Processes in Human Evolution: The journey from early hominins to Neanderthals and modern humans

I am a physician that has had an itch for paleoanthropology since I was young. I rebound the bug, and started by reading books by Lee Berger, Jeremy Desilva, Svante Paabo, and more. So much has been added to the field that I felt I needed more than books meant for a broad audience. The journals for paleoanthropology can be frustrating to get, so I looked for a text.I read a bunch of texts bc that is sometimes the best thing to learn about a subject. I love that this book guess the primary papers throughout so it is easier to look up things I have questions on. Having read an undergraduate-level text prior to this, that was surely missed.What I really love is how they present different arguments and make their opinion clear. I think this adds weight while leaving us open to interpret differently.The organization is top notch. What inspired me to write this review was how they made clear an issue before buying where in the text the answer to that issue was put forth. I just greatly appreciate them saying, "this is important... But important for later, but you can skip here if you need an answer now."I find this a top notch book for those with a itch that can only be scratched by learning more.

This book is a completely updated version of Ayala and Cela-Conde's Human Evolution. There are detailed reports on sites, as well as the human fossil remains. The archaeology is also clearly presented and up to date. There is a particular emphasis on the Spanish sites and Neanderthal material. The book is probably most useful as a text for graduate courses. I intend to use it in my graduate human evolution course.

Very good book.Very profound analysis of human evolution .Good and many photos (black & white)and diagrams.I recommend for who likes the subject.

I had felt compelled to update for my benefit, the status of paleoanthropologic knowledge. It was an interest that I had initiated, literally, by attending a lecture given by Richard Leakey some time ago. This text served that purpose quite admirably in a suitably detailed and up-to-date fashion (i.e. for my tastes). Further, the preface had noted, "a distinctively different approach taken" as contrasted with previous editions. That distinction was readily apparent. The various methodologies presented and liberally discussed, i.e., as the existing or possible interpretations of finds, fossils and artifacts, struck me as a useful means of presenting the balance of anthropological data, again, as we currently understand it vis a vis our interpretation(s). The text is written logically and clearly, although a modest academic background in geology, chemistry and/or physics would come in quite handy. It was a pleasure!

I’m a Neanderthal Boy, you’re a Cro-Magnon GirlThis is a clear, thorough and up to date account of our ancestry since we started to come down from the trees. It is very well presented, with lots of boxes, tables and diagrams. Almost all of this stuff has been discovered in my lifetime, and it is wonderful and humbling to see how far we have come. Still lots of gaps and questions of course, and the concept of a species does not stand up very well given such wide variations and interbreeding, and the tendency of the next species to keep using the old technology.Most enlightening of all are the Neanderthals. They did manage to become a separate species in Europe, they had bigger brains, were stronger, ate lots of meat to fuel their brains, were cold adapted and perhaps had a less suicidal birth canal. For many years, the Just So story had the Neanderthals wiped out by advanced modern man, which never seemed likely to me given these advantages, and the low population densities. It always seemed more likely they would not realise they were different species, and make love not war.Initial DNA results seemed to contradict this, so it was terrific to get the whole genome sequenced and confirm that we Europeans are in fact 3% Neanderthal, and those clever artistic Cro-Magnons were twice as Neanderthal - 6% .The book makes some unconvincing attempts to explain this, ah yes but the Neanderthal brain was the wrong shape. It is simpler to suppose that their European homeland got compressed by the ice sheets, and they were simply overwhelmed and outbred by the sheer numbers of migrants from Africa and the Near East. But I still have them to thank for my big head, big nose, hairiness and fondness for burgers.For a text book it does have a fair number of errors, about one a page. The occasional diagram gets left out or duplicated, and some of the diagrams are too small and grey . But these are minor niggles.

Excellent.

Rather than place in our front porch or side door cupboard, the deliverer left on a table in the back garden. It rained. Fortunately the book was not damaged, only the dust cover. What a stupid place to leave it!!