Questioning the Millennium: A Rationalist's Guide to a Precisely Arbitrary Countdown pdf

斯蒂芬杰古尔德是美国古生物学家、进化生物学家和科学史学家。他是他这一代最有影响力和最广泛阅读的科普作家之一。古尔德的大部分职业生涯都在哈佛大学任教，并在纽约的美国自然历史博物馆工作。 1996 年，古尔德被聘为纽约大学的文森特·阿斯特（Vincent Astor）生物学客座研究教授，之后他在纽约大学和哈佛之间分配教学时间。 古尔德对进化生物学最重要的贡献是与 Niles Eldredge 在 1972 年提出的间断平衡理论。该理论提出，大多数进化的特点是长期的进化稳定性，很少被快速的分支物种形成所打断。该理论与种类渐进论形成鲜明对比，后者是一种流行的观点，即进化变化的特征是化石记录中平稳而连续的变化模式。 Gould 的大部分实证研究都是基于蜗牛属 Poecilozonites 和 Cerion。他还为进化发育生物学做出了重要贡献，他的著作《个体发育和系统发育》获得了广泛的专业认可。 [5]在进化论中，他反对严格的选择论、应用于人类的社会生物学和进化心理学。他反对神创论，并建议将科学和宗教视为两个不同的领域（或“不重叠的权威”），其权威不重叠。 古尔德被公众所熟知主要是因为他在《自然历史》杂志上发表了 300 篇受欢迎的文章，以及为专家和非专家撰写的众多书籍。 2000年4月，美国国会图书馆将他命名为“活着的传奇”

Questioning the Millennium: A Rationalist's Guide to a Precisely Arbitrary Countdown pdf 斯蒂芬·杰·古尔德

In this new edition of Questioning the Millennium, best-selling author Stephen Jay Gould applies his wit and erudition to one of today's most pressing subjects: the significance of the millennium. In 1950 at age eight, prompted by an issue of Life magazine marking the century's midpoint, Stephen Jay Gould started thinking about the approaching turn of the millennium. In this beautiful inquiry into time and its milestones, he shares his interest and insights with his readers. Refreshingly reasoned and absorbing, the book asks and answers the three major questions that define the approaching calendrical event. First, what exactly is this concept of a millennium and how has its meaning shifted? How did the name for a future thousand-year reign of Jesus Christ on earth get transferred to the passage of a secular period of a thousand years in current human history? When does the new millennium really begin: January 1, 2000, or January 1, 2001? (Although seemingly trivial, the debate over this issue tells an intriguing story about the cultural history of the twentieth century.) And why must our calendars be so complex, leading to our search for arbitrary regularity, including a fascination with millennia? This revised edition begins with a new and extensive preface on a key subject not treated in the original version. As always, Gould brings into his essays a wide range of compelling historical and scientific fact, including a brief history of millennial fevers, calendrical traditions, and idiosyncrasies from around the world; the story of a sixth-century monk whose errors in chronology plague us even today; and the heroism of a young autistic man who has developed the extraordinary ability to calculate dates deep into the past and the future. Ranging over a wide terrain of phenomena--from the arbitrary regularities of human calendars to the unpredictability of nature, from the vagaries of pop culture to the birth of Christ--Stephen Jay Gould holds up the mirror to our millennial passions to reveal our foibles, absurdities, and uniqueness--in other words, our humanity.