Eco Homo

This volume argues that the ecological and environmental changes that may have occurred at the same time may have been the vital cause of the evolution from ape to modern human. It offers theories as how the evolution of the gorilla may be tied to a long period of global cooling; how the drying up of the Mediterranean may have decreased the salinity of the northern Atlantic, lowering its freezing point and culminating in the Ice Age; and how waves of climatic aridity led to the formation of the deserts and may have been responsible for pushing hominids out of Africa, not once but several times. The book aims to shed new light on humankind's irrevocable ties to its environment.