This book is a wonderful breath of fresh air and a book for the general reader as much as for philosophers. Mary Midgley (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Midgely) explores the relation between men and other animals in an original but common sense way. The book has garnered more relevance to bioethical controversies today than it had on publication in 1978. It forms an introduction to the kind of ‘green’ philosophy now developing in Europe and America, and it has strongly influenced a great deal of thought, both practical and philosophical.
Philosophers have traditionally concentrated on the qualities that make human beings different from other species. In Beast and Man (1978) Midgley stresses continuities. What makes people tick? Largely, she argues, the same things as animals. She tells us humans are rather more like other animals than we previously allowed ourselves to believe, and reminds us just how primitive we are in comparison to the sophistication of many animals.
A veritable classic for our age, Beast and Man has changed our self-understanding. Essential reading.
Follow up an interest in Mary Midgely by reading her memoir The Owl of Minerva: A Memoir. Routledge, 2005. ISBN 0-415-36788-3 (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Owl-Minerva-Memoir-Mary-Midgley/dp/0415371392/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1387228640&sr=8-1&keywords=midgley+owl+of+minerva)
Check if this title is in stock at your local library by consulting the online catalogue here Home | South Lanarkshire Libraries (sllclibrary.co.uk)
416 pages in Routledge paperback edition
ISBN 978-0415289870
Mary Midgely