The Agile Gene: How Nature Turns on Nurture - Softcover

Ridley, Matt

Softcover

ISBN 10: 006000679X ISBN 13: 9780060006792

Publisher: Harper Perennial, 2004

Synopsis

Armed with extraordinary new discoveries about our genes, acclaimed science writer Matt Ridley turns his attention to the nature-versus-nurture debate in a thoughtful book about the roots of human behavior.

Ridley recounts the hundred years' war between the partisans of nature and nurture to explain how this paradoxical creature, the human being, can be simultaneously free-willed and motivated by instinct and culture. With the decoding of the human genome, we now know that genes not only predetermine the broad structure of the brain, they also absorb formative experiences, react to social cues, and even run memory. They are consequences as well as causes of the will.

About this title

Review:

Nature Via Nurture follows on from Matt Ridley's bestselling Genome. He takes on a centuries-old question: is it nature or nurture that makes us who we are? Ridley asserts that the question itself is a "false dichotomy". Using copious examples of human and animal behaviour, he presents the notion that our environment affects the way our genes express themselves.

Ridley writes that the switches controlling our 30,000 or so genes not only form the structures of our brains but do so in such a way as to cue off the outside environment in a tidy feedback loop of body and behaviour. In fact, it seems clear that we have genetic "thermostats" that are turned up and down by environmental factors. He challenges both scientific and folk concepts, from assumptions of what's malleable in a person to sociobiological theories based solely on the "selfish gene".

Ridley's proof is in the pudding for such touchy subjects as monogamy, aggression, and parenting, which we now understand have some genetic controls. Nevertheless, "the more we understand both our genes and our instincts, the less inevitable they seem". A consummate populariser of science, Ridley once again provides a perfect mix of history, genetics, and sociology for readers hungry to understand the implications of the human genome sequence. --Therese Littleton, Amazon.com

Review:

"Terrific popular science." -- Booklist (starred review)

"Thoughtful and entertaining." -- Salon.com

Thoughtful and entertaining. --Salon.com

"Terrific popular science."--Booklist (starred review)

"Fascinating and important information from the world of science."--New York Times Book Review

"Thoughtful and entertaining."--Salon.com

"Ridley is simply one of the best science writers in the business."--Hartford Courant

"NATURE VIA NURTURE proposes a new way of looking at an ongoing debate."--Washington Post Book World

An engrossing study of what makes us who we are conveyed with insight and style. --Publishers Weekly (starred review)"

Terrific popular science. --Booklist (starred review)"

About this edition

• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 006000679X
• ISBN 13: 9780060006792
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 352