Future Primal How Our Wilderness Origins Show Us the Way Forward

by Herman, Louis G.

• ISBN13: 9781608681150
• ISBN10: 1608681157
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2013-03-19
• Publisher: New World Library

Summary

What if the way out of global political unrest and ecological collapse lay not in the search for the new but in an exploration of the old? Louis G. Herman argues that to re-envision the future we should look back into our deepest past. This past is seen in the San Bushmen of southern Africa, the oldest culture on Earth. As Herman reminds, "every human alive today is a direct descendant" of this group. For at least nine-tenths of the time we have been human, we have lived as hunter-gatherers in small communities in intimate relationship with wilderness. Herman does not suggest we move back to this way of life but that we mine this archetypal model for its wisdom. What he sets forth here, with convincing conviction, is a way to "reset the confused compass of humanity," using both cutting-edge science and our oldest, aboriginal way of being.

Author Biography

Louis G. Herman, a professor of political science at the University of Hawaii, was born in an orthodox Jewish community in Apartheid South Africa. He attained multiple degrees at Cambridge and volunteered for military service in Israel. He lives in Honolulu.