The Imperial Animal

155 scriptions of genital and sexual development are clear and thorough. However, his description of the various genetic and hormonal factors involved in sexual development is skimpy and very difficult to follow. For example, Jost's classic experiments on the factors involved in determining sex and internal and external genital development are hardly mentioned, and certainly not dealt with in a way that would help the reader understand this complicated process. The second half of the book is devoted to disorders of male pseudohermaphro-ditism. In this section, again the illustrations and pictures are superb. However, the author's classification of the various types of male pseudohermaphroditism is an anatomic classification, and as such becomes cumbersome and confusing. Again, the author does not correlate well these various disorders with biochemical, genetic and hormonal defects. He is often either incorrect or not thorough in his descriptions of the types of male pseudohermaphroditism. For example, he attributes Reifenstein's syndrome to androgen insensitivity, but this has never been definitively shown. The section on adrenal hyperplasia does not mention the 17-a hydroxylase defect, a recently described cause of male pseudohermaphroditism. The author hardly mentions the psychological consequences of these disorders, as have been well described by Money. There is also too little emphasis on the treatment of these disorders. The book can best be recommended as an anatomic atlas and for its pictures, illustrations, and thorough bibliography. The Imperial Animal is a study of human universals-what the authors call the human "biogrammar:" those basic rules and patterns underlying social behavior in all cultures. While eschewing the simple determinism of instinct theories, the authors contend that men are "wired" to respond to certain social situations in predictable ways. Thus, put a group of males together and you end up with the type of hierarchical, competitive social structure common to modern bureaucracies and primitive hunting groups, as well as baboon troops. A major corollary to this thesis is that human evolution ended in the Stone Age and that we are essentially Paleolithic hunters in business suits. If we complain of alienation, it is partly because we have come to live in a world far different from the open savannas for which we were "programmed." Although many of the ideas are insightful and challenging, the book is generally overwritten. Too many chapters are overloaded with repetitious and rhetorical examples. One ends up wishing for more matter and less art.