TATTESALL_Ian_EN

/ 45 An event created and organized by the Villa Gillet - 25 rue Chazière - 69004 Lyon - France

Tel : 00 33 (0)4 78 27 02 48 - Fax : 00 33 (0)4 72 00 93 00 - www.villagillet.net

Ian TattersallUnited States

Ian Tattersall, PhD is a curator emeritus in the Division of Anthro-pology of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, where he co-curated the Spitzer Hall of Human Origins. He is an acknowledged leader in studies of the human fossil record, and a prominent interpreter of human evolution to the public, having won the American Association of Physical Anthropologists’ W. W. Howells Award for his book Becoming Human. Tattersall has appeared on Charlie Rose and NPR’s Science Friday, and has writ-ten for Scientific American and Archaeology. He is widely cited by the media, including The New York Times, BBC, MSNBC, and Natio-nal Geographic. He lives in New York City.

The Author

Bibliography

Masters of the Planet: The Search for Our Human Origins (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)Race? Debunking a Scientific Myth, with Rob DeSalle (Texas A&M University Press, 2011)Paleontology: A Brief History of Life (Templeton Press, 2010)The World from Beginnings to 4000 BCE (Oxford University Press, 2008)Bones, Brains and DNA: The Human Genome and Human Evolution, with Robert DeSalle and Patricia J. Wynne (Illustrator) (Bunker Hill Publishing, 2007)The Monkey in the Mirror: Essays on the Science of What Makes Us Human (Mariner Books, 2003)Extinct Humans, with Jeffrey Schwartz (Basic Books, 2001)Becoming Human: Evolution and Human Uniqueness (Mariner Books, 1999)The Last Neanderthal: The Rise, Success, and Mysterious Extinction of Our Closest Human Relative (New York: Macmillan, 1995 ; 2nd ed. Basic Books, 1999).The Fossil Trail: How We Know What We Think We Know About Human Evolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995 ; 2nd ed. 2008)The Human Odyssey: Four Million Years of Human Evolution (Macmillan General Reference, 1993 ; 2nd ed. iUniverse, Incorporated, 2001)The Primates of Madagascar (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982)

Zoom

© Dennis Finnman/AMNH

Masters of the Planet: The Search for Our Human Origins (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)

50,000 years ago – merely a blip in evolutionary time – our Homo sapiens ancestors were com-peting for existence with several other human species, just as their own precursors had been doing for millions of years. Yet something about our species separated it from the pack, and led to its survival while the rest became extinct. So just what was it that allowed Homo sapiens to become Masters of the Planet? Curator Emeri-tus at the American Museum of Natural History,

Ian Tattersall takes us deep into the fossil record to uncover what made humans so special. Surveying a vast field from initial bipe-dality to language and intelligence, Tattersall argues that Homo sapiens acquired a winning combination of traits that was not the result of long term evolutionary refinement. Instead it emerged quickly, shocking their world and changing it forever.

Reviews

"Tattersall is no slouch in the storytelling department, but his nar-rative emphasizes the necessarily fragmentary nature of the fossil record and the provisional nature of what we can safely conclude from it . . . [His] account highlights the major advances in paleoanth-ropology that have been made in the last decade or two."

Natural History magazine“A concise history of how humans became humans . . . Tattersall moves through the complex fossil records effortlessly and with a welcome sense of wonder. He also consistently conveys a deep knowledge of his subject . . . Tattersall’s combination of erudition and a conversational style make this is an excellent primer on hu-man evolution.”

Publishers Weekly"For almost 40 years, Ian Tattersall has been one of our leaders in the field of human evolution. Masters of the Planet is a stunning culmination of a career in science: a brilliant and engaging account that illuminates and inspires. Read Tattersall and you will not see yourself, let alone our entire species, in the same way again."

Neil Shubin, author of Your Inner Fish

Portrait of the Man as an AnimalSunday October 21st 2012 / Roulette



Race? Debunking a Scientific Myth, with Rob DeSalle (Texas A&M University Press, 2011)

