Human Origins

Add to your list(s) Download to your calendar using vCal

• Dr Adam Rutherford, Author, Broadcaster
• Friday 17 January 2020, 17:30-18:30
• LMH, Lady Mitchell Hall.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Janet Gibson.

We like to think of ourselves as exceptional beings, but are we really any more special than other animals? Humans are the slightest of twigs on a single family tree that encompasses four billion years, a lot of twists and turns, and a billion species. All of those organisms are rooted in a single origin, with a common code that underwrites our existence. This paradox – that our biology is indistinct from all life, yet we consider ourselves to be special – lies at the heart of who we are. This was also the paradox that lies at the heart of Darwin’s second magnum opus, The Descent of Man.

In this lecture I will explore how many of the things once considered (including by Darwin) to be exclusively human are in fact not: we are not the only species that communicates, makes tools, utilises fire, or has sex for reasons other than to make new versions of ourselves. Evolution has, however, allowed us to develop our culture to a level of complexity that outstrips any other observed in nature, and it is the sharing of ideas that our own evolution has taken us down a path distinct from other species.

Adam Rutherford is a science writer and broadcaster. He studied genetics at University College London, and a PhD on the genetics of the developing eye. He has written and presented many award-winning series and programmes for the BBC , including the flagship weekly BBC Radio 4 programme Inside Science and The Curious Cases of Rutherford & Fry with Dr Hannah Fry. He is the author of several books about evolution and genetics, including A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived, the Book of Humans and the forthcoming How To Argue With a Racist.

This talk is part of the Darwin College Lecture Series series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• AUB_Cambridge Seminars
• All Talks (aka the CURE list)
• Annual Food Agenda
• Cambridge Infectious Diseases
• Centre for Health Leadership and Enterprise
• Chris Davis' list
• Darwin College Lecture Series
• Darwin Lectures and Seminars
• DevBio
• Featured lists
• Featured talks
• Graduate-Seminars
• Guy Emerson's list
• Hanchen DaDaDash
• History and Philosophy of Science long list
• Humanitas and General Science
• Inference Group Summary
• LMH, Lady Mitchell Hall
• Major Public Lectures in Cambridge
• Neurons, Fake News, DNA and your iPhone: The Mathematics of Information
• TMP
• Talks related to sustainability and the environment
• custom
• history
• personal list

Note that ex-directory lists are not shown.