The Evolution of Beauty

The Evolution of Beauty PDF Author: Richard O. Prum
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0385537220
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 436

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Book Description
A FINALIST FOR THE PULITZER PRIZE NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW, SMITHSONIAN, AND WALL STREET JOURNAL A major reimagining of how evolutionary forces work, revealing how mating preferences—what Darwin termed "the taste for the beautiful"—create the extraordinary range of ornament in the animal world. In the great halls of science, dogma holds that Darwin's theory of natural selection explains every branch on the tree of life: which species thrive, which wither away to extinction, and what features each evolves. But can adaptation by natural selection really account for everything we see in nature? Yale University ornithologist Richard Prum—reviving Darwin's own views—thinks not. Deep in tropical jungles around the world are birds with a dizzying array of appearances and mating displays: Club-winged Manakins who sing with their wings, Great Argus Pheasants who dazzle prospective mates with a four-foot-wide cone of feathers covered in golden 3D spheres, Red-capped Manakins who moonwalk. In thirty years of fieldwork, Prum has seen numerous display traits that seem disconnected from, if not outright contrary to, selection for individual survival. To explain this, he dusts off Darwin's long-neglected theory of sexual selection in which the act of choosing a mate for purely aesthetic reasons—for the mere pleasure of it—is an independent engine of evolutionary change. Mate choice can drive ornamental traits from the constraints of adaptive evolution, allowing them to grow ever more elaborate. It also sets the stakes for sexual conflict, in which the sexual autonomy of the female evolves in response to male sexual control. Most crucially, this framework provides important insights into the evolution of human sexuality, particularly the ways in which female preferences have changed male bodies, and even maleness itself, through evolutionary time. The Evolution of Beauty presents a unique scientific vision for how nature's splendor contributes to a more complete understanding of evolution and of ourselves.

The Evolution of Beauty

The Evolution of Beauty PDF Author: Richard O. Prum
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0385537220
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 436

Get Book Here

Book Description
A FINALIST FOR THE PULITZER PRIZE NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW, SMITHSONIAN, AND WALL STREET JOURNAL A major reimagining of how evolutionary forces work, revealing how mating preferences—what Darwin termed "the taste for the beautiful"—create the extraordinary range of ornament in the animal world. In the great halls of science, dogma holds that Darwin's theory of natural selection explains every branch on the tree of life: which species thrive, which wither away to extinction, and what features each evolves. But can adaptation by natural selection really account for everything we see in nature? Yale University ornithologist Richard Prum—reviving Darwin's own views—thinks not. Deep in tropical jungles around the world are birds with a dizzying array of appearances and mating displays: Club-winged Manakins who sing with their wings, Great Argus Pheasants who dazzle prospective mates with a four-foot-wide cone of feathers covered in golden 3D spheres, Red-capped Manakins who moonwalk. In thirty years of fieldwork, Prum has seen numerous display traits that seem disconnected from, if not outright contrary to, selection for individual survival. To explain this, he dusts off Darwin's long-neglected theory of sexual selection in which the act of choosing a mate for purely aesthetic reasons—for the mere pleasure of it—is an independent engine of evolutionary change. Mate choice can drive ornamental traits from the constraints of adaptive evolution, allowing them to grow ever more elaborate. It also sets the stakes for sexual conflict, in which the sexual autonomy of the female evolves in response to male sexual control. Most crucially, this framework provides important insights into the evolution of human sexuality, particularly the ways in which female preferences have changed male bodies, and even maleness itself, through evolutionary time. The Evolution of Beauty presents a unique scientific vision for how nature's splendor contributes to a more complete understanding of evolution and of ourselves.

Animal Beauty

Animal Beauty PDF Author: Christiane Nusslein-Volhard
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 026203994X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 123

