Exploding the happy family myth: a controversial new look at why we're destined to family fighting.Why is a baby's cry such a stressful sound? Why do brothers and sisters fight so often? Why do teenagers rebel? Why can family life be so difficult? The answers, say the authors of Baby Wars, have more to do with our own genetic survival than a dysfunctional psyche.
Baby Wars explodes the vision of the nuclear family once and for all, revealing the conflicts simmering beneath the surface of even the happiest households. While we consciously crave the ideal of quiet and calm family life, forces within us are furiously at war: fatherhood, motherhood, nurturing and care. Beneath these deeply human instincts lies another even deeper one - the will to guarantee our own genetic survival - at the expense of those whom we love and cherish.
In his previous book, Sperm Wars, Robin Baker, an evolutionary biologist, showed the day-to-day Darwinism of our sex lives in a series of fascinating, instantly recognizable fictional situations. Here, he and his partner, Elizabeth Oram, do the same for parenthood, discovering how our instinct to survive results in competitive behaviors that deeply affect family harmony.
Highly provocative, yet profoundly persuasive, Baby Wars strips away the layers of contemporary family life, exposing the genetic reasons for its everyday foibles - and its darkest secrets.
A compelling read for anyone who has ever wondered if their family life is "normal," Baby Wars delivers some unforgettable answers.

Baby Wars

Politics & Social Sciences

Baker, Robin

Sociology

HarperCollins, Publishers

Even the happiest families endure periods of intense conflict and emotional strife. Read this eye-opening book and find out why.What does evolution have to do with morning sickness? With the stressful sound of a baby's cry? With sibling rivalry and adolescent rage? With child abuse? Everything, says Dr. Robin Baker, whose best-selling Sperm Wars illustrated the day-to-day Darwinism of human sexual life. Now Dr. Baker teams up with journalist and children's books author Elizabeth Oram to do the same for parenthood and family life. They look at a variety of instantly recognizable family situations and offer evolutionary explanations for common, often traumatic, events--explanations that not only make clear the genetic roots of family conflicts but that reveal, in many cases, their wider reproductive purpose. Highly provocative yet profoundly persuasive, this compelling book sheds light on the darkest secrets of family life and brings them out into the open where they can be addressed with honesty and without judgment.

Baby Wars: The Dynamics of Family Conflict

Oram, Elizabeth

Ecco

Robin Baker puts forward the thesis that evolution has programmed men to conquer and monopolise women while women, without even knowing they are doing it, seek the best genetic input on offer from potential sexual partners. Facts of life presented include: 10 per cent of children are not fathered by their "fathers", less than 1 per cent off a man's sperm is capable of fertilizing anything - the rest is there to fight off other men's sperm, "smart" vaginal mucus encourages some sperm but blocks others, and a woman is far more likely to conceive through a casual fling than through sex with her regular partner. Baker describes fictionalized scences and then explains the science behind the actions to demonstrate how our everyday behaviour fits into a pattern of evolution.

Sperm Wars: Infidelity, Sexual Conflict and Other Bedroom Battles

Science & Math

MACMILLAN PUB. LTD.

Argues that men inately believe their sperm will be competing with that of other men for the opportunity to fertilize an egg, and that women unconsciously promote this competition

Sperm Wars: The Science Of Sex

Self-Help

Basic Books

Designing the Future: The Computer in Architecture and Design

Arts & Photography

Graphic Design

Thames&Hudson

Human navigation and the sixth sense

Technology

SIMON AND SCHUSTER

Sex in the Future: The Reproductive Revolution and How it Will Change Us

Baker explains the technologies of assisted reproduction that are currently available and those likely to become available: from in vitro fertilization and surrogate motherhood to cloning, gamete banking, and novel ways of micro-manipulating sperm and egg, testes and ovaries. Also discusses the changes in society, relationships, and attitudes that the new technologies will catalyze. Predicts a social revolution -- the decline of the nuclear family in favor of the single-parent family, the potentially complete separation of sex from reproduction, and the rise of a reproductive bazaar, where people will be able to shop for their reproductive choices. Uses fictional scenarios to dramatize the ways our behavior will change, and weighs the social and moral issues.

Sex In The Future: The Reproductive Revolution And How It Will Change Us

Medical Books

Medicine

Diane Pub Co.

This revolutionary book demonstrates that sexual behavior is driven by neither the psyche nor the conscious mind, but by biological imperatives programmed into us millions of years ago. Argues that a man's sexual behavior is based on the expectation that his sperm will have to compete with other men's sperm to fertilize the descending egg, &amp; women are programmed to promote this sperm warfare. Uses a series of fictional scenes involving some form of sexual contact, followed by an interpretation of each scene from the viewpoint of an evolutionary biologist. Provides a strikingly original &amp; fascinating window into sexual behavior.

Sperm Wars: The Science of Sex

Health, Fitness & Dieting

Psychology & Counseling

An evolutionary biologist's view of family life and family conflict argues that all human behavior is the result of genetics

Ecco Pr

Mesopotamian Civilization and the Origins of the New Testament

In this ground-breaking study, Robin Baker investigates the contribution ancient Mesopotamian theology made to the origins of Christianity. Drawing on a formidable range of primary sources, Baker's conclusions challenge the widely held opinion that the theological imprint of Babylonia and Assyria on the New Testament is minimal, and what Mesopotamian legacy it contains was mediated by the Hebrew Bible and ancient Jewish sources. After evaluating and substantially supplementing previous research on this mediation, Baker demonstrates significant direct Mesopotamian influence on the New Testament presentation of Jesus and particularly the character of his kingship. He also identifies likely channels of transmission. Baker documents substantial differences among New Testament authors in borrowing Mesopotamian conceptions to formulate their Christology. This monograph is an essential resource for specialists and students of the New Testament as well as for scholars interested in religious transmission in the ancient Near East and the afterlife of Mesopotamian culture.\nBook Description\nRedefines conceptions of the New Testament's origins by illuminating the East's contribution to the formation of early Christology.

History

Ancient Civilizations

Cambridge University Press

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Books by Baker, Robin