Race has provided the ratio-nale and excuse for some of the worst atrocities in human history. Yet, according to many biologists, physical anthropo-logists, and geneticists, there is no valid scientific justifica-tion for the concept of race.To be more precise, although there is clearly some physical

basis for the variations that underlie perceptions of race, clear boundaries among “races” remain highly elusive from a purely biological stand-point. Differences among human populations that people intuitively view as “racial” are not only superficial but are also of astonishingly recent origin.In this intriguing and highly accessible book, phy-sical anthropologist Ian Tattersall and geneticist Rob DeSalle, both senior scholars from the Ame-rican Museum of Natural History, explain what human races actually are—and are not—and place them within the wider perspective of natu-ral diversity. They explain that the relative isola-tion of local populations of the newly evolved hu-man species during the last Ice Age—when Homo sapiens was spreading across the world from an African point of origin—has now begun to reverse itself, as differentiated human populations come back into contact and interbreed. Indeed, the au-thors suggest that all of the variety seen outside of Africa seems to have both accumulated and started reintegrating within only the last 50,000 or 60,000 years—the blink of an eye, from an evolu-tionary perspective.The overarching message of Race? Debunking a Scientific Myth is that scientifically speaking, there is nothing special about racial variation within the human species. These distinctions result from the working of entirely mundane evolutionary processes, such as those encoun-tered in other organisms.

Paleontology: A Brief History of Life (Templeton Press, 2010)

In this volume, Ian Tattersall, a highly esteemed figure in the fields of anthropology, ar-chaeology, and paleontology, leads a fascinating tour of the history of life and the evolution of human beings.

Starting at the very beginning,

Tattersall examines patterns of change in the biosphere over time, and the correlations of bio-logical events with physical changes in the Earth’s environment. He introduces the complex of evo-lutionary processes, situates human beings in the luxuriant diversity of Life (demonstrating that however remarkable we may legitimately find ourselves to be, we are the product of the same basic forces and processes that have driven the evolutionary histories of all other creatures), and he places the origin of our extraordinary spiritual sensibilities in the context of the exaptational and emergent acquisition of symbolic cognition and thought.

Concise and yet comprehensive, historically pe-netrating and yet up-to-date, responsibly factual and yet engaging, Paleontology serves as the per-fect entrée to science’s greatest story.

The World from Beginnings to 4000 BCE (Oxford University Press, 2008)

To be human is to be curious. And one of the things we are most curious about is how we came to be who we are--how we evolved over millions of years to become creatures ca-pable of inquiring into our own evolution.In this lively and readable intro-duction, renowned anthropolo-

gist Ian Tattersall thoroughly examines both fossil and archaeological records to trace human evolu-tion from the earliest beginnings of our zoologi-cal family, Hominidae, through the appearance of Homo sapiens to the Agricultural Revolution. He begins with an accessible overview of evolutionary theory and then explores the major turning points in human evolution: the emergence of the genus Homo, the advantages of bipedalism, the birth of the big brain and symbolic thinking, Paleolithic and Neolithic tool making, and finally the enor-mously consequential shift from hunter-gathe-rer to agricultural societies 10,000 years ago. Focusing particularly on the pattern of events and innovations in human biological and cultural evo-lution, Tattersall offers illuminating commentary on a wide range of topics, including the earliest known artistic expressions, ancient burial rites, the beginnings of language, the likely causes of Neanderthal extinction, the relationship between agriculture and Christianity, and the still unsolved mysteries of human consciousness.Complemented by a wealth of illustrations and written with the grace and accessibility for which Tattersall is widely admire, The World from Be-ginnings to 4000 BCE invites us to take a closer look at the strange and distant beings who, over the course of millions of years, would become us.

Bones, Brains and DNA: The Human Genome and Human Evolution, with Robert DeSalle and Patricia J. Wynne (Illustrator) (Bunker Hill Publishing, 2007)

Based on the New Hall of Human Origins in the Ame-rican Museum of Natural History which opened in No-vember 2006, Bones, Brains and DNA takes the young reader to the cutting edge of science, exploring and exa-mining the tools by which we study our origins. Cove-

ring the milestones in evolution, global migration and how we became human through the invention of language, music, art and technology.



The Monkey in the Mirror: Essays on the Science of What Makes Us Human (Mariner Books, 2003)

Ian Tattersall is widely re-garded as one of the rare eminent scientists who is also a graceful and engaging wri-ter. In this extraordinary new work he attempts to answer the most controversial ques-tions on human origins: What makes us so different? How did we get this way? How do

we know? Guiding readers around the world and far into the past, Tattersall examines and explores evolutionary theory, a science based not on a finite set of conclusions drawn from overwhelming evidence, but rather our evolving effort to make sense out of a handful of incom-plete fossil remains.Brimming with delightful stories and scientific wisdom, this exquisite book offers fresh insight into the fundamental questions of our origins--and our evolutionary future.

Extinct Humans, with Jeffrey Schwartz (Basic Books, 2001)

Scientists have long envi-sioned the human ”family tree” as a straight-line pro-gression from the apelike australopithecines to the enigmatic Homo habilis to the famous Neanderthals, culminating in us, Homo sapiens. But this model is unlike the evolutionary pat-

terns known for all other vertebrates—patterns that typically reveal multiple branchings and extinctions. In Extinct Humans, Ian Tattersall and Jeffrey Schwartz present convincing evidence that many distinct species of humans have existed du-ring the history of the hominid family, often simul-taneously. Furthermore, these species may have contributed to one another’s extinction. Who were these different human species? Which are direct ancestors to us? And, the most profound question of all, why is there only a single human species alive on Earth now?

