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Adam's Curse: A Future without Men | 
| Author: Bryan Sykes
Category: Book
List Price: $25.95
Buy New: $16.91
You Save: $9.04 (35%)
New (5) Used (11) from $8.56
Avg. Customer Rating:  32 reviews
Sales Rank: 911303
Format: Bargain Price
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1 Amer ed
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.2
ISBN: 2702890490
Dewey Decimal Number: 599.936
EAN: 9782702890493
ASIN: B000FUO0NS
Publication Date: March 31, 2004
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
amazon.com
Bryan Sykes follows up The Seven Daughters of Eve with the equally challenging and well-written Adam's Curse. This time, instead of following humanity's heritage back to the first women, Sykes looks forward to a possible future without men. The seeds of the book's topics were sown when Sykes met a pre-eminent pharmaceutical company chairman who shared his surname. Using the Y chromosome, which is passed nearly unchanged from father to son, the author found that he shared a distant ancestor with the other Sykes. Along the way, he discovered that the Y chromosome was worth examining more closely. The first third of Adam's Curse is devoted to a clear and comprehensive lesson about genetics, the second narrates several fascinating stories of tracing ancestry via the Y chromosome, and the last chapters explore the history of male humanity and its future. Some readers will eagerly skim until they reach Chapter 21, where Sykes gets to the heart of the matter--why and how the Y chromosome has created a world where men overwhelmingly own the wealth and power, commit the crimes, and fight the wars. He uses the structural puniness of the Y chromosome to demonstrate that men are as unnecessary biologically as they are dominant socially. Sykes' provocative and quite personal book is likely to be unpopular among science readers who prefer their biology divorced from sociology, but his points taken in context will be difficult to refute. --Therese Littleton
Book Description
The inside story of the Y chromosome's fatal flaw, as told by one of the world's leading geneticists. Male reproductive fragility has been the subject of much highly publicized recent research. Is it possible, asked the New York Times, that men face extinction? Bryan Sykes examines the validity of these shocking reports, focusing on the defining characteristic of men: the Y chromosome in their DNA. Guiding his readers through chapters like "The Blood of Vikings" and "Ribbons of Life," Sykes masterfully blends natural history with scientific fact, elucidating the biology of sexual reproduction, modern genetics, and evolutionary biology. He reveals that, while the Y chromosome makes man's existence possible, it also carries within it the seeds of his destruction. Timely and fascinating, this major work covers a wealth of controversial topics, including whether there is a genetic cause for male greed, aggression, and promiscuity; the possible existence of a male homosexual gene; and what, if anything, can be done to save men from a slow, but certain, extinction.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 27 more reviews...
 Sykes May 22, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
I have just begun reading this book, it deals with the male side of the family. Finding out that the Y chromosome is only in males is a suprise to me & probably to others. Sykes is great in telling the average person all about DNA chr& what it does & how it plays a role in humans...
 A Fasinating Read October 26, 2007
This was a fascinating book, really fascinating. And the audio book was even better (because it kills two birds with one stone: hearing a fabulous tale and getting from A to B without total boredom or road rage.) I recommend this book which concentrates on the male Y chromosome and it's companion, The Seven Daughters of Eve by the same author which traces mDNA or mitachondrial DNA that is passed only down through women.
So true! June 27, 2007
1 out of 5 found this review helpful
After reading this book, I have a whole new view of the male of our species. So many things about males became clear. The aggression, the laziness, the superior attitude which is so misplaced. Ladies! A must read!
 Disappointing April 20, 2007
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
OK, I loved Sykes' book "The Seven Daughters of Eve." So I wanted to read this one as well. Very disappointing. For one thing, I couldn't care less about the mating and reproductive habits of insects. For another, while I understand his wish to clarify things scientifically, I thought some of his opinions about women and homosexuality were pretty outlandish. There were a few interesting things in the book. The parts about Ghengis Khan would be one example.
But my biggest issue with the book is that Sykes seems to have gotten way too full of himself and way too focused on "being a writer." Please! Do I really care what the weather was like or what the library looked like when he got idea XYZ? What made the other book so engaging was that he was just telling about the excitement of the discovery process and some of the possibilities for these women who many of us are descended from.
The demise of males January 10, 2007
2 out of 9 found this review helpful
An excellent, well-written book on the genetic consequences of sex. Written in such a way that the basic genetic ideas are easily grasped by persons with no prior knowledge of DNA and the way it operates. A fascinating glimpse of the consequences of a genetic mechanism for sex determination and a time-frame for the loss of the Y chromosome and the end of males for all time. Essential freading!
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