A brain for all seasons : human evolution and abrupt climate change

Preamble 3 51°N 0°E Darwin's home Catastrophic gradualism 13 51°N 0°W Evolution House, Kew Gardens The Darwinian Quality Bootstrap 21 51°N 1°E Down among the fossils All of those chimp-human differences 27 49°N 2°E Musée de l'Homme in Paris The Ghost of Habitats Past 35 50°N 8°E Bockenheim Tracing roots back to the Big Bang 47 52°N 5°E Layover Limbo IQ and evolution's package deals 59 22°N 14°E Contemplating the Sahara Why climate can suddenly flip 65 0°N 22°E Latitude Zero Population fluctuations and refugia 75 19°S 23°E Okavango Delta The island advantage 83 25°S 16°E Sossusvlei Dunes Hominid opportunities in deserts? 97 26°S 28°E Sterkfontein Caves The big change in hominid diet 103 34°S 18°E Cape of Good Hope The turning point that wasn't 111 1°S 37°E Nairobi Creating new species from old ones 117 2°S 36°E Olorgesailie Page 3 The easiest tool of all 125 0°S 36°E Kariandusi A layer cake of handaxes 133 0°S 36°E Lake Nakuru Where droughts cause a boom time 147 1°N 36°E Lake Baringo The earliest hominids 151 1°S 36°E Lake Naivasha Droughts even in good times 155 3°S 35°E Olduvai Gorge Degrees of separation 169 1°S 35°E Maasai Mara The Crash-Boom-Boom cycle 177 20°N 15°E Libya by moonlight The last big step toward humans 193 52°N 5°E Layover Limbo (again) The Little Ice Age and its witch hunts 205 56°N 13°E Copenhagen's ice cores Slow ice ages and abrupt whiplashes 211 56°N 13°E The plane where it's always noon How ice age climate got the shakes 221 60°N 11°E High above Oslo The ocean has a conveyor belt 229 63°N 6°E Out over the sinking Gulf Stream Dan's coffee cream trick 237 71°N 8°W Jan Mayen Island Flushing the Gulf Stream 243 72°N 12°W The Greenland Sea Losing the first Panama Canal 247 74°N 19°W Greenland fjords What stops the conveyor 253 75°N 40°W Atop Greenland Why melting can cause cooling 257 78°N 69°W Thule Rube Goldberg cause-and-effect 261 73°N 95°W Somerset Island North Poles aren't what they used to be 269 68°N 105°W Crossing the North American coast How we might stabilize climate 275 62°N 114°W Yellowknife, Northwest Territories Feedbacks in the greenhouse 283 49°N 123°W Bumpy border crossing Managing high-risk situations 289 Afterthoughts 297 Acknowledgments 299 Glossary 301 Recommended Reading 312 Chapter Notes 317 Subject Index 338 Directions, Distances, Temperatures: A westerly wind comes from the west, moving eastward. Ocean currents, however, are described by the direction that the current would carry a ship toward. An east wind and an east current thus flow in opposite directions. Don't blame the scientists for this one (it's an old maritime tradition); our peculiarities can be found in the extensive glossary starting at page 301.