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Book Description
An illustrated exploration of colors and patterns in the animal kingdom, what they communicate, and how they function in the social life of animals. Are animals able to appreciate what humans refer to as “beauty”? The term scarcely ever appears nowadays in a scientific description of living things, but we humans may nonetheless find the colors, patterns, and songs of animals to be beautiful in apparently the same way that we see beauty in works of art. In Animal Beauty, Nobel Prize–winning biologist Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard describes how the colors and patterns displayed by animals arise, what they communicate, and how they function in the social life of animals. Watercolor drawings illustrate these amazing instances of animal beauty. Darwin addressed the topic of ornament in his 1871 book The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex, and did not hesitate to engage with criteria of beauty, convinced that animals experienced color and ornament as attractive and agreeable in the same way that we do, and that the role this played in mate choice pointed to a “sexual selection” distinct from natural selection. Nüsslein-Volhard examines key examples of ornament and sexual selection in the animal kingdom and lays the groundwork for biological aesthetics. Noting that color patterns have not been a research priority—perhaps because they appeared to be nonessential luxuries rather than functional necessities—Nüsslein-Volhard looks at recent scientific developments on the topic. In part because of Nüsslein-Volhard's own research on the zebrafish, it is now possible to decipher the molecular genetic mechanisms that lead to production of colors in animal skin and its appendages and control its pattern and distribution.

Bobbi Brown Beauty Evolution

Bobbi Brown Beauty Evolution PDF Author: Bobbi Brown
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0060088818
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 232

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Book Description
Bobbi Brown, renowned beauty authority and author of two New York Times bestsellers, follows up with her most important book to date, Bobbi Brown Beauty Evolution. A celebration of beauty across the generations, this positive-outlook guide for women of all ages reflects, as Bobbi says, "What happens to us as we make our way through life, and how we can continue making ourselves better." In Bobbi Brown Beauty Evolution, Bobbi shares her candid views of her own beauty odyssey, as well as her formidable makeup expertise, to help women feel good about themselves at every age. Readers from their twenties to their seventies and beyond will experience a new appreciation of themselves through Bobbi's enriching book, and ultimately, even embrace -- yes, embrace -- the aging process. In the engaging, down-to-earth style that's pure Bobbi, she addresses the need-to-know issues we all face at one time or another -- from how to deal with changes in skin to what adjustments in makeup application are really necessary (and appropriate) as we age and everything in between. With more than 300 photographs specially commissioned for this book, Bobbi Brown Beauty Evolution includes the personal, heartfelt thoughts of real women from all walks of life -- all ages (from 20 to 101!), shapes, sizes, and ethnicities -- reflecting on what beauty means to them. Their words serve to underscore Bobbi's message that true beauty isn't something you're blessed with -- "it comes from having confidence and feeling good about who you are."

The Art Instinct

The Art Instinct PDF Author: Denis Dutton
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0199539421
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
The Dinka have a connoisseur's appreciation of the patterns and colours of the markings on their cattle. The Japanese tea ceremony is regarded as a performance art. Some cultures produce carving but no drawing; others specialize in poetry. Yet despite the rich variety of artistic expression to be found across many cultures, we all share a deep sense of aesthetic pleasure. The need to create art of some form is found in every human society.In The Art Instinct, Denis Dutton explores the idea that this need has an evolutionary basis: how the feelings that we all share when we see a wonderful landscape or a beautiful sunset evolved as a useful adaptation in our hunter-gather ancestors, and have been passed on to us today, manifest in our artistic natures. Why do people indulge in displaying their artistic skills? How can we understand artistic genius? Why do we value art, and what is it for? These questions have long been asked by scholars in the humanities and in literature, but this is the first book to consider the biological basis of this deep human need.This sparking and intelligent book looks at these deep and fundamental questions, and combines the science of evolutionary psychology with aesthetics, to shed new light on longstanding questions about the nature of art.

Beauty and the Beasts

Beauty and the Beasts PDF Author: Carole Jahme
Publisher: Soho Press
ISBN: 9781569472958
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 436

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Book Description
Why are the majority of primatologists women? Mary Leakey, Dian Fossey, and Jane Goodall are among the women profiled as Carole Jahme explores the unusual bond between female primatologists and their simian subjects.

Survival of the Beautiful

Survival of the Beautiful PDF Author: David Rothenberg
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 1408830566
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
'The peacock's tail makes me sick!' said Charles Darwin. That's because the theory of evolution as adaptation can't explain why nature is so beautiful. It took the concept of sexual selection for Darwin to explain that, a process that has more to do with aesthetic taste than adaptive fitness. Survival of the Beautiful is a revolutionary new examination of the interplay of beauty, art, and culture in evolution. Taking inspiration from Darwin's observation that animals have a natural aesthetic sense, philosopher and musician David Rothenberg probes why animals, humans included, have an innate appreciation for beauty - and why nature is, indeed, beautiful.

