
Referring to Lewis Carroll's Red Queen from Through the Looking-Glass, a character who has to keep running to stay in the same place, Matt Ridley demonstrates why sex is humanity's best strategy for outwitting its constantly mutating internal predators. The Red Queen answers dozens of other riddles of human nature and culture -- including why men propose marriage, the method behind our maddening notions of beauty, and the disquieting fact that a woman is more likely to conceive a child by an adulterous lover than by her husband. Brilliantly written, The Red Queen offers an extraordinary new way of interpreting the human condition and how it has evolved.
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The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature
February 14, 2012 | 416 pages
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VonBrandtner (Grade: A) "... it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place..." says the Red Queen to Alice in Lewis Carol's "Through the Looking Glass".
This book is about the evolutionary arms race which pushes both predator and prey to become better at what they do. Another major topic of discussion is sexual selection and how it has shaped human psychology and sexuality.
This book is fantastic. A must read for anyone curious about the development of human sexuality, evolution, and biology.
(Rated on May 3, 2014)