Our ancestors of pre-history lived in an animal harmony with nature, free of the existential suffering we Homo sapiens experience.  But evolutionary changes to our bodies and brains left us with both an increased capacity for creative productivity and the discontent that comes with disconnection from our environment.  It is this duality of our evolution that sets us apart from all other species and inspires our most profound intellectual and spiritual yearning.  
  Science and spiritual practice have long been considered mutually exclusive, and yet they are both methods of investigation, of striving toward understanding of the universe in which we live.  Dismantling Discontent offers a provocative perspective on our existential suffering from the metaphorical viewpoints of Darwin and Buddha, synthesizing their two approaches--science and meditation, both rooted in the natural world--into a powerful union.
  In writing this book, Charlie Fisher, Ph.D., has touched upon a scientific taboo and shattered previous assumptions about the incompatibility of these two very different ways of knowing.  His daring, grounded in years of solid research and sincere practice, has cleared the path to an inspired, new "middle way" for us humans to be at greater peace with our selves, each other, and the world in which we live.

Charlie Fisher was a professor of Sociology at Brandeis University for thirty years, where he taught subjects including the history of science, courses on humans' relationship to nature, and meditation. He has a doctorate in mathematics from the University of California at Berkeley. He has been an agricultural laborer and cowboy., done bird and plant censuses, lived in ashrams and wild places, and has been meditating for years.

	Contents: DISMANTLING DISCONTENT: Buddha's Way Through Darwin's World
	Illustrations	5
	Preface	7
	Foreword by Lynn Margulis	15
	Introduction by Dorion Sagan	19
	Buddha and Darwin Biographies	23
1.	The Burden of Discontent	29
2.	Darwin's World	49
	Evolutionary Change	54
	Nature's Order Is Hard to Pin Down	63
	Are Things Getting Better?	73
	Darwin's Suffering	80
3.	Disease, Old Age and Death	85
	Not Often Seen	90
	Predation: Gentle or Violent?	91
	Conversation of Death	96
	Not so Gentle	98
	Only for Need?	101
	Predation not Paramount	103
	Death and Nature	104
	Ways of Dying	108
	Mortality Rates	112
	Dying Young	114
	Disease	115
	Disability	118
	Old Age, Sex and Death	119
	Animal Emotions	126
	Conclusion	133
4.	The Human Body	137
	Early Humans	139
	Mortality in the Wild	142
	The Paleolithic	148
	Transition to Civilization	150
	Diseases of Civilization	155
	Senescence	164
	Medical Death	168
	Discontent	170
	Acceptance	177
5.	Evolution, Mind and Meditation	187
	The Origin of Mind	191
	Nonverbal Communication	193
	Speech, Consciousness and Thought	201
	Meditation	206
	The Brain and the Mind	214
	Neurophysiology and Meditation	221
6.	Emotions, Dreams and Insight	237
	Concentration	244
	The Limits of Meditation	249
	Dreaming	257
	Insight	269
	Observation	274
7.	Attention and Wisdom	279
	Hunter-gatherers	279
	Hunter-gatherer Attention	279
	Historiography	286
	Hunter-gatherer Emotions	288
	Prehistoric Wisdom	297
	Non-harming and Nature	303
	Impact on the Environment	307
	Conclusion	310
8.	Civilization's Discontent	313
	Transition to Civilization	313
	The Modern World	326
	The Mind as Tool	333
	Stimulation and Fantasy	339
9.	Silence	359
10.	Postscript: The Lama and the MRI	375
	Acknowledgments	397
	Glossary	399
	Bibliography	405
	Endnotes	423
	Index	439