The Science of Human Evolution: Getting it Right

✍ Scribed by John H. Langdon (auth.)

• Publisher: Springer International Publishing
• Year: 2016
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 229
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This textbook provides a collection of case studies in paleoanthropology demonstrating the method and limitations of science. These cases introduce the reader to various problems and illustrate how they have been addressed historically. The various topics selected represent important corrections in the field, some critical breakthroughs, models of good reasoning and experimental design, and important ideas emerging from normal science.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter....Pages i-xxi
Case Study 1. The Darwinian Paradigm: An Evolving World View....Pages 1-8
Case Study 2. Proving Prehistory: William Pengelly and Scientific Excavation....Pages 9-15
Case Study 3. Testing Predictions: Eugene Dubois and the Missing Link....Pages 17-23
Case Study 4. Self-Correcting Science: The Piltdown Forgery....Pages 25-35
Case Study 5. Checking the Time: Geological Dating at Olduvai Gorge....Pages 37-42
Case Study 6. Quantifying Evolution: Morris Goodman and Molecular Phylogeny....Pages 43-49
Case Study 7. Reinterpreting Ramapithecus: Reconciling Fossils and Molecules....Pages 51-58
Case Study 8. Taming the Killer Ape: The Science of Taphonomy....Pages 59-65
Case Study 9. Reading the Bones (1): Recognizing Bipedalism....Pages 67-73
Case Study 10. Reading the Bones (2): Sizing Up the Ancestors....Pages 75-81
Case Study 11. The Habilis Workbench: Experimental Archaeology....Pages 83-90
Case Study 12. Hunting for Predators: The Scavenging Hypothesis....Pages 91-97
Case Study 13. Climate Change in the Pliocene: Environment and Human Origins....Pages 99-108
Case Study 14. Free Range Homo: Modernizing the Body at Dmanisi....Pages 109-115
Case Study 15. Reading the Bones (3): Tracking Life History at Nariokotome....Pages 117-122
Case Study 16. Democratizing Homo naledi: A New Model for Fossil Hominin Studies....Pages 123-132
Case Study 17. A Curious Isolation: The Hobbits of Flores....Pages 133-140
Case Study 18. Neanderthals in the Mirror: Imagining our Relatives....Pages 141-149
Case Study 19. Leaving Africa: Mitochondrial Eve....Pages 151-158
Case Study 20. The Neanderthal Problem: Neighbors and Relatives on Mt. Carmel....Pages 159-166
Case Study 21. Chasing Smaller Game: The Archaeology of Modernity....Pages 167-174
Case Study 22. The Cutting Edge of Science: Kissing Cousins Revealed Through Ancient DNA....Pages 175-182
Case Study 23. Is Humanity Sustainable? Tracking the Source of our Ecological Uniqueness....Pages 183-194
Case Study 24. The Unknowable Biped: Questions We Cannot Answer....Pages 195-202
Case Study 25. Parallel Paradigms: Umbrella Hypotheses and Aquatic Apes....Pages 203-208
Case Study 26. What Science Is: A Cultural and Legal Challenge....Pages 209-216
Back Matter....Pages 217-220

✦ Subjects

Evolutionary Biology;Biological Anthropology;Animal Anatomy / Morphology / Histology;History of Science;Archaeology;Developmental Biology