Darwin's Radio

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All the best thrillers contain the solution to a mystery, and the mystery in this intellectually sparkling scientific thriller is more crucial and stranger than most. Why are people turning against their neighbors and their newborn children? And what is causing an epidemic of still births? A disgraced paleontologist and a genetic engineer both come across evidence of cover-ups in which the government is clearly up to no good. But no one knows what's really going on, and the government is covering up because that is what, in thrillers as in life, governments do. And what has any of this to do with the discovery of a Neanderthal family whose mummified faces show signs of a strange peeling?

Greg Bear has spent much of his recent career evoking awe in the deep reaches of space, but he made his name with Blood Music, a novel of nanotechnology that crackled with intelligence. His new book is a workout for the mind and a stunning read; human malignancy has its role in his thriller plot, but its real villain, as well as its last best hope, is the endless ingenious cruelty of the natural world and evolution. --Roz Kaveney, Amazon.co.uk

Book Description

A 2000 HUGO AWARD NOMINEE

Ancient diseases encoded in the DNA of humans wait like sleeping dragons to wake and infect again--or so molecular biologist Kaye Lang believes. And now it looks as if her controversial theory is in fact chilling reality. For Christopher Dicken, a "virus hunter" at the Epidemic Intelligence Service, has pursued an elusive flu-like disease that strikes down expectant mothers and their offspring. Then a major discovery high in the Alps --the preserved bodies of a prehistoric family--reveals a shocking link: something that has slept in our genes for millions of years is waking up.

Now, as the outbreak of this terrifying disease threatens to become a deadly epidemic, Dicken and Lang must race against time to assemble the pieces of a puzzle only they are equipped to solve--an evolutionary puzzle that will determine the future of the human race . . . if a future exists at all.

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Greg Bear's powerfully written, brilliantly inventive novels combine cutting-edge science and unforgettable characters, illuminating dazzling new technologies -- and their dangers.

Now, in Darwin's Radio, Bear draws on state-of-the-art biological and anthropological research to give us an ingeniously plotted thriller that questions everything we believe about human origins and destiny -- as civilization confronts the next terrifying step in evolution.

A mass grave in Russia that conceals the mummified remains of two women, both with child -- and the conspiracy to keep it secret... a major discovery high in the Alps: the preserved bodies of a prehistoric family -- the newborn infant possessing disturbing characteristics... a mysterious disease that strikes only pregnant women, resulting in miscarriage. Three disparate facts that will converge into one science-shattering truth.

Molecular biologist Kaye Lang, a specialist in retroviruses, believes that ancient diseases encoded in the DNA of humans can again come to life. But her theory soon becomes chilling reality. For Christopher Dicken -- a "virus hunter" at the Epidemic Intelligence Service -- has pursued an elusive flu-like disease that strikes down expectant mothers and their offspring. The shocking link: something that has slept in our genes for millions of years is waking up.

Now, as the outbreak of this terrifying disease threatens to become a deadly epidemic, Dicken and Lang, along with anthropologist Mitch Rafelson, must race against time to assemble the pieces of a puzzle only they are equipped to solve. An evolutionary puzzle that will determine the future of the human race... if a future exists at all.

A fiercely intelligent, utterly enthralling novel of adventure and ideas, genetics and evolution, a fast-paced thriller that is grounded in the timeless human themes of struggle, loss, and redemption.

WINNER OF THE NEBULA AWARD

Selected by the San Franciso Chronicle, Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly as one of the Best Books of the Year

"A frightening new wrinkle in human evolution... Darwin's Radio delivers the kind of narrative kick that distinguishes such novels as Arthur C. Clarke's Childhood's End and John Wyndham's The Midwich Cuckoos."
   SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE

"Vintage Bear... [His] characters are as complex as his ideas."
   THE SEATTLE TIMES

"A masterpiece... Fascinating."
   USA TODAY

Customer Reviews:

The Evolution of Dialogue.......2007-09-18

Evolution is a very intriguing topic to me. I am fascinated with it, I am absorbed by nostalgia. When I came across this book the cover sold me into peering at its summary. From there I decided to purchase it. With such a book, which should have been common sense, you cannot neglect the over abundance of dialogue.

There is no action sequences and very little surprises in the book and it is consumed by dialogue. Characters ramble on in less than interesting conversations. The plot itself is not astounding. However, the author does do a very good job in his character development and conveyance. You truly get a feel for the characters personalities and feelings. This is truly the only intricate part of the book.Nonetheless, the book offers a mediocre story line that most definitely did not deserve a sequel.

The book itself has lead me into further non-fiction reading of ERV, genes, cells and in-depth evolution. That is the only reason it got a third star, because without having read this book I would not be researching the exact topics that affect evolution today.

I do not recommend you to read the sequel because it will take you to the same place....nowhere.

Super Reader.......2007-08-04

The earlier part of the book is the most interesting, with the investigation, and the parts in Georgia, and phage science, among other things.

Interesting, but not outstanding. The latter new child family oriented stuff drags a bit. The relationship and actions between the two main adult characters and parents doesn't necessarily ring true either, I think.

