Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human January 27, 2010

In his latest book, Catching Fire, Harvard biological anthropologist Richard Wrangham puts forth the bold theory that our Paleolithic Homo ancestors tamed fire and began cooking 1.8 million years ago, much earlier than conventionally believed. Wrangham will discuss how cooking started a revolution in human evolution, which drove large-scale changes in our physiology, behavior, and cognition and has defined our species to this very day. The program will include a discussion moderated by Noel Michele Holbrook, Professor of Biology and Charles Bullard Professor of Forestry at Harvard. Free and open to the public.