Beauty Imagined

Beauty Imagined PDF Author: Geoffrey Jones
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191609617
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 432

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Book Description
The global beauty business permeates our lives, influencing how we perceive ourselves and what it is to be beautiful. The brands and firms which have shaped this industry, such as Avon, Coty, Estée Lauder, L'Oréal, and Shiseido, have imagined beauty for us. This book provides the first authoritative history of the global beauty industry from its emergence in the nineteenth century to the present day, exploring how today's global giants grew. It shows how successive generations of entrepreneurs built brands which shaped perceptions of beauty, and the business organizations needed to market them. They democratized access to beauty products, once the privilege of elites, but they also defined the gender and ethnic borders of beauty, and its association with a handful of cities, notably Paris and later New York. The result was a homogenization of beauty ideals throughout the world. Today globalization is changing the beauty industry again; its impact can be seen in a range of competing strategies. Global brands have swept into China, Russia, and India, but at the same time, these brands are having to respond to a far greater diversity of cultures and lifestyles as new markets are opened up worldwide. In the twenty first century, beauty is again being re-imagined anew.

A Taste for the Beautiful

A Taste for the Beautiful PDF Author: Michael J. Ryan
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691191395
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
"In A Taste for the Beautiful, Michael Ryan, one of the world's leading authorities on animal behavior, tells the remarkable story of how he and other scientists have taken up where Darwin left off, transforming our understanding of sexual selection and shedding new light on animal and human behavior. Drawing on cutting-edge science, Ryan explores the key questions: Why do animals perceive certain traits as beautiful and others not? Do animals have an inherent sexual aesthetic and, if so, where is it rooted? Ryan argues that the answers lie in the brain--particularly of females, who act as biological puppeteers, spurring the development of beautiful traits in males."--Back cover

Bobbi Brown Beauty

Bobbi Brown Beauty PDF Author: Bobbi Brown
Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks
ISBN: 9780060929763
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
Celebrated makeup artist and the Today show beauty editor Bobbie Brown share the secretes that have made her one of the most sought-after names in makeup today. In this straightforward, refreshingly honest guide to makeup, no one "perfect" beauty standard is promoted; Bobbie knows that every woman has her own look, and her mission is to help readers maximize their individual potential. Learn the essential techniques necessary for any woman who wants to look and feel her best--day or night. Learning to appreciate your own beauty How to do makeup fast How to handle bad beauty days How to get out of a makeup rut How to make lipstick last How to wear foundation correctly With Bobbie Brown Beauty, women will quickly learn what makes their face unique and how to play up their particular strengths. Never before has a beauty book tackled the pressing concerns of a woman's everyday beauty routine--what every woman, fromm fifteen to seventy-five, really wants to know.

Here She Is

Here She Is PDF Author: Hilary Levey Friedman
Publisher: Beacon Press
ISBN: 080708364X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
A fresh exploration of American feminist history told through the lens of the beauty pageant world. Many predicted that pageants would disappear by the 21st century. Yet they are thriving. America’s most enduring contest, Miss America, celebrates its 100th anniversary in 2020. Why do they persist? In Here She Is, Hilary Levey Friedman reveals the surprising ways pageants have been an empowering feminist tradition. She traces the role of pageants in many of the feminist movement’s signature achievements, including bringing women into the public sphere, helping them become leaders in business and politics, providing increased educational opportunities, and giving them a voice in the age of #MeToo. Using her unique perspective as a NOW state president, daughter to Miss America 1970, sometimes pageant judge, and scholar, Friedman explores how pageants became so deeply embedded in American life from their origins as a P.T. Barnum spectacle at the birth of the suffrage movement, through Miss Universe’s bathing beauties to the talent- and achievement-based competitions of today. She looks at how pageantry has morphed into culture everywhere from The Bachelor and RuPaul’s Drag Race to cheer and specialized contests like those for children, Indigenous women, and contestants with disabilities. Friedman also acknowledges the damaging and unrealistic expectations pageants place on women in society and discusses the controversies, including Miss America’s ableist and racist history, Trump’s ownership of the Miss Universe Organization, and the death of child pageant-winner JonBenét Ramsey. Presenting a more complex narrative than what’s been previously portrayed, Here She Is shows that as American women continue to evolve, so too will beauty pageants.