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The Strange Order of Things: Life, Feeling, and the Making of Cultures
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About The Strange Order Of Things: Life, Feeling, And The
Product Description “Damasio undertakes nothing less than a reconstruction of the natural history of the universe. . . . [A] brave and honest book.” —The New York Times Book Review The Strange Order of Things is a pathbreaking investigation into homeostasis, the condition that regulates human physiology within the range that makes possible not only survival but also the flourishing of life. Antonio Damasio makes clear that we descend biologically, psychologically, and even socially from a long lineage that begins with single living cells; that our minds and cultures are linked by an invisible thread to the ways and means of ancient unicellular existence and other primitive life-forms; and that inherent in our very chemistry is a powerful force, a striving toward life maintenance that governs life in all its guises, including the development of genes that help regulate and transmit life. The Strange Order of Things is a landmark reflection that spans the biological and social sciences, offering a new way of understanding the origins of life, feeling, and culture. www.antoniodamasio.com Review "These pages make enthralling reading....It is indispensable for any psychoanalyst—and not only for psychoanalysts, of course. Damasio is the closest thing we have in the post-truth era to a great public intellectual." —Mark Solms, Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association “Nietzsche would have given four cheers for this intricately argued book, which is at once scientifically rigorous and humanely accommodating, and, so far as this reviewer can judge, revolutionary….From Plato onwards, western philosophy has favoured mind over “mere” body, so that by the time we get to Descartes, the human has become hardly more than a brain stuck atop a stick, like a child’s hobbyhorse. This is the conception of humanness that Damasio wishes to dismantle. For him, as for Nietzsche, what the body feels is every bit as significant as what the mind thinks, and further, both functions are inextricably intertwined....There are echoes here too of William James, that most endearing of philosophers, as when Damasio pauses for a brief, Jamesian consideration of the anomalous fact that for all the hi-tech sophistication of modern life, we still cling to the primitive pleasure and reassurance of the domestic fireplace. And James would have been delighted by Damasio’s “everydayness”, his readiness to acknowledge the fundamental underpinnings of even our highest endeavours....But Damasio, while ever ready to salute his predecessors and peers, is wholly his own man, and The Strange Order of Things is a fresh and daring effort to identify the true spring and source of human being – of the being, in fact, of all living things – namely feeling.” —John Banville, The Guardian “A radical revision of how we understand mind, feeling, consciousness, and the construction of cultures…. Damasio draws a visionary link between biology and social science in a fascinating investigation of homeostasis—the delicate balance that underpins our physical existence, ensures our survival, and defines our flourishing. At the heart of his inquiry is his lifelong interest in the nature of human affect—why we feel what we feel, how we use emotions to construct selfhood, what makes our intentions and our feelings so frequently contradictory, how the body and the mind conspire in the inception of emotional reality. What emerges is not an arsenal of certitudes and answers but a celebration of curiosity and a reminder that intelligent, informed speculation is how we expand the territory of knowledge by moving the boundary of the knowable further into the unknown.” —Maria Popova, Brain Pickings “Almost a quarter century after Descartes’ Error, Antonio Damasio has done it again—created a grand exploration of the inextricable relationship between mind, body, and the source of human feelings. Along the way, Damasio takes the reader on an adventure that starts with the single-ce
