Excellent overall treatment of the world between the end of the dinosaurs and the beginning of the human species. Fine evocation of the contexts of evolution and of the creatures that faced the variety of demands presented by the natural world through time.
'Steve Brusatte, the author of The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs, brings mammals out from the shadow of their more showy predecessors in a beautifully written book that . . . makes the case for them as creatures who are just as engaging as dinosaurs.' - The Sunday Times, 'Best Books For Summer'
The passing of the age of the dinosaurs allowed mammals to become ascendant. But mammals have a much deeper history. They - or, more precisely, we - originated around the same time as the dinosaurs, over 200 million years ago; mammal roots lie even further back,…
The author of such acclaimed books as Hero With a Thousand Faces and The Power of Myth discusses the primitive roots of mythology, examining them in light of the most recent discoveries in archaeology, anthropology, and psychology
What does the breathtakingly beautiful art depicted on the walls of caves such as Lascaux, Chauvet and Altamira, tell us about the nature of the ancestral mind? How did these images spring, seemingly from nowhere into the human story?
The Mind in the Cave puts forward the most plausible explanation yet proposed for the origins of image-making and art. This is a masterful piece of detective work, casting light on the darkest mysteries of our earliest ancestors and on the nature of our own consciousness and experience.
Much of what we think we know may not be true at all.
Based on decades of research and casework in the criminal justice system, forensic cognitive scientist Professor Matthew J. Sharps takes us on a tour of the human mind from a forensic view, a view which incorporates but goes far beyond the critical and sometimes hazardous demands of law enforcement and the world of criminal justice. This is a tour of extraordinary extremes: Cultists commit suicide, or homicide. Perfectly rational people encounter UFOs, Space Aliens, giant pterodactyls, or even attacking enemy aircraft where none exist at all. Great explorers find mermaids and unicorns that just aren’t there, and equally great scientists find artifacts and architecture created by nonexistent alien civilizations on lifeless planets.
Our minds allow us to misinterpret reality and to believe in our own misinterpretations, and to see and believe in things that don’t exist at all. These processes are ubiquitous in the world of criminal justice, including eyewitness memory and the interpretation of officer-involved shootings; but they also extend to beliefs and sightings in the paranormal world, ranging from UFOs and Space Aliens to ghosts and Bigfoot. The Forensic View shows us the mental currents and dynamics that operate in all these realms, and how the same processes work in the sciences as well, even influencing our perception and interpretation of mental illness. These processes are all perfectly normal functions of the mind; but they can create havoc in our perceptions, our beliefs, and our understanding of the very fabric of reality itself.
Human mental processes can be bizarre, but they can be understood. Dr. Sharps explains how a forensic view of our minds can help us to understand these perceptions and beliefs, real and unreal, and to avoid seeing and believing in things that aren't really there at all. This book is for anyone interested in the distinction between external reality and what our minds may do to that reality. It’s critically important to know what’s real, what isn’t, and what we think is real when in fact we made it up.
A Forensic View can guide us to a better understanding of our minds and our realities.
