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Why Beautiful People Have More Daughters: From Dating, Shopping, and Praying to Going to War and Becoming a Billionaire-- Two Evolutionary Psychologists Explain Why We Do What Wedo Paperback – 2 Sept. 2008
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Why are most neurosurgeons male and most kindergarten teachers female? Why aren't there more women on death row? Why do so many male politicians ruin their careers with sex scandals? Why and how do we really fall in love? This engaging book uses the latest research from the field of evolutionary psychology to shed light on why we do the things we do?from life plans to everyday decisions. With a healthy disregard for political correctness, Miller and Kanazawa reexamine the fact that our brains and bodies are hardwired to carry out an evolutionary mission? an inescapable human nature that actually stopped evolving about 10,000 years ago.
- Print length272 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherTarcherperigee
- Publication date2 Sept. 2008
- Dimensions14.07 x 1.78 x 20.98 cm
- ISBN-100399534539
- ISBN-13978-0399534539
Product description
Review
?"Seattle Post-Intelligencer"
?A rollicking bit of pop science.?
?"Los Angeles Times"
?An exuberant, accessible, exhilarating, intellectually aerobic workout.?
?David P. Barash, author of "Madame Bovary's Ovaries"
A powerful jump-starter for conversations about the nature of being human.
"Seattle Post-Intelligencer"
A rollicking bit of pop science.
"Los Angeles Times"
An exuberant, accessible, exhilarating, intellectually aerobic workout.
David P. Barash, author of "Madame Bovary s Ovaries"
aA powerful jump-starter for conversations about the nature of being human.a
a"Seattle Post-Intelligencer"
aA rollicking bit of pop science.a
a"Los Angeles Times"
aAn exuberant, accessible, exhilarating, intellectually aerobic workout.a
aDavid P. Barash, author of "Madame Bovaryas Ovaries"
That mouthful of a title says it all. According to Kanazawa, a media-savvy researcher whose studies of "beautiful people" have been covered by the BBC and the New York Times, and the late Miller, a professor of social psychology, evolutionary psychology explains almost everything about human behavior. Proponents of what they call "the Standard Social Science Model" believe that the human mind is exempt from biological pressures, while evolutionary psychologists hold that people are an animal species driven by animal needs. The authors suggest that human evolution stopped when agriculture began changing the world much faster than the world could change us, and now 10,000-year-old impulses to find the right mate and produce healthy offspring control nearly every aspect of our existence, from choosing jobs to religious belief. This accessible book opens the youthful field of evolutionary psychology wide for examination, with results often as disturbing as they are fascinating. ("Publishers Weekly")
About the Author
Satoshi Kanazawa is a British-American evolutionary psychologist who is currently a reader in management at the London School of Economics. He is the coauthor, with Alan Miller, of Why Beautiful People Have More Daughters: From Dating, Shopping, and Praying to Going to War and Becoming a Billionaire--Two Evolutionary Psychologists Explain Why We Do What We Do; Why Men Gamble and Women Buy Shoes: How Evolution Shaped the Way We Behave; and Order by Accident: The Origins and Consequences of Conformity in Contemporary Japan.
Product details
- Publisher : Tarcherperigee; Reprint edition (2 Sept. 2008)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 272 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0399534539
- ISBN-13 : 978-0399534539
- Dimensions : 14.07 x 1.78 x 20.98 cm
- Best Sellers Rank: 174,421 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- 157 in Evolutionary Psychology
- 6,260 in Higher Education of Biological Sciences
- 23,776 in Biographies & Memoirs (Books)
- Customer reviews:
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understand why we do the things we do
However, book was received in very bad shape, scraped
The book is organized so that you can skip from chapter to chapter or read randomly; however, the little positive achieved thus is unfortunately more than compensated by very noticeable repetition all over the book. (that's why 4 stars not 5)
Anybody who is capable of thinking will revel in the many, many wonders exposed by both Miller and the late Satoshi Kanazawa's most impressive work on evolutionary psychology. Actually, just writing that term, evolutionary psychology, will sound alarm bells in some, but it really shouldn't: you are here in for an instantly fascinating, and always easily accessible read. There are no generalizations here, because this book is very carefully footnoted with extensive referencing throughout.
Yet it's still a book for everyone of the few of we who enjoy thinking for thinking's sake (and I'm sure you know what I mean in saying that!).
Buy this book and learn something about how the world we know is not exactly the world we think we know. And more importantly, why!?
Because this is one of the most interesting psychology books I've ever read, I most surely give it an unquestionable 5/5
PS if you want to believe anyone who gave it less than 5/5, just read their other reviews for all the reasons why they're so very blissfully mistaken. 'Nuff said...
Top reviews from other countries
The best thing about this work is that it's so easy to read. The language is perfectly understandable for the average literate American adult. I recommend reading each chapter in order, but you don't have to. Most of the chapters are self-contained units and Kanazawa reviews key concepts from time to time throughout.
Most of the book deals with the central concerns of evolutionary psychology, namely dating, mating, relations between the sexes, and the evolutionary basis for human behavior. So if you're uncomfortable with this topic, then obviously this book won't be for you. Also be aware that this book was written during the peak "War on Terror" years during the mid-2000s, and so some of the political references may seem outdated for readers in the 2020s. (This is such a minor issue, but if you're going to write a review you have to let people know what to expect.) I found literally every page of it to be fascinating regardless, and I plan to purchase other works by Kanazawa soon.
I highly recommend this amazing book