Why Is Sex Fun
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Publicado: 27 de febrero de 2013
Why is Sex Fun
Jared Diamond
"Why is Sex Fun? is the best book on the subject I've read. This lively exploration of our sexual heritage offers fascinating reading for anyone curious about why lovers do what they do." -Diane Ackerman, author of A Natural History of the Senses "I am so jealous of Jared Diamond, for he writes with such an elegant simplicity! Here, he takes a loot at theendlessly fascinating topic of human sexuality His convincing arguments should persuade xm that there are very special reasons why we evolved to use sex for recreation as well as for procreatim whereas most other mammals are denied that pleasure.... It is a great little book, by one of the worlds foremost biological philosophers." -ROGER Shohl Professor of Physiology Monash University Australia "Onceagain Jared Diamond provides us with answers to questions we may never have stopped to ask, but wish we had. In this long essay Diamond explains that recreational sex, while not unique to humans, is a rare behavior in the animal world. Above all, we learn, sexual activity divorced fron procreation is not only part of what it is to be human, but the very crux of our evolutionary success." -BettyaxnKevles. author of Naked to the Bonn Medical Imaging in the Twentieth Centnty
The Science Masters Series is a global publishing vonture consisting of original science books written by leading scientists and published by a worldwide team of twenty-six publishers assembled by John Brockman. The series was conceived by Anthony Cheetham of Orion Publishers and John Brockman of Brockman Inc., a NewYork literary agency, and developed in coordination with Basic Books.
The Science Masters name and marks are owned by and licensed to the publisher by Brockman Inc.
Copyright © 1997 by Jared Diamond.
Published by Basic Books, A Member of the Perseus Books Group.
All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used in any manner whatsoever withoutwritten permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, address Basic Books, 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY 10022-5299.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Diamond, Jared M.
Why is sex fun? : the evolution of human sexuality / by Jared Diamond. 1st ed. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 0-465-03127-7 (cloth) ISBN0-465-03126-9 (paper)
To Marie, My best friend, coparent, lover, and wife
CONTENTS Preface 1 The Animal with the Weirdest Sex Life 2 The Battle of the Sexes 3 Why Don't Men Breast-feed Their Babies? The Non-Evolution of Male Lactation 4 Wrong Time for Love: The Evolution of Recreational Sex 5 What Are Men Good For? The Evolution of Men's Roles 6 Making More by Making Less: The Evolution of FemaleMenopause 7 Truth in Advertising: The Evolution of Body Signals
PREFACE The subject of sex preoccupies us. It's the source of our most intense pleasures. Often it's also the cause of misery, much of which arises from built-in conflicts between the evolved roles of women and men. This book is a speculative account of how human sexuality came to be the way it now is. Most of us don't realize howunusual human sexual practices are, compared to those of all other living animals. Scientists infer that the sex life of even our recent apelike ancestors was very different from ours today. Some distinctive evolutionary forces must have operated on our ancestors to make us different. What were those forces, and what really is so bizarre about us? Understanding how our sexuality evolved isfascinating not only in its own right but also in order to understand our other distinctively human features. Those features include our culture, speech, parent-child relations, and mastery of complex tools. While paleontologists usually attribute the evolution of these features to our attainment of large brains and upright posture, I argue that our bizarre sexuality was equally essential for their...
Jared Diamond
"Why is Sex Fun? is the best book on the subject I've read. This lively exploration of our sexual heritage offers fascinating reading for anyone curious about why lovers do what they do." -Diane Ackerman, author of A Natural History of the Senses "I am so jealous of Jared Diamond, for he writes with such an elegant simplicity! Here, he takes a loot at theendlessly fascinating topic of human sexuality His convincing arguments should persuade xm that there are very special reasons why we evolved to use sex for recreation as well as for procreatim whereas most other mammals are denied that pleasure.... It is a great little book, by one of the worlds foremost biological philosophers." -ROGER Shohl Professor of Physiology Monash University Australia "Onceagain Jared Diamond provides us with answers to questions we may never have stopped to ask, but wish we had. In this long essay Diamond explains that recreational sex, while not unique to humans, is a rare behavior in the animal world. Above all, we learn, sexual activity divorced fron procreation is not only part of what it is to be human, but the very crux of our evolutionary success." -BettyaxnKevles. author of Naked to the Bonn Medical Imaging in the Twentieth Centnty
The Science Masters Series is a global publishing vonture consisting of original science books written by leading scientists and published by a worldwide team of twenty-six publishers assembled by John Brockman. The series was conceived by Anthony Cheetham of Orion Publishers and John Brockman of Brockman Inc., a NewYork literary agency, and developed in coordination with Basic Books.
The Science Masters name and marks are owned by and licensed to the publisher by Brockman Inc.
Copyright © 1997 by Jared Diamond.
Published by Basic Books, A Member of the Perseus Books Group.
All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used in any manner whatsoever withoutwritten permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, address Basic Books, 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY 10022-5299.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Diamond, Jared M.
Why is sex fun? : the evolution of human sexuality / by Jared Diamond. 1st ed. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 0-465-03127-7 (cloth) ISBN0-465-03126-9 (paper)
To Marie, My best friend, coparent, lover, and wife
CONTENTS Preface 1 The Animal with the Weirdest Sex Life 2 The Battle of the Sexes 3 Why Don't Men Breast-feed Their Babies? The Non-Evolution of Male Lactation 4 Wrong Time for Love: The Evolution of Recreational Sex 5 What Are Men Good For? The Evolution of Men's Roles 6 Making More by Making Less: The Evolution of FemaleMenopause 7 Truth in Advertising: The Evolution of Body Signals
PREFACE The subject of sex preoccupies us. It's the source of our most intense pleasures. Often it's also the cause of misery, much of which arises from built-in conflicts between the evolved roles of women and men. This book is a speculative account of how human sexuality came to be the way it now is. Most of us don't realize howunusual human sexual practices are, compared to those of all other living animals. Scientists infer that the sex life of even our recent apelike ancestors was very different from ours today. Some distinctive evolutionary forces must have operated on our ancestors to make us different. What were those forces, and what really is so bizarre about us? Understanding how our sexuality evolved isfascinating not only in its own right but also in order to understand our other distinctively human features. Those features include our culture, speech, parent-child relations, and mastery of complex tools. While paleontologists usually attribute the evolution of these features to our attainment of large brains and upright posture, I argue that our bizarre sexuality was equally essential for their...
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