Sex, Gender, Ethics and the Darwinian Evolution of Mankind examines the impact of Darwin’s Descent of Man on contemporary biology and the humanities. Its publication in 1871 was a founding event in anthropology. Its content was primarily concerned with the development of sexual life, social life and intellectual life, not only as outcomes of evolution, but as components that have actively intermixed over time with the evolutionary mechanism of natural selection. The stamp of Darwinism on modern thought is still very important and brings novelties to academic studies. Several fields influenced by Darwinian anthropology developed in recent decades, including evolutionary ethics, the evolution of sociality and sexual communication in animal and plant species. Sociobiology and evolutionary psychology are topics that draw heavily on Darwin’s Descent of Man. The understanding of Darwin’s thought has also progressed greatly in recent decades, following the systematic study of Darwin’s correspondence and notebooks, leading to a reassessment of the development of his thought on humans, social groups and heredity, and how they come together in his theory of evolution. The book combines a historical perspective on Darwin’s achievement and his legacy. It will be of interest to students and scholars in a variety of fields, from experimental biology to the social and historical sciences.

God, Sex, Science, Gender: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Christian Ethics is a timely, wide-ranging attempt to rescue dialogues on human sexuality, sexual diversity, and gender from insular exchanges based primarily on biblical scholarship and denominational ideology. Too often, dialogues on sexuality and gender devolve into the repetition of party lines and defensive postures, without considering the interdisciplinary body of scholarly research on this complex subject. This volume expands beyond the usual parameters, opening the discussion to scholars in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences to foster the development of Christian sexual ethics for contemporary times. Essays by prominent and emerging scholars in the fields of anthropology, sociology, psychology, philosophy, literary studies, theology, and ethics reveal how faith and reason can illuminate our understanding of human sexual and gender diversity. Focusing on the intersection of theology and science and incorporating feminist theory, God, Science, Sex, Gender is a much-needed call for Christian ethicists to map the origins and full range of human sexual experience and gender identity. Essays delve into why human sexuality and gender can be so controversial in Christian contexts, investigate the complexity of sexuality in humans and other species, and reveal the implications of diversity for Christian moral theology. Contributors are Joel Brown, James Calcagno, Francis J. Catania, Pamela L. Caughie, Robin Colburn, Robert Di Vito, Terry Grande, Frank Fennell, Anne E. Figert, Patricia Beattie Jung, Fred Kniss, John McCarthy, Jon Nilson, Stephen J. Pope, Susan A. Ross, Joan Roughgarden, and Aana Marie Vigen.

This volume tackles a quickly-evolving field of inquiry, mapping the existing discourse as part of a general attempt to place current developments in historical context; at the same time, breaking new ground in taking on novel subjects and pursuing fresh approaches. The term "A.I." is used to refer to a broad range of phenomena, from machine learning and data mining to artificial general intelligence. The recent advent of more sophisticated AI systems, which function with partial or full autonomy and are capable of tasks which require learning and 'intelligence', presents difficult ethical questions, and has drawn concerns from many quarters about individual and societal welfare, democratic decision-making, moral agency, and the prevention of harm. This work ranges from explorations of normative constraints on specific applications of machine learning algorithms today-in everyday medical practice, for instance-to reflections on the (potential) status of AI as a form of consciousness with attendant rights and duties and, more generally still, on the conceptual terms and frameworks necessarily to understand tasks requiring intelligence, whether "human" or "A.I."

This edited volume challenges popular notions of sex, gender and biology and features international, trans-disciplinary research. The book begins with an exploration of supposedly ‘natural’ sexual differences, then looks at research in evolutionary biology and examines topics such as gender stereotypes in humans. The first chapters explore important questions: What are the fundamental sex differences? How do genes and hormones influence an individual’s sex? Subsequent chapters concern topics including: sex stereotypes in the field of sexual conflict, how the focus on genes in evolutionary biology disregards other means of inheritance, and the development of Darwin's theory of sex differences. The last three chapters look at humans, discussing: an interdisciplinary approach to the evolution of sex differences in body height, biological versus social constructive perspectives on the gendering of voices and nature-culture arguments in the current political debate on paternity leave in Norway.

Standing at the intersection of evolutionary biology and feminist theory is a large audience interested in the questions one field raises for the other. Have evolutionary biologists worked largely or strictly within a masculine paradigm, seeing males as evolving and females as merely reacting passively or carried along with the tide? Would our view of nature `red in tooth in claw' be different if women had played a larger role in the creation of evolutionary theory and through education in its transmission to younger generations? Is there any such thing as a feminist science or feminist methodology? For feminists, does any kind of biological determinism undermine their contention that gender roles purely constructed, not inherent in the human species? Does the study of animals have anything to say to those preoccupied with the evolution and behavior of humans? All these questions and many more are addressed by this book, whose contributing authors include leading scholars in both feminism and evolutionary biology. Bound to be controversial, this book is addressed to evolutionary biologists and to feminists and to the large number of people interested in women's studies.

Leading scholars take stock of Darwin's ideas about human evolution in the light of modern science In 1871, Charles Darwin published The Descent of Man, a companion to Origin of Species in which he attempted to explain human evolution, a topic he called "the highest and most interesting problem for the naturalist." A Most Interesting Problem brings together twelve world-class scholars and science communicators to investigate what Darwin got right—and what he got wrong—about the origin, history, and biological variation of humans. Edited by Jeremy DeSilva and with an introduction by acclaimed Darwin biographer Janet Browne, A Most Interesting Problem draws on the latest discoveries in fields such as genetics, paleontology, bioarchaeology, anthropology, and primatology. This compelling and accessible book tackles the very subjects Darwin explores in Descent, including the evidence for human evolution, our place in the family tree, the origins of civilization, human races, and sex differences. A Most Interesting Problem is a testament to how scientific ideas are tested and how evidence helps to structure our narratives about human origins, showing how some of Darwin's ideas have withstood more than a century of scrutiny while others have not. A Most Interesting Problem features contributions by Janet Browne, Jeremy DeSilva, Holly Dunsworth, Agustín Fuentes, Ann Gibbons, Yohannes Haile-Selassie, Brian Hare, John Hawks, Suzana Herculano-Houzel, Kristina Killgrove, Alice Roberts, and Michael J. Ryan.