Ridley recounts the hundred years' war between the partisans of nature and nurture to explain how this paradoxical creature, the human being, can be simultaneously free-willed and motivated by instinct and culture. Published fifty years after the discovery of the double helix of DNA, Nature via Nurture chronicles a new revolution in our understanding of genes. They are consequences as well as causes of the will. Genes not only predetermine the broad structure of the brain they also absorb formative experiences, react to social cues and even run memory. Nurture depends on genes, too, and genes need nurture. Matt Ridley argues that the emerging truth is far more interesting than this myth. This startling revision led some scientists to conclude that there are simply not enough human genes to account for all the different ways people behave: we must be made by nurture, not nature. What makes us who we are? In February 2001 it was announced that the genome contains not 100,000 genes as originally expected but only 30,000. Armed with the extraordinary new discoveries about our genes, Ridley turns his attention to the nature versus nurture debate to bring the first popular account of the roots of human behaviour. Acclaimed author Matt Ridley's thrilling follow-up to his bestseller Genome.
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