Sex, Time, and Power

How Women's Sexuality Shaped Human Evolution

By: Leonard Shlain

Narrated by: Bob Souer

As in the best-selling The Alphabet Versus the Goddess, Leonard Shlain's provocative book promises to change the way listeners view themselves and where they came from.

Sex, Time, and Power offers a tantalizing answer to an age-old question: Why did big-brained Homo sapiens suddenly emerge some 150,000 years ago? The key, according to Shlain, is female sexuality. Drawing on an awesome breadth of research, he shows how, long ago, the narrowness of the newly bipedal human female's pelvis and the increasing size of infants' heads precipitated a crisis for the species. Natural selection allowed for the adaptation of the human female to this environmental stress by reconfiguring her hormonal cycles, entraining them with the periodicity of the moon. The results, however, did much more than ensure our existence; they imbued women with the concept of time, and gave them control over sex - a power that males sought to reclaim. And the possibility of achieving immortality through heirs drove men to construct patriarchal cultures that went on to dominate so much of human history.

From the nature of courtship to the evolution of language, Shlain's brilliant and wide-ranging exploration stimulates new thinking about very old matters.

©2003 Leonard Shlain (P)2020 Tantor

eye-opening

Wow, the beginning of our species and in general, biology plays a huge role in how the sexes interact with each other. Fascinating listen. I know understand better hoe male and female motivation and behavior works.

Do I make you horny baby?

The books is an interesting one...I preferred his Alphabet Versus the Goddess book in depth and content. in listening to this book I am reminded of our hairy shitting dying ape nature! but of course, we are more than that. have a listen and see what stands out to you.

I am grateful you are so curious and bright.

This book has so much wisdom in it to criticize anything here in my opinion is a fool’s errand.
You dissect details subjective in nature as clever as one possibly could knowing the ambiguity of such a illusive subject is challenging to say the least.
Worth reading a few times! Thank you!

I loved this book

There are so many interesting ideas here. Sure, the archaeology, and the science hasn’t caught up to prove or disprove Shlain’s thesis.

I think it’s best to read this thinking of Shlain as an artist as opposed to a scientist.

He is setting out some big ideas for us to contemplate certainly it’s a scientific way of looking at human evolution, but it ties together the evolution of the social structures that make up our complex society with our biological evolution, which is quite mysterious.

I am actually a believer in the supernatural and the spirit world, but I also believe in evolutionary biology, but then again, I am an artist not a scientist, and an artist can hold contradictory ideas in their head, and find a way to see the possibility of them both.

I would like to extend Leonard Shlain a tiny amount of artistic license and allow him to take us on these thoroughly imagined thought exercises.

If you are a scientist dive in, pick up the argument, what would it take to prove or disprove his thesis? If you’ve already made up your mind about everything well, this is probably not the book for you.

An intellectualized interpretation of the book of genesis

I love this book. It provides a scientific and less “fantastical” expression of the creation of man. I believe it exemplifies the concept that Adam and Eve were the guides of awakening others around them to the truth of sex and reproduction; which was a huge turning point in human development. I also believe it provides valuable insights into the dynamics between men and women, and how we can work together to help create more peace and harmony in our most intimate relationships

Very interesting account of the relationship of us

this is a very thorough and interesting account of the biology of men and women and how we relate to one another, it has much to do with our hormones and Cave Man and Woman days!

I’m sad he has passed, he was a great mind

I’ve wondered about many of these ideas myself. It’s really cool reading a book that talks about this and I find it compelling. I told my husband to read it too so we can talk about it. I think he’s wrong about gays and lesbians, but all the rest I liked. I think gay men have a mind-altering parasite or some other disease. It must be sexually transmitted anally and they are driven to compulsively seek others to infect. Lesbians have no fewer children than straight women. It’s an adaptation to get a higher value man and sharing him. That’s why men find lesbianism attractive, two for one deal. But the rest of it I loved! Why some men go bald, are left handed, and are color blind is fascinating! And I think I need to learn to like steak, I’ve been anemic for years, I should fix that. I kept thinking about the incel sub-culture and how well their existence and attitudes are explained by this world view. Next time I encounter a red-piller I’m going to recommend this book. Hopefully it will make them realize that women aren’t being malicious, this is just how Mother Nature set us up. And men are the way they are for the same reason. It’s kinda tragic, actually. Now that we’ve done away with the cultural norms that made the system function, a compromise between the sexes where neither got all they desired but were happy enough. And now that the deal is broken many men and women are deeply unhappy.

Well done Shlain, well done....

This book was interesting. Shlain has done a good job putting things together to elucidate our past and it's impacts on now.

Almost perfect

This was a nice attempt by a man to sort out some of the things that women experience and how we have evolved. It lacks any acknowledgement of our spiritual nature, and how that contributes to the dance between the evolution of the sexea. The part that is very incorrect however, perhaps being dated, is about male circumcision. The foreskin sheath functions as the "ears" of the penis, able to percieve and feel the woman during intercourse, and protecting against useless friction that results in dryness and irritation. Being able to feel a woman in the most intimate way possible, a man can respond better to her pleasure or lack there of. Having sex with a circumcised male is uncomfortable, often resulting with difficulty for women to remain lubricated, and for men to feel what they are even doing inside her. Infant genital mutilation is essentially for separating men from their full capacity to be intimate with women, and instead have them seek a mythical male diety as a God/savior. Circumcision destroys the potential intimacy and depth a man can feel, only compounding the effect of monotheistic patriarchal religion on the male psyche.

I couldn’t stop listening.

Fascinating book, accessible to the science-averse, and very thought provoking. Special kudos to the narrator for delivering the words in a way that’s engaging without ever veering into the kind of cloying performance that has forced me to abandon many books whose content was not the problem.