawkins.

The Better Angels of Our Nature

The Better Angels of Our Nature
Author: Steven Pinker
Publisher: Penguin Books
Total Pages: 834
Release: 2012-09-25
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0143122010

Faced with the ceaseless stream of news about war, crime, and terrorism, one could easily think this is the most violent age ever seen. Yet as bestselling author Pinker shows in this startling and engaging new work, just the opposite is true.

The Goodness Paradox

The Goodness Paradox
Author: Richard Wrangham
Publisher: Vintage
Total Pages: 402
Release: 2019-01-29
Genre: Science
ISBN: 1101870915

“A fascinating new analysis of human violence, filled with fresh ideas and gripping evidence from our primate cousins, historical forebears, and contemporary neighbors.” —Steven Pinker, author of The Better Angels of Our Nature We Homo sapiens can be the nicest of species and also the nastiest. What occurred during human evolution to account for this paradox? What are the two kinds of aggression that primates are prone to, and why did each evolve separately? How does the intensity of violence among humans compare with the aggressive behavior of other primates? How did humans domesticate themselves? And how were the acquisition of language and the practice of capital punishment determining factors in the rise of culture and civilization? Authoritative, provocative, and engaging, The Goodness Paradox offers a startlingly original theory of how, in the last 250 million years, humankind became an increasingly peaceful species in daily interactions even as its capacity for coolly planned and devastating violence remains undiminished. In tracing the evolutionary histories of reactive and proactive aggression, biological anthropologist Richard Wrangham forcefully and persuasively argues for the necessity of social tolerance and the control of savage divisiveness still haunting us today.

Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels

Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels
Author: Ian Morris
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 394
Release: 2017-05-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 0691175896

The best-selling author of Why the West Rules—for Now examines the evolution and future of human values Most people in the world today think democracy and gender equality are good, and that violence and wealth inequality are bad. But most people who lived during the 10,000 years before the nineteenth century thought just the opposite. Drawing on archaeology, anthropology, biology, and history, Ian Morris explains why. Fundamental long-term changes in values, Morris argues, are driven by the most basic force of all: energy. Humans have found three main ways to get the energy they need—from foraging, farming, and fossil fuels. Each energy source sets strict limits on what kinds of societies can succeed, and each kind of society rewards specific values. But if our fossil-fuel world favors democratic, open societies, the ongoing revolution in energy capture means that our most cherished values are very likely to turn out not to be useful any more. Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels offers a compelling new argument about the evolution of human values, one that has far-reaching implications for how we understand the past—and for what might happen next. Originating as the Tanner Lectures delivered at Princeton University, the book includes challenging responses by classicist Richard Seaford, historian of China Jonathan Spence, philosopher Christine Korsgaard, and novelist Margaret Atwood.

Violence and Social Orders

Violence and Social Orders
Author: Douglass Cecil North
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 345
Release: 2009-02-26
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0521761735

This book integrates the problem of violence into a larger framework, showing how economic and political behavior are closely linked.

Economic Development Strategies and the Evolution of Violence in Latin America

Economic Development Strategies and the Evolution of Violence in Latin America
Author: W. Ascher
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2016-01-19
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1137272694

Economic Development Strategies and the Evolution of Violence in Latin America explores the links between Latin American governments' economic policies and the nature and dynamics of inter-group violence. Based on the patterns of ten countries, the contributions to this volume trace the remarkable transformation from open ideological conflict to the explosion of social (seemingly apolitical) violence, the upsurge of urban crime, and the confrontations over natural resources and drugs across the region spanning from Mexico to Argentina. The variations in economic success and in conflict prevention and transformation can guide policymakers, development professionals, and activists committed to conflict-sensitive development.

Demonic Males

Demonic Males
Author: Richard W. Wrangham
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Total Pages: 372
Release: 1996
Genre: Nature
ISBN: 9780395877432

Whatever their virtues, men are more violent than women. Why do men kill, rape, and wage war, and what can be done about it? Drawing on the latest discoveries about human evolution and about our closest living relatives, the great apes, "Demonic Males" offers some startling new answers to these questions.

Violence in Europe

Violence in Europe
Author: Sophie Body-Gendrot
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 254
Release: 2008-01-08
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0387745084

Violence in Early Modern Europe 1500-1800

Violence in Early Modern Europe 1500-1800
Author: Julius R. Ruff
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2001-10-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780521598941

A broad-ranging survey of violence in western Europe from the Reformation to the French Revolution. Julius Ruff summarises a huge body of research and provides readers with a clear, accessible, and engaging introduction to the topic of violence in early modern Europe. His book, enriched with fascinating illustrations, underlines the fact that modern preoccupations with the problem of violence are not unique, and that late medieval and early modern European societies produced levels of violence that may have exceeded those in the most violent modern inner-city neighbourhoods. Julius Ruff examines the role of the emerging state in controlling violence; the roots and forms of the period's widespread interpersonal violence; violence and its impact on women; infanticide; and rioting. This book, in the successful textbook series New Approaches to European History, will be of great value to students of European history, criminal justice sciences, and anthropology.