O noes! Save the babies!.......2007-08-02

This novel started off great. Neanderthal bodies found in a remote cave with a human infant. How did they die? What can science tell us? Then the story goes off the deep end with this weird virus that is spreading throughout the country causing women to abort their babies. As if this is not horrible enough, a government task force is developed whose primary goal is to contain the situation even if it means spreading misinformation. Men are blamed, women are persecuted and humanity seems at the brink of extinction.

I really liked the story in this novel but I loathed the main characters. Mitch was an arrogant fool and Kay blisteringly naive. Very sappy. Their romance in the face of the spreading disaster seemed selfish and tacky to me. I disliked the over-focus on 'baby making.' Surely people with Mitch and Kay's talents would be better focused on helping convince the media of their beliefs than running around trying to procreate. I felt the story really jumped the shark when the Native Americans show up in trucks to rescue Kay and Mitch from being put in an internment camp... Terribly corny and contrived.

This started off great, but soon became a sappy soapy and silly.

An average book.......2007-07-21

I've read Bear's books before (Eon, Heritage) and although I was never quite satisfied with them, they held some promise. Seeing how a lot of people think "Darwin's Radio" is one of his finest, I decided to give it a try.

I stick to the same verdict. Quite promising, but disappointing. Characters are flat, plot is over-stretched.

The only good part about the book is the basic science of endogenous retroviruses. Bear did his research and it shows. He can also explain it in terms that are understandable to general public. Yet he fails where it matters most - in justifying the reasons and mechanisms for quick evolutionary change. From his descriptions it seems that he lacks even basic understanding of how evolution works. And since the whole book is dedicated to the idea of rapid evolutionary jumps, the book falls flat and all that research is wasted. Without the science this book has nothing to offer.

"sci-fi" wielded as "suspense".......2007-05-03

Greg Bear, as many of us know, is a sci-fi and fantasy writer. I buy his books (2nd hand, naturally) because I love to read his take of science the future (i.e. Eon and Anvil of Stars). Imagine my surprise when Darwin's Radio was being labeled as a "suspense" novel. Has he gone mass-market? Seeing books like Quantico and Dead Lines, I'm beginning to think I've lost the author I used to love.

This may very well be his last stab at a hard sci-fi book. And what a stab it was! The technical gooiness is a pleasure to wade through (extra kudos for the dictionary of terminology in the back). The plot is somewhat plausible, but nevertheless fantastic and deeply intriguing. The entire book gets solid points all across board, even for the bone-chilling ending. You may have to shake your head a few times and read the passage over again a few times to make sure you actually read right!

Average customer rating:

Does not waste time with controversy; just read the book.
How to Worship Charles Darwin

On the Origin of Species
Charles Darwin
Manufacturer: Broadview Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1551113376

Book Description

Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, in which he writes of his theories of evolution by natural selection, is one of the most important works of scientific study ever published.

Broadview's unabridged edition of On the Origin of Species (which corrects the first edition against the second) also includes an introduction, a bibliography, explanatory notes, a chronology of Darwin's life, and a register of names cited. The appendices contain substantial selections from Darwin's other works (Autobiography, Notebooks, letters, Voyage of the Beagle, and Descent of Man) and selections from Darwin's sources and contemporaries (excerpts from Genesis, Paley, Lamarck, Spencer, Lyell, Malthus, Huxley, and Wallace).

Customer Reviews:

Does not waste time with controversy; just read the book........2006-09-04

This is a quick review of the book not a dissertation on Darwin or any other subject loosely related. At first I did not know what to expect. I already read " The Voyage of the Beagle: Charles Darwin's Journal of Researches" (see my review). I figured the book would be similar. However I found "Origin" to be more complex and detailed.

Taking in account that recent pieces of knowledge were not available to Charles Darwin this book could have been written last week. Having to look from the outside without the knowledge of DNA or Plate Tectonics, he pretty much nailed how the environment and crossbreeding would have an effect on natural selection. Speaking of natural selection, I thought his was going to be some great insight to a new concept. All it means is that species are not being mucked around by man (artificial selection).

If you picked up Time magazine today you would find all the things that Charles said would be near impossible to find or do. Yet he predicted that it is doable in theory. With an imperfect geological record many things he was not able to find at the writing of this book have been found (according to the possibilities described in the book.)

The only draw back to the book was his constant apologizing. If he had more time and space he could prove this and that. Or it looks like this but who can say at this time. Or the same evidence can be interpreted 180 degrees different.

In the end it is worth reading and you will never look at life the same way again.

How to Worship Charles Darwin.......2006-01-29

This edition of the Origin is a rare item: a book for the classroom that actually does the job. It contains a bibliography, explanatory notes, a chronology of Darwin's life, and a register of names. The appendices contain selections from Darwin's other works and selections from Darwin's sources and contemporaries. All for $9.95!

In addition to these nuts and bolts, the editor has composed an Introduction to initiate students into the sublimity of Darwin's World. Here's how it begins: `(The Origin) is one of the two or three most significant scientific works of all time-one of those works that fundamentally and permanently alter our vision of the world.' Interested? Here's more: this surpassing achievement `requires no specialized scientific training'-great news for students mortified by maths. And more: Origin is `also a great literary classic' that is `eloquent, imaginatively evocative, and rhetorically compelling'. Holy Darwin! How good can it get? Even English lit students might go for that.

