Beast and Man: The Roots of Human Nature
ISBN: 9780203626504
Platform/Publisher: Taylor & Francis / Routledge
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Unlimited; Download: Unlimited
Subjects: Humanities; Philosophy; Ethics Philosophy;

Philosophers have traditionally concentrated on the qualities that make human beings different from other species. In Beast and Man Mary Midgley, one of our foremost intellectuals, stresses continuities. What makes people tick? Largely, she asserts, the same things as animals. She tells us humans are rather more like other animals than we previously allowed ourselves to believe, and reminds us just how primitive we are in comparison to the sophistication of many animals. A veritable classic for our age, Beast and Man has helped change the way we think about ourselves and the world in which we live.


Mary Midgley was born Mary Scrutton in Dulwich, England on September 13, 1919. She was educated at Oxford University. While raising her sons, she reviewed novels and children's books for The New Statesman. She returned to teaching philosophy in 1965 at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne. She was a moral philosopher who wrote numerous books including Beast and Man: The Roots of Human Nature, Evolution as a Religion, Science as Salvation: A Modern Myth and Its Meaning, Science and Poetry, The Owl of Minerva, and What Is Philosophy For? She died on October 10, 2018 at the age of 99.

(Bowker Author Biography)

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