Becoming Human: Evolution and Human Uniqueness (Mariner Books, 1999)

In Becoming Human, noted anthropologist and renais-sance man Ian Tattersall ex-plores what makes us uniquely human, the qualities that set us apart from our ancestors, and the significance of our knowledge. A worldwide tour of discovery, Tattersall takes the reader from 30,000-year-old

cave paintings in France and anthropological digs in Africa, to examining human behavior in a New York restaurant. And by offering wisdom gleaned from fossil remains, primate behavior, prehistoric art, and archaeology, Tattersall presents a stun-ning picture of where humankind evolved, how Darwin’s theories have changed, and what we re-liably know about modern-day human’s capacity for love, language, and thought. Widely praised in the media, Becoming Human is an amazing trip into the past and into the future.

The Last Neanderthal: The Rise, Success, and Mysterious Extinction of Our Closest Human Relative (New York: Macmillan, 1995 ; 2nd ed. Basic Books, 1999)

Scientists have long known that the popular image of the Neanderthal as a primi-tive, hairy, heavily browed, club-wielding brute is not supported by the fossil evi-dence. But to date, no such consensus has existed on the riddle of Neanderthals’ disappearance. The Last

Neanderthal, written by one of the most res-pected authorities on the subject and supported by a dazzling wealth of material, paints the first full portrait of the most familiar and haunting of human relatives. Drawing on the latest findings and sophisticated new techniques of analysis, Ian Tattersall marshals the best available evi-dence to unravel the mysteries of the Neander-thals - who they were, how they lived, how they succeeded for so long. Drawing on his own re-search and the work of others, Tattersall takes on the most fascinating question of all - what happened to them? This revised edition is fully updated to include information on Tattersall’s recent survey of all known Neanderthal fossils, cutting-edge work with Neanderthal DNA, and new discoveries in Spain.



The Fossil Trail: How We Know What We Think We Know About Human Evolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995 ; 2nd ed. 2008)

Extensively revised and upda-ted, the second edition of The Fossil Trail: How We Know What We Think We Know About Human Evolution offers a colorful history of fossil discoveries and a revealing insider’s look at how these finds have been interpreted--and misinterpreted--through

time. It covers the dramatic increase in the size and scope of the human fossil record as well as new techniques for analyzing and interpre-ting that record that have emerged in the thir-teen intervening years since the first edition’s publication. Author Ian Tattersall, Curator in the Division of Anthropology of the American Museum of Natural History, places the resear-chers and their discoveries within the context of their social and scientific milieus and reveals the many forces that shape our interpretation of fossil findings.

The Fossil Trail provides an up-to-the-minute overview of paleoanthropological thought and discovery and presents our "family tree" as it is portrayed in the Spitzer Hall of Human Origins at the American Museum of Natural History.

The Human Odyssey: Four Million Years of Human Evolution (Macmillan General Reference, 1993 ; 2nd ed. iUniverse, Incorporated, 2001)

This newly updated text chro-nicles a history of human evolution starting three and a half million years ago, when two upright figures walked together across the Laetoli desert in Tanzania, and their footsteps were captured forever in volcanic ash. Were these remarkable footprints

made by one of our earliest ancestors, and what can they tell us about the human evolutionary journey?This is just one of many puzzles of the compel-ling story of human evolution explored in this volume. Based on the new Hall of Human Bio-logy and Evolution at the American Museum of Natural History, the most extensive exhibition of the subject ever designed, The Human Odys-sey examines how both significant fossil finds and startling new theories have been used by scientists to trace the path of human evolution.Here are the stories behind such famous fos-sil discoveries as Gigantopithecus, the "Black Skull," "Java Man," and "Lucy," and the surpri-sing clues they reveal about the date and place of human origins. Here too are the bold theories and controversies that have influenced the field of evolution, from the idea of natural selection put forth by Charles Darwin to the new role that DNA analysis plays in fossil research.Illustrated throughout with more than a hun-dred photographs, drawings, maps, and stun-ning artistic re-creations of early humans and their environment, The Human Odyssey is virtually a portable museum devoted to this fascinating subject. Drawing from the latest research in both the laboratory and the field, it clearly illuminates some of the most provo-cative questions scientists have ever asked: Where did we come from, and how did we be-come what we are today?

Documents

TATTESALL_Ian_EN