Animal Evolution

From the cup of coffee that jump-starts the day to dangerously addictive drugs, the recreational use of plants with psychoactive properties has a long history among humans. But, as with many things, it turns out that other animals got there first. From parrots to primates, consuming medicinal chemicals is an instinctive behavior that helps countless organisms fight infection and treat disease. But the similarities don't end there: Like us, many creatures also consume substances that have no apparent benefit...except for inducing intoxication.

An exquisite exploration of the power of flowers, placing them at the center of the story of how evolution created the world we know today We live on a floral planet, yet flowers don’t get the credit they deserve. We admire them for their aesthetics, not their power. In this exquisite...

Revealing little-known facts about the fight to teach evolution in schools, this riveting account of the dramatic 1925 Scopes Trial (aka “the Monkey Trial”) speaks directly to today’s fights over what students learn, the tension between science and religion, the influence of the media on...

Ihre Fans wird es nicht überraschen: Die Katze zählt nicht nur zu den beliebtesten Haustieren– sie hat sich seit ihren Ursprüngen in Afrika auch zu einer der erfolgreichsten Spezies auf dem Planeten entwickelt. Jonathan B. Losos, vielfach ausgezeichneter Evolutionsbiologe und begeisterter Katzenbesitzer, erläutert unterhaltsam, was die Wissenschaft über Herkunft und Verhalten der Hauskatze weiß. Neben Genomforschung, GPS-Tracking und forensischer Archäologie stützt er sich dabei auch auf Beobachtungen aus dem eigenen Alltag.

Viruses are the world's most abundant life form, and now, when humanity is in the midst of a close encounter with their immense power, perhaps the most feared. But do we understand viruses? Possibly the most enigmatic of living things, they are sometimes not considered a life form at all...

A leading anthrozoologist and the bestselling author of Dog Sense and Cat Sense explains why we are so drawn to pets. Historically, we relied on our pets to herd livestock, guard homes, and catch pests. But most of us don't need animals to do these things anymore. Pets have never been less...

“A remarkable combination of biology, genetics, zoology, evolutionary psychology and philosophy.” —Richard Powers, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Overstory “A brilliant, thought-provoking book.” —Matt Haig, New York Times bestselling author of The Midnight Library A...

Darwin developed the theory of sexual selection to explain why the animal world abounds in stunning beauty, from the brilliant colors of butterflies and fishes to the songs of birds and frogs. He argued that animals have "a taste for the beautiful" that drives their potential mates to evolve features that make them more sexually attractive and reproductively successful. But if Darwin explained why sexual beauty evolved in animals, he struggled to understand how.

‘What is it like to be a bat?’, the philosopher Thomas Nagel famously asked concerning consciousness. For biologist Martin Stevens, the question forms the starting point of an exploration of animal senses. In this enthralling account, we learn not only of the wonder of animal senses, but how they work and how scientists go about investigating them. And, throughout, we consider how these senses came to be.

Dog training is full of differing opinions, myths, and old wives' tales. With so much conflicting information, how do you know what theory is the best for training your dog? The Evolution of Dog Training details how to teach your dog, one step at a time, without causing your dog pain or fear. It carefully explains how training with choke chains started and why trainers are now using clickers instead. You'll also learn what current research and scientific studies tell us about how dogs learn, making it easier to a turn your beloved pet into a well-behaved dog.

How did human minds become so different from those of other animals? What accounts for our capacity to understand the way the physical world works, to think ourselves into the minds of others, to gossip, read, tell stories about the past, and imagine the future? These questions are not new: they have been debated by philosophers, psychologists, anthropologists, evolutionists, and neurobiologists over the course of centuries. One explanation widely accepted today is that humans have special cognitive instincts.

While we joke that men are from Mars and women are from Venus, our gender differences can't compare to those of other animals. For instance: the male garden spider spontaneously dies after mating with a female more than fifty times his size. Female cichlids must guard their eggs and larvae--even from the hungry appetites of their own partners. And male blanket octopuses employ a copulatory arm longer than their own bodies to mate with females that outweigh them by four orders of magnitude. Why do these gender gulfs exist?

The story of evolution as you’ve never heard it before. What’s the easiest way to tell species apart? Check their genitals. Researching private parts was long considered taboo, but scientists are now beginning to understand that the wild diversity of sex organs across species can tell us a lot about evolution. Menno Schilthuizen invites listeners to join him as he uncovers the ways the shapes and functions of genitalia have been molded by complex Darwinian struggles.

In 1955, on a visit to South Africa, Robert Ardrey became aware of the growing evidence that man had evolved on the African continent from carnivorous, predatory stock - ones who had also, long before man, achieved the use of weapons. A dramatist, Ardrey's interest in the African discoveries sprang less from purely scientific grounds than from the radical new light they cast on the eternal question: Why do we behave as we do? Are we naturally inclined towards war and weapons?

There are two supreme predators on the planet with the most complex brains in nature: humans and orcas. In the 20th century alone, one of these animals killed 200 million members of its own species, the other killed none. Jeffrey Masson’s fascinating new book begins here: There is something different about us. In Beasts he demonstrates that the violence we perceive in the "wild" is mostly a matter of projection. We link the basest human behavior to animals, to "beasts" ("he behaved no better than a beast"), and claim the high ground for our species.

Through the fascinating discoveries made by ethologists, anthropologists, and archeologists, Serra deciphers our behaviors in light of their animal roots and demystifies ideas about how different animals are from humans. She compares human behaviors with those exhibited by other species in chapters spanning topics as varied as sex, morality, emotions, intelligence, and family.

A wildlife expert explores what science tells us about animals as unique individuals and why animal personality matters for the human-animal bond and for adaptation in nature. Why are some cats cuddly and others standoffish? Why are some dogs adventuresome, others homebodies? As any pet owner...

We often consider dogs to be our enduring sidekicks, but the truth is domestic pigs have played a role in our lives for nearly as long. Pigs are highly social and smart. They like to play. They’re inventive, crafty and belligerent - and incredibly single-minded. Ultimately, we have far more in common with these creatures than we like to admit. Here is a charming ode to one of the most common yet surprisingly intelligent animals populating our landscapes.

This book takes an innovative look at the circle of life including animals, dinosaurs, stars, volcanoes, and even YOU. Shoot back in time 4.5 billion years to see how planet Earth was formed and then leap into the future to see what happens when stars die. Everything has a beginning and an end...

Beim Hören wirst Du verstehen, warum Dinos noch leben und was das mit der Geschichte der Erde zu tun hat. Mit Evolutionstheorie, dem Wettbewerb der Tiere und der Tatsache, dass wir besser überleben, wenn wir sehr, sehr unterschiedlich sind. Du wirst verstehen: Diese scheinbar kleine Frage ist mit der Klimakatastrophe, der Gut-Schlecht-Gleichzeitigkeit, Massensterben, T-rex-Klettergerüsten und Insel-Kiwis verbunden. Und mit uns. Mit der Frage, wie wir leben wollen. Und wie wir mit unserer Menschen-Magie die Welt verändern.