Why read The Soul of the Ape & My Friends the Baboons?

Book cover of The Soul of the Ape & My Friends the Baboons

Book description

Eugene Marais spent three years living in the South African wilderness in close daily contact with a troop of baboons. He later described this as the happiest, most content time of his troubled life. This period produced two works which are testament to his research and conclusions; they have very…

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The unconscious mind

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Soul of the Ape & My Friends the Baboons as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Simon Clark

Author

Early in the twentieth century, Marais studied a troop of baboons, studying their behavior, gaining insights into how this primate thinks, and, moreover, drawing conclusions about the development of the human psyche. Marais believed that the human unconscious mind, which he called “the subliminal soul” and which still “shapes our thoughts and actions”, is the ancient animal mentality, submerged beneath the evolution of the conscious mind. Therefore, he postulates, the hereditary mind that belonged to our pre-human ancestors is very much alive and well within us.

From Simon's list on the development of the human mind.