Sign-In
Cart
The Eighth Day: Social Evolution as the Self-Organization of Energy
Paperback
ISBN13: 9780292720619
Publisher: Univ Of Texas Pr
Published: Mar 1 1988
Pages: 312
Weight: 1.05
Height: 0.90 Width: 6.12 Depth: 8.96
Language: English
Can human social evolution be described in terms common to other sciences, most specifically, as an energy process? The Eighth Day reflects a conviction that the human trajectory, for all its uniqueness and indeterminism, will never be satisfactorily understood until it is framed in dynamics that are common to all of nature. The problem in doing this, however, lies in ourselves. The major social theories have failed to treat human social evolution as a component of broader natural processes.
The Eighth Day argues that the energy process provides a basis for explaining, comparing, and measuring complex social evolution. Using traditional ecological energy flow studies as background, society is conceived as a self-organization of energy. This perspective enables Adams to analyze society in term of the natural selection of self-organizing energy forms and the trigger processes basic to it. Domestication, civilization, socioeconomic development, and the regulation of contemporary industrial nation-states serve to illustrate the approach. A principal aim is to explore the limitation that energy process imposes on human social evolution as well as to clarify the alternatives that it allows.
Richly informed by contemporary anthropological historicism, sociobiology, and Marxism, The Eighth Day avoids simple reductionism and denies facile ideological categorization. Adams builds on work in nonequilibrium thermodynamics and theoretical biology and brings three decades of his own work to an analysis of human society that demands an extreme materialism in which human thought and action find a central place.
Also in
Anthropology
Playing Oppression: The Legacy of Conquest and Empire in Colonialist Board Games
Jakobsson, Mikael
Flanagan, Mary
Hardcover
The Language of the Face: Stories of Its Uniquely Expressive Features
Gonzalez-Crussi, Frank
Hardcover
Mountain Farmers: Moral Economies of Land & Agricultural Development in Arusha & Meru
Spear, Thomas
Paperback
Family, Fields, and Ancestors: Constancy and Change in China's Social and Economic History, 1550-1949
Eastman, Lloyd E.
Paperback
China Wakes: The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power
Kristof, Nicholas D.
Wudunn, Sheryl
Paperback
The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917-2017
Khalidi, Rashid
Paperback
Hunt, Gather, Parent: What Ancient Cultures Can Teach Us about the Lost Art of Raising Happy, Helpful Little Humans
Doucleff, Michaeleen
Paperback
How to Kill a Language: Power, Resistance, and the Race to Save Our Words
Galer, Sophia Smith
Hardcover
The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins
Tsing, Anna Lowenhaupt
Paperback
This Book May Cause Side Effects: The Curious and Dangerous Power of the Nocebo Effect, Placebo's Evil Twin
Pilcher, Helen
Hardcover
How to Build a Haunted House: The History of a Cultural Obsession
Blackwell Baines, Caitlin
Hardcover
Rule Makers, Rule Breakers: Tight and Loose Cultures and the Secret Signals That Direct Our Lives
Gelfand, Michele
Paperback
Weird Scenes Inside the Canyon: Laurel Canyon, Covert Ops & the Dark Heart of the Hippie Dream
McGowan, David
Paperback
Custodians of Wonder: Ancient Customs, Profound Traditions, and the Last People Keeping Them Alive
Stein, Eliot
Hardcover
A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Human Story Retold Through Our Genes
Rutherford, Adam
Paperback
Explorations: An Open Invitation to Biological Anthropology (Second Edition)
Aguilera, Kelsie
Paperback
Unproven, Unlikely, and Firmly Believed: Why We Fall for History's Most Seductive Conspiracy Theories, and How We Rediscover Reality
Phillips, Tom
Elledge, Jonn
Paperback
The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure
Lukianoff, Greg
Haidt, Jonathan
Paperback
Magic from the Hilltops and Hollers: Folk Witchery, Superstitions, and Healing Practices from Appalachia
Middleton, Leah
Paperback
The Rules That Make Us: How Culture Shapes the Way We Act, Think, Believe, and Buy