Surprise: editor Joseph Carroll is an English lit prof. His speciality is the evolutionary analysis of literature, an innovation that he pioneered. Lit departments aren't science-friendly territory. Often they run an anti-science line, linking it to exploitation, global warming, racism, misogyny and the like. Come to think of it, isn't Darwinism among the worst offenders?! Survival of the fittest, let the weak perish and the rich get richer, eugenic breeding to clean out the bungled and botched, that kind of thing. To block such negative thoughts, Carroll preaches an oration of superlatives about the Great Man that exceeds anything I've encountered. In scientific achievement, personal character, wisdom, and influence, Lord Darwin in his shining eminence leaves all others in the shadows. Here is Carroll on Darwin's most important contribution to culture: `The vision of nature Darwin offers is not that of some broad, abstract, intellective pattern, but that of living impulse, eager, frantic, animating every single organism, vast and minute, in inconceivable numbers, everywhere on earth, persisting throughout all time of organic life'. It is a vision of `competitive struggle', of the `great battle of life', and the `war of nature'. Interestingly, in this context Carroll notes that Darwin specifies an empirical finding that would `annihilate my theory'--a species that developed `an adaptation solely for the benefit of some other species'. That's because, Darwin believed, as Victorians typically believed, that every organism looks out for Number 1. It's called `individualism'.

What about that? Is there any species with adaptations that benefit only another species? Sorry to say this, but yes, there are. The pattern is called `inquilinism', which lies at the extreme end of the spectrum of parasitism. See E. O. Wilson, Sociobiology, p 371. Note: Darwin says unequivocally that his theory is `annihilated', yet for some reason the ardent Darwinian Wilson doesn't draw that conclusion.

An English prof isn't expected to know about inquilinism, but literary visions of nature are another matter. Poets and novelists homed in on the implications of godlessness of the mechanistic universe well before the Origin was published. Among those usually mentioned is Alfred Tennyson's In Memorium (1850), whose famous lines `Who trusted God was love indeed / And love Creation's final law -- / Tho' Nature, red in tooth and claw / With ravine, shriek'd against his creed' convey the temper of his sombre, lengthy meditation on nature. `Nature red in tooth and claw' became a byword among Victorians for the world they had come to inhabit. We might expect Carroll to seize on this fact, to stress how Darwin's vision fitted into the new cognitive-symbolic structures created by poets. But not a word of that! Carroll disregards not only Tennyson, but all imaginative writing that formed the context of Darwin's publications. Why this silent denigration of the importance of his own field?

Probably because even summary recognition of the literary dimension of Victorian culture would expose the historical inaccuracy of Carroll's extravagant claims for Darwin's originality. For example, he attributes massive innovative force to Darwin's replacement of creationism by purely naturalistic explanation in natural history. In fact, this was no innovation at all; the physical and hard biological sciences had long since oriented on exclusively natural causes. The only `scientists' still clinging to creative intervention in nature were naturalists-those amateur bird watchers and rock collectors who often enough were clergymen. Since Darwin identified himself with naturalists, it was `natural' for him to challenge creationism. But this challenge had been forcefully launched in 1844 in the anonymously published best-seller Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation. The author, Robert Chambers, wrote a defence of no-exception naturalism far more frontal, eloquent, and incisive than anything from Darwin's pen (Darwin was loath to give offence, especially to his pious wife Emma).

Not only had the sciences eliminated divine causality, so had theology! In 1846 the entirely secularist The Life of Jesus Critically Examined was translated from German into English by the novelist George Eliot (aka Marian Evans). Eliot enjoyed a close friendship with Herbert Spencer; together they edited the Westminster Review. They were part of an intellectual circle that included Thomas Huxley, George Lewes, J.S. Mill, H.G. Atkinson, and Harriet Martineau. Martineau, who translated August Comte's Positive Philosophy, published in 1851 Letters on the Laws of Man's Nature and Development, which projected humanist unbelief as the end point of millennia of cultural improvement. Carroll, whose speciality is the literature of this period, particularly the writings of George Eliot, presumably knows all of this. Yet he utters not a word about it! Why not? Perhaps because these facts reverse the relation between Darwin and his public that Carroll extols: far from being the mighty innovator who transforms English thought (`revolution'), he reiterates and magnifies the then aspiring progressive culture. That culture seized on the Origin and magnified it because the weight of Darwin's high social status brought with it the promise of the triumph of progressivism (the real meaning of the `Darwinian revolution'). Indeed, one of the first reviews of Origin hailed it as `the Whitworth gun of liberalism', a clear salute to the political dimension of the evolution belief. The author of the review was Thomas Huxley.

Carroll apparently doesn't see that a Darwinian analysis of literature needs to be complemented by a literary analysis of Darwinism.

Human Nature After Darwin: A Philosophical Introduction

Average customer rating:

An excellent introