Sex, Time and Power: How Women's Sexuality Shaped Human Evolution

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Summary: "Sex, Time and Power" What a Brilliant Read!!!!!!!!
Review: "Sex, Time and Power", by Leonard Shlain was, without a doubt, the most interesting book I have ever read. First of all, it focuses on everything that we take for granted and gives you the evolutionary backgrounds and the beginnings. Not only does Dr. Shlain make everthing easy to understand, he is funny-a very talented writer. It really opened up my brain!!!! A absolute must read.

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Summary: Sex, Time and Power
Review: As a white, middle aged, working class male, I found Dr. Shlain's book "Sex, Time and Power" deeply moving, inciteful and inspiring. His profound analysis backed up by thorough research, well referenced and footnoted to other scientists, scholars and authorities of our time gives one pause to contemplate some of the most powerful and important issues of our age. Dr. Shlain tells us how women have made essential contributions to the evolution of our sapien species and how they have been denied the acknowledgement of these accomplishments and their basic human rights. I have bought 4 copies of this book to pass around to my friends and donate to libraries. Great read, I couldn't put it down.

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Summary: Unforgettable
Review: As a woman and mother, I found this book absolutely fascinating. It wasn't written too dry like a textbook, but it had so much to digest, I took my time reading it. I've always been very interested in human sexuality, especially as it differed from animals and I've never found a book that dared to dig in and really discuss the differences and the WHYS, until now. The revolutionary concepts Mr. Shlain presents should be taught in all high schools. Perhaps then the next generation would have a better idea of why they behave the way they do and how they can improve relations between the sexes. This book is definitely mind-altering. You're a genius, Mr. Shlain!

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Summary: sex time and power
Review: Being a simple layman, I found the book to be fascinating.
I caught on in the first few chapters that the author was
taking many liberties in his presentation. However by doing
so he allowed me to sort of understand his message regarding
the relationship between men and women and how that relationship has evovled over the last 150 thousand years. I sort of got the big picture without falling asleep after reading the first 50 pages. I'll probably read some his other books.

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Summary: Interesting to Read but Difficult to Love
Review: Dr. Shlain has undoubtedly done us all a favor in giving this matter so much thought. And he has much to bring to the topic. This is an in depth examination, looking at both fact and theory, into the physical and behavioral differences in the genders of humans, and how those differences in turn differ from those of animals.

He reaches some fascinating conclusions. His treatise alone on the relationship between women and the nutritional mineral iron should give us all, as women, reason to pause and look closely at our chronic disadvantage in this matter. In a modern era when women of childbearing age seem at times to have little in common but our exhaustian, we should pay close attention to such clues as to why it can be literally more difficult for us than for men to do something as basic as bring oxygen to our brain. And furthermore, from menarche to menopause, we are united in this challenge.

I'm afraid though, that Dr. Shlain position on science and spirituallity is so tenuous and unpredictable that he will in turn alienate every member of his audience. He actually seems to grow less scientific as the book progresses. Early on he is emphatically thinking in terms of pure, Darwinian natural selction, in which all traits both physical and behavioral are presumed to have evolved based solely on the ability of the possessors to survive and reproduce.

But as the book progresses, he begins to introduce, with little explanation, an alternative source of evolutionary influence that he personifies repeatedly as a sentient force of nature. This "Mother Nature" is concluded to be a deal-maker who trades with humans who must relinquish an advantage to gain a weakness (and with no explanation of how this deal could come about through natural selection). Later on she is a schemer, cleverly and deliberately aligning women's menses with the lunar calendar -- apparently through sheer magic -- for the sole purpose of teaching humans about time. With these implications, Dr. Shlain essentially introduces a nature deity into what he previously was calculating as coldly mathematical evolutionary equation. This Nature Godess seems to come and go from the treatise as is convenient for Dr. Shlain's conclusions.

At no time however does he allow for the presence of a third force -- that of human spirituality. All human behavior is presumed to be hormonal and anatomical in nature, based enitrely on ancestral patterns. While Dr. Shlain calls a great many anthropological conclusions into question, he appears to accept all psychological theory unquestioning.

Add to this a highly imperfect and unpredictable sense of logic and the book becomes difficult to take as seriously as I would like. A clever extrapolation on the survival value of color blindness and left-handedness is stunted by an attempt to extend the theory to homosexuality with a logic so faulty it can not stand when the existence of asexuality and bisexuality are also considered. And a futher attempt to extend his logic to male-pattern baldness is entirely comical.

People who are either deeply spiritual or cooly scientific may have trouble with this book. So may bisexuals or vegetarians. So may anyone who appreciates consistency of logic.

If you can tolerate these foibles and if you are interested in the physioligcal differences between men and women, the book is at least worth skimming -- or perhaps read the first half, which is much more solid. Enjoy the beautiful art work and its clever juxtipositioning, particularly several works by Munch, an artist who, had he been contemporary, no doubt could have easily illustrated the full text. Enjoy the doctors theories, some of which are quite clever and may be qutie valid.

Finally, for the more devoted residents of what everyone in Oregon knows is properly called "The Gorge" you may wish to brace yourselves for the epilogue in which Dr. Shlain describes his ephinany while driving on Highway 84 through "The Columbia River Canyon". He said it, not I.

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Summary: Best book on why the sexes behave the way they do
Review: Dr. Shlain has written one of the most thought-provoking and riveting books I have ever read. While most books on male/female bahavior merely catalogue our characteristics, Dr. Shlain postulates convincing theories on the species survival motivations for our behavior--largely driven by the female's sexuality and the pressures of birth and rearing children. His theories on our development of perception of time and mortality, and our consequent inventions of art and ritual make me wonder why women aren't the center of our world in every way--or, maybe they are! This wonderful book answers many of my long-standing questions about (in my case as a male) why women are the way they are. For a truly profound examination of the bahavior of the sexes, you can do no better than to read this book, discuss it with your friends and significant others, and wonder about its implications for understanding your own humanity. It has been a life-changing book for me.

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Summary: A Unique and Fascinating Book About Human Evolution!
Review: Dr. Shlain's refreshing insight and research shines a new light on the vastly complex concept of how human societies have evolved. The main question brought forth and examined centers on a fundamental biologic difference between females and males. The book then brilliantly develops this thesis to bring a novel perspective to social topics ranging from relationships to politics. This is a book that takes one to a higher and deeper space of intellect, challenging common thought and inevitably enlightening the curious reader. This is a book that will no doubt create wonderful scientific, philosophic, and social discussions among great minds!

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Summary: Old Record Holder Displaced!
Review: For 25 years, "A Pattern Language" (C. Alexander, et al) has occupied first place in my "Most Human Wisdom In a Book Cover" category. Leonard Shlain's "Sex, Time, and Power" has just replaced it. Surely, even amongst the well educated, the relationship between men and women holds more misunderstanding than any other human endeavor. Dr. Shlain's insightful study sheds more light into this thorny area than the sum of all other similar books I have read. Although the writing style is personal and humerous, this book is a relatively slow read due to the sheer density of ideas presented and quantity of supporting documentation supplied. Every time I loan out this book, it proves very difficult to get back. It is a slooow read that borrowers do not want to relinquish until they have finished. After a few weeks rumination time, I find them asking me if the book is available again. Get your own copy! Anyone trying to make sense of "The Urge to Merge" will find themselves returning to this fertile well of ideas again and again.
As a related aside, attending a book store talk given by Dr. Shlain, I found him to be every bit an excellent speaker as he is an excellent writer. If given the chance to hear him speak, don't miss it!

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Summary: Let's see who can win the speculation contest
Review: How women's sexuality shaped human evolution. The more I read in this book the more difficult it seemed for me to go on. The author has made one mighty attempt after another to explain why women are the way they are through evolutionary change and why their particular sexual characteristics such as menstruation, menopause, and ever the ability to climax made them more "fit" in the fight for survival of the fittest. Unfortunately, Shlain's conjectures start sounding so far-fetched that one is led to begin questioning Darwin. I don't believe it does anyone a service to be so speculative without more to go on.

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Summary: Praise
Review: I enjoyed Leonard Shlain's book very much. Shlain offer's new ideas about the forces shaping human evolution. He is a smart, clear, and very thought-provoking writer with an incredible depth of knowledge and imagination.

In Shlain's words, he hopes: "that my endeavor has added to the reader's understanding of relations between the sexes and has predisposed them to conceive of human mating behaviors in a new way." I think he definately hit the mark!