Sweet, Oliver
Hardcover
Mothering the Mother: African American Postpartum Traditions, Recipes and Healing
Monroe, Shafia
Paperback
Food of the Gods: The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge a Radical History of Plants, Drugs, and Human Evolution
McKenna, Terence
Paperback
A Brief History of Japan: Samurai, Shogun and Zen: The Extraordinary Story of the Land of the Rising Sun
Clements, Jonathan
Paperback
Hunt, Gather, Parent: What Ancient Cultures Can Teach Us about the Lost Art of Raising Happy, Helpful Little Humans
Doucleff, Michaeleen
Hardcover
Our Moon: How Earth's Celestial Companion Transformed the Planet, Guided Evolution, and Made Us Who We Are
Boyle, Rebecca
Paperback
Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen
McDougall, Christopher
Paperback
Nature and the Mind: The Science of How Nature Improves Cognitive, Physical, and Social Well-Being
Berman, Marc
Paperback
The Martians: The True Story of an Alien Craze That Captured Turn-Of-The-Century America
Baron, David
Hardcover
All the Living and the Dead: From Embalmers to Executioners, an Exploration of the People Who Have Made Death Their Life's Work
Campbell, Hayley
Paperback
Everything All at Once: How to Think Like a Science Guy, Solve Any Problem, and Make a Better World
Nye, Bill
Paperback
Nature and the Mind: The Science of How Nature Improves Cognitive, Physical, and Social Well-Being
Berman, Marc
Hardcover
Coming of Age in Samoa: A Psychological Study of Primitive Youth for Western Civilisation
Mead, Margaret
Paperback
Wilmington's Lie (Winner of the 2021 Pulitzer Prize): The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy
Zucchino, David
Paperback
The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy
Graeber, David
Paperback
Japanese Stories for Language Learners: Bilingual Stories in Japanese and English (Online Audio Included)
Sato, Eriko
McNulty, Anne
Paperback
The Weirdest People in the World: How the West Became Psychologically Peculiar and Particularly Prosperous
Henrich, Joseph
Paperback
Popol Vuh: The Definitive Edition of the Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of
Tedlock, Dennis
Paperback
The Healing Wisdom of Africa: Finding Life Purpose Through Nature, Ritual, and Community
Some, Malidoma Patrice
Paperback
True Hallucinations: Being an Account of the Author's Extraordinary Adventures in the Devil's Paradis
McKenna, Terence
Paperback
The Martians: The True Story of an Alien Craze That Captured Turn-Of-The-Century America
Baron, David
Paperback
Combating Cult Mind Control: The #1 Best-Selling Guide to Protection, Rescue, and Recovery from Destructive Cults
Hassan, Steven
Paperback
The Geography of Thought: How Asians and Westerners Think Differently...and Why
Nisbett, Richard
Paperback
In Praise of Addiction: Or How We Can Learn to Love Dependency in a Damaged World
Roberts, Elizabeth F. S.
Hardcover
Playing Well with Others: Your Field Guide to Discovering, Exploring and Navigating the Kink, Leather and Bdsm Communities
Williams, Mollena
Harrington, Lee
Paperback
Acid Dreams: The Complete Social History of LSD: The CIA, the Sixties, and Beyond
Lee, Martin A.
Shlain, Bruce
Paperback
Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping--Updated and Revised for the Internet, the Global Consumer, and Beyond
Underhill, Paco
Paperback
The Secret of Our Success: How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter
Henrich, Joseph
Paperback
Ra Y El Camino de la Unidad: Un Viaje Hacia La Unicidad, La Luz Y El Despertar de la Conciencia
Gonzalez, Dalia Margarita Aldana
Aldana, Margarita
Paperback
Language and Life on Ocracoke: The Living History of the Brogue
Reaser, Jeffrey
Wolfram, Walt
Gaskill, Candy
Paperback
NKJV Study Bible, Leathersoft, Brown, Comfort Print: The Complete Resource for Studying God's Word
Thomas Nelson
Hardcover
Lost on Planet China: One Man's Attempt to Understand the World's Most Mystifying Nation
Troost, J. Maarten
Paperback
The Essential Questions: Interview Your Family to Uncover Stories and Bridge Generations
Keating, Elizabeth, PH. D.
Hardcover
Finding Your Third Place: Building Happier Communities (and Making Great Friends Along the Way)
Kyte, Richard
Paperback