How We Became Human: A Challenge to Psychoanalysis tackles the question of what distinguishes human beings from other animals. By interweaving psychoanalysis, biology, physics, anthropology, and philosophy, Julio Moreno advances a novel thesis: human beings are faulty animals in their understanding of the world around them. This quality renders humans capable of connecting with inconsistencies, those events or phenomena that their logic cannot understand. The ability to go beyond consistency is humans’ distinctive trait. It is the source of their creativity and of their ability to modify the environment they inhabit. On the basis of this connective-associative interplay, Moreno proposes a new approach to the links human beings create amongst themselves and with the world around them. This theory focuses on a key question: What is the difference between human beings and the other animals? From this perspective, Moreno seeks to reformulate many of the classic psychoanalytic, psychological, and anthropological postulates on childhood, links, and psychic change. Reviews: This lucid and deep, simple and complex book raises a basic question: What is human about humans? Equipped with a solid training as a researcher and a psychoanalyst, Moreno daringly ties research from a variety of fields, from ethology to psychoanalysis, from logic to neurophysiology, from anthropology to computer science and virtual reality—resulting in a very broad outlook that How We Became Human encompasses in a careful and accomplished manner. — Horacio Etchegoyen, MD, former president of the International Psychoanalytical Association Contents: Acknowledgments Preface
Chapter 1: Humanness Chapter 2: Virtual Reality Chapter 3: Connection and Association Chapter 4: The Link I: Theory Chapter 5: The Link II: Manifestations Chapter 6: Belief Chapter 7. Childishness Chapter 8: Childishness II: The History of Childhood and Toys Chapter 9: The Emergence of Humanness Chapter 10: The Biological History of the Parent-Child Link: Childrearing Strategies
References Index About the Author About the Author: Julio Moreno, MD, PhD, is a faculty member at Buenos Aires Psychoanalytic Association’s Psychoanalytic Institute, the School of Psychology at Buenos Aires University, and the University of Hospital Italiano. His previous works include Tiempo y trauma: Continuidades rotas, and La infancia y sus bordes: Desafíos para el psicoanálisis. |