Featuring Eva Jablonka, PhD                       

"Each aspect of a human symbolic culture is part of an interacting network of behaviors,
ideas, and the products of behavior and ideas that is shaped by many different forces.
This makes it very difficult to think about any artifact or behavior as anevolutionary
unit in isolation from the culture in which it is historically embedded."

Professor Eva Jablonka is one of our Invited speakers at the next Wold Conference 11, in Sydney in July 2013. She has a Ph.D. in Genetics from the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel. Her post-Doctoral studies were in the Philosophy of Science, and in Developmental Genetics. She is a professor in the Cohn Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Ideas, Tel-Aviv. Her main interest is the understanding of evolution, especially evolution that is driven by non-genetic hereditary variations, and in the evolutionary transition to phenomenal consciousness. The co-authored books listed below examine and discuss some of these issues. See her CV below.

Here we have some readings that she generously share with us:

• Plasticity and canalization in the evolution of linguistic communication: an evolutionary-developmental approach (see Dor Jablonka 2010)
• The co-evolution of language and emotions (see 2012 language and emotions)
• Epigenetics and the Embodiment of Race: Developmental Origins of US Racial Disparities in Cardiovascular Health (see 2009 Kuzawa and Sweet)