Audio only
Length9h 17m
About this audiobook
Blending history, science, and culture, a stunning and highly engaging evolutionary story exploring how walking on two legs allowed humans to become the planet’s dominant species.
Humans are the only mammals to walk on two, rather than four legs—a locomotion known as bipedalism. We strive to be upstanding citizens, honor those who stand tall and proud, and take a stand against injustices. We follow in each other’s footsteps and celebrate a child’s beginning to walk. But why, and how, exactly, did we take our first steps? And at what cost? Bipedalism has its drawbacks: giving birth is more difficult and dangerous; our running speed is much slower than other animals; and we suffer a variety of ailments, from hernias to sinus problems.
In First Steps, paleoanthropologist Jeremy DeSilva explores how unusual and extraordinary this seemingly ordinary ability is. A seven-million-year journey to the very origins of the human lineage, First Steps shows how upright walking was a gateway to many of the other attributes that make us human—from our technological abilities, our thirst for exploration, our use of language–and may have laid the foundation for our species’ traits of compassion, empathy, and altruism. Moving from developmental psychology labs to ancient fossil sites throughout Africa and Eurasia, DeSilva brings to life our adventure walking on two legs.
Delving deeply into the story of our past and the new discoveries rewriting our understanding of human evolution, First Steps examines how walking upright helped us rise above all over species on this planet.
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
Audiobook details
Rating★★★★ 4.4 (1.8K)
Includes Goodreads, Amazon, StoryGraph, LibraryThing
GenrePsychology, Science and Nature, History
Length9 hrs 17 mins
Narrated byKaleo Griffith
FormatAudiobook
Publish dateApr 6, 2021
LanguageEnglish
Matters of the HeartJacinta Nampijinpa Price9h 35m4.8 (359)$29 · $0.00
Black AF HistoryMichael Harriot15h 43m4.7 (14.6K)$33 · $0.00
Bad Fat Black GirlSesali Bowen6h 32m4.7 (2.8K)$24 · $0.00
Invisible StormJason Kander6h 48m4.7 (3.2K)$24 · $0.00
I Am The StormJanice Dean9h4.6 (1.5K)$8 · $0.00
On Democracies and Death CultsDouglas Murray10h 38m4.6 (6.5K)$29 · $0.00
TerraformPropaganda5h 39m4.7 (594)$24 · $0.00
Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases (Annotated)Ida B. Wells-Barnett2h 44m4.6 (1.3K)$2 · $0.00
Hour of the HeartIrvin D. Yalom, Benjamin Yalom8h 19m4.6 (2.3K)$26 · $0.00
Braving the TruthRachel Held Evans11h 31m4.7 (359)$29 · $0.00
Level UpRob Dial7h 42m4.6 (3.3K)$26 · $0.00
As a JewSarah Hurwitz8h 36m4.6 (1.2K)$26 · $0.00
Saint Joan (Annotated)George Bernard Shaw6h 20m4.6 (1.2K)$1.20 · $0.00
Burn the HaystackJennie Young, PhD9h 30m4.6 (543)$29 · $0.00
Woman and the New Race (Annotated)Margaret Sanger6h 30m4.6 (1K)$1.99 · $0.00
Good InsideBecky Kennedy9h 55m4.5 (59.3K)$29 · $0.00
The Mis-Education of the NegroCarter Godwin Woodson5h 4m4.5 (29.4K)$1.20 · $0.00
Du Bois: EssaysW.E.B. Du Bois6h 22m4.6 (1.5K)$1 · $0.00
The North American Indian (Illustrated Edition)Edward S. Curtis, Frederick Webb Hodge5h 59m4.6 (1.4K)$2 · $0.00
Valley of the BirdtailAndrew Stobo Sniderman, Douglas Sanderson10h 1m4.6 (2.4K)$29 · $0.00
A Brief History of IntelligenceMax S. Bennett12h 18m4.6 (6.6K)$29 · $0.00
The Story of BirdsSteve Brusatte11h 49m4.6 (401)$29 · $0.00
Life On Earth 40th Anniversary EditionSir David Attenborough12h 27m4.6 (6.5K)$29 · $0.00
BeyondStephen Walker15h 39m4.6 (3.2K)$33 · $0.00
LiftoffEric Berger9h 4m4.6 (9.5K)$29 · $0.00
Black Earth WisdomLeah Penniman11h 54m4.6 (577)$8 · $0.00
Total Cat MojoJackson Galaxy10h 13m4.5 (8.4K)$23 · $0.00
My Life Among the UnderdogsTia Torres5h 51m4.5 (4K)$24 · $0.00
What It Takes to Save a LifeKwane Stewart6h4.6 (556)$24 · $0.00
Pastoral SongJames Rebanks8h 35m4.5 (12K)$26 · $0.00
How Stella Learned to TalkChristina Hunger7h4.5 (10.9K)$24 · $0.00
Craig & FredCraig Grossi8h 6m4.5 (9.6K)$26 · $0.00
Celebrating BirdsNatalia Rojas, Ana Maria Martinez6h 47m4.6 (330)$24 · $0.00
Saving JemimaJulie Zickefoose4h 59m4.5 (749)$20 · $0.00
Will's Red CoatTom Ryan8h 23m4.5 (2.3K)$26 · $0.00
Of Time and TurtlesSy Montgomery10h 34m4.5 (5K)$29 · $0.00
THE WOLF TRILOGY: Call of the Wild, White Fang & The Son of the WolfJack London17h 31m4.5 (2.4K)$1.99 · $0.00
Zen and the Art of Saving the PlanetThich Nhat Hanh9h 20m4.5 (3.9K)$29 · $0.00
BLACK BEAUTY (With Original Illustrations)Anna Sewell7h 31m4.5 (1.3K)$1.99 · $0.00
Bottle of LiesKatherine Eban14h 25m4.4 (12K)$33 · $0.00
A Brief History of IntelligenceMax S. Bennett12h 18m4.6 (6.6K)$29 · $0.00
Black AF HistoryMichael Harriot15h 43m4.7 (14.6K)$33 · $0.00
The Gulag Archipelago Volume 3Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn21h 56m4.7 (8.9K)$46 · $0.00
Pearl of Great PriceJoseph Smith3h 8m4.7 (7.2K)$1.20 · $0.00
The Happiest Man on EarthEddie Jaku3h 48m4.6 (178K)$7 · $0.00
MotherlandJulia Ioffe17h 52m4.7 (2.5K)$40 · $0.00
Where Cowards Go to DieBenjamin Sledge8h 42m4.7 (351)$20 · $0.00
RevolutionariesSanjeev Sanyal11h 23m4.6 (2.6K)$29 · $0.00
Days of Love and Rage: A Story of RevolutionAnand Gopal22h 36m4.7 (584)$34 · $0.00
We Crossed a Bridge and It TrembledWendy Pearlman6h4.6 (5.2K)$24 · $0.00
Unbroken Bonds of BattleJohnny Joey Jones8h 31m4.6 (2.6K)$8 · $0.00
The Daughter of AuschwitzTova Friedman, Malcolm Brabant7h 54m4.6 (16.7K)$26 · $0.00
Lily's PromiseLily Ebert, Dov Forman8h 54m4.6 (16.1K)$29 · $0.00
On Democracies and Death CultsDouglas Murray10h 38m4.6 (6.5K)$29 · $0.00
Across the RiverKent Babb11h 40m4.6 (927)$29 · $0.00
Balcony Over Jerusalem: A Middle East Memoir - Israel, Palestine and BeyondJohn Lyons12h 37m4.6 (1.4K)$33 · $0.00
BeyondStephen Walker15h 39m4.6 (3.2K)$33 · $0.00
Kings and PawnsHoward Bryant10h 9m4.6 (678)$29 · $0.00
No EscapeNury Turkel9h 30m4.6 (809)$28 · $0.00
Jubal Stone: U.S. Marshal: Blood Trail To Hell: A Western Adventure NovelCasey Nash3h 42m4.6 (3.2K)$18 · $0.00
You may also like
SapiensYuval Noah Harari15h 18m4.3 (1.4M) · 1362$33 · $0.00
The Simple Beauty of the Unexpected, Second EditionMarcelo Gleiser6h 16m4.1 (354)$17
The Homing InstinctBernd Heinrich11h 7m4.0 (1.6K)$29 · $0.00
CozyIsabel Gillies5h 14m3.6 (2K)$24 · $0.00
The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to SexCharles Darwin28h 1m4.1 (6.4K)$1 · $0.00
THE WOLF TRILOGY: Call of the Wild, White Fang & The Son of the WolfJack London17h 31m4.5 (2.4K)$1.99 · $0.00
EvolutionScientific American7h 23m3.7 (32)$17
Behind the FootlightsMrs. Alec-Tweedie10h 9m$2 · $0.00
Why There Are No Denisovans or Any Other SpeciesJovica Novotny4h$3.50 · $0.00
Empty HandsArthur Stringer8h 56m$2 · $0.00
The Mason-WaspsJean-Henri Fabre7h 41m4.0 (50)$1 · $0.00
Our Oldest CompanionsPat Shipman6h 47m3.5 (398)$17
The Power of Movement in PlantsSir Francis Darwin, Charles Darwin19h 20m3.4 (84)$1 · $0.00
Englisch lernen Audio - Sind Sie ein guter Zuhörer?Rita Forbes, Michael Pilewski1h$11
The Birth of IberiaSantiago Machain4h 11m$19 · $0.00
The DishAndrew Friedman7h 3m3.8 (314)$24 · $0.00
Ethnological results of the Point Barrow expeditionJohn Murdoch20h 38m$2 · $0.00
The quantum postulate and the recent development of atomic theoryNiels Bohr1h 14m$1 · $0.00
PsychologyAristotle4h$3 · $0.00
Why There Are No Neanderthals or Any Other SpeciesJovica Novotny3h 7m$3.50 · $0.00