First Steps, Jeremy DeSilva
First Steps, Jeremy DeSilva
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First Steps
How Upright Walking Made Us Human

Author: Jeremy DeSilva

Narrator: Kaleo Griffith

Unabridged: 9 hr 17 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: HarperAudio

Published: 04/06/2021

Includes: Bonus Material Bonus Material Included


Synopsis

Blending history, science, and culture, a stunning and highly engaging evolutionary story exploring how walking on two legs allowed humans to become the planet’s dominant species.

Humans are the only mammals to walk on two, rather than four legs—a locomotion known as bipedalism. We strive to be upstanding citizens, honor those who stand tall and proud, and take a stand against injustices. We follow in each other’s footsteps and celebrate a child’s beginning to walk. But why, and how, exactly, did we take our first steps? And at what cost? Bipedalism has its drawbacks: giving birth is more difficult and dangerous; our running speed is much slower than other animals; and we suffer a variety of ailments, from hernias to sinus problems.In First Steps, paleoanthropologist Jeremy DeSilva explores how unusual and extraordinary this seemingly ordinary ability is. A seven-million-year journey to the very origins of the human lineage, First Steps shows how upright walking was a gateway to many of the other attributes that make us human—from our technological abilities, our thirst for exploration, our use of language–and may have laid the foundation for our species’ traits of compassion, empathy, and altruism. Moving from developmental psychology labs to ancient fossil sites throughout Africa and Eurasia, DeSilva brings to life our adventure walking on two legs.Delving deeply into the story of our past and the new discoveries rewriting our understanding of human evolution, First Steps examines how walking upright helped us rise above all over species on this planet.Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

About Jeremy DeSilva

Jeremy DeSilva is an anthropologist at Dartmouth College. He is part of the research team that discovered and described two ancient members of the human family tree—Australopithecus sediba and Homo naledi. He has studied wild chimpanzees in Western Uganda and early human fossils in museums throughout Eastern and South Africa. From 1998 to 2003, he worked as an educator at the Boston Museum of Science. He continues to be passionate about science education and travels throughout New England, giving lectures on human evolution. He and his wife, Erin, live in Norwich, Vermont, with their twins, Ben and Josie.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Jamie on February 23, 2025

Some people seem to have been born for certain professions. I have known those who say they were meant to be engineers, or pilots, or chefs. If you are detail oriented and willing to spend part of your life crawling around in the dirt under an equatorial sun, you might have what it takes to be a pal......more

Goodreads review by William on January 26, 2022

When I blaze through a book, it speaks volumes on the quality of the writing. First Steps took me around three hours of focused reading to complete, and I loved every bit of it. Jeremy DeSilva specializes in the foot and ankle bones of early hominids. Using fossils of our ancient relatives and ancest......more

Goodreads review by Steve on December 19, 2020

Fascinating look at walking upright I enjoyed this book. Jeremy DeSilva writes with a good sense of humor and a conversational tone. I like how DeSilva shares his journey with the reader. He also provides information on the players in the area. There is some science in the book, but it is all very cl......more

Goodreads review by Hans on July 18, 2021

4.5 - Geweldig boek.......more