"The Birth of Global Civilization"

Two conditions that have emerged in recent decades are now driving humanity toward an ultimate fusion of world cultures. First, the rapidly growing threat to the planetary environment cannot be resolved by any single nation but only by all nations working together. Second, the proliferation of digital technologies has made it possible for rapid, efficient, and affordable interaction to take place among all societies and cultures. The potential synergies between these two conditions should not be underestimated. Click here to read the article.

"Can We Colonize Other Planets?"

There is an idea that has become popular in recent years, in which it is imagined that future generations of humans will escape the earth’s problems by using advanced technologies to colonize other planets. But even if we ignore the sheer logistical problem of launching hundreds of thousands of tons of supplies and equipment into space—and we consider only the environmental conditions that we know to exist on other planets—the goal of colonizing other heavenly bodies seems, for all practical purposes, literally unattainable.  Click here to read the article.

"Canine Teeth and Lethal Weapons: Was the Fabrication of Wooden Spears and Digging Sticks by Human Ancestors Responsible for the Evolution of Bipedal Locomotion?"

When a population of prehistoric apes began to use long, sharpened sticks as lethal weapons, the ability to attack predators and prey from a safe distance gave an advantage to those individuals who could best stand, walk, and run on two legs, leading to a complete redesign of the primate body and the evolution of full upright posture.  Click here to read the article.

 "The Flowering of Symbolic Communication"

How the invention of symbolic communication led to the sharing of knowledge, the creation of ethnic identities, the conceptualization of time, and the rise of civilizations.   Click here to read the article.

          "Sociobiology: The New Heresy"

This feature article about the controversy surrounding Edward O. Wilson's landmark book, Sociobiology: The New Synthesis was published as a cover story in the November, 1976 issue of Human Behavior.   Click here to read the article.

"The Hot-Cold Syndrome and Symbolic Balance 

in Mexican and Spanish-American Folk Medicine"

This scholarly article has been cited hundreds of times and reprinted in its entirety in numerous edited collections. It was first published in the journal Ethnology in July of 1966.   Click here to read the article.