Evolving Hamlet [electronic resource] : seventeenth-century English tragedy and the ethics of natural selection / Angus Fletcher.
Fletcher, Angus, 1976-
2011
PR678.T7 F54 2011eb
Available Online

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Title Evolving Hamlet [electronic resource] : seventeenth-century English tragedy and the ethics of natural selection / Angus Fletcher.
Author Fletcher, Angus, 1976-
Edition 1st ed.
ISBN 9780230118386 (electronic bk.)
9780230111684
Imprint New York : Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
Language English
Description 1 online resource (xvi, 192 p.)
Call Number PR678.T7 F54 2011eb
Dewey Decimal Classification 822/.05120936
Summary "Recent work in cognitive science has rooted our moral dispositions in the more ancient and less plastic regions of our brains, seeming to confirm Darwin's suspicion that a biological approach to human life must necessarily produce a narrowly conservative (and perhaps even immutable) account of ethics. This book, however, explores a now-forgotten suggestion made by William James and other early pioneers of cognitive science who saw art as a means to translate the experimental study of the mind into a skeptical, pluralist, and progressive approach to the good life. Using Hamlet and a number of other popular and influential seventeenth-century tragedies as case-studies, this book shows how aesthetic experience can help organize the biological functions of our brains into adaptive social networks that not only make us more resilient to the pressures of natural selection, but fulfill the human need for intentional life. Seen this way, art is not--as many recent cognitive scientists have suggested--simply a mirror of our natural mental functions. Rather, it is also an active contributor to new functions, a useful tool for translating the theoretical discoveries of science into progressive ethical practice"-- Provided by publisher.
Bibliography, etc. Note Includes bibliographical references and index.
Access Note Access limited to authorized users.
Source of Description Description based on print version record.
Series Cognitive studies in literature and performance.
Available in Other Form Evolving Hamlet.
Linked Resources Online Access
Record Appears in Online Resources > Ebooks
All Resources
Introduction: The Descent of Ethics
Faustus, Macbeth, and the Riddle of Tomorrow
Partial Belief in Julius Caesar and Hamlet
Othello and the Subject of Ocular Proof
The Indian Emperour and the Reason of New World Conflict
Cartesian Generosity and the New Shakespeare
King Lear and the Endurance of Tragedy
The Progress of Ethics
Conclusion
Notes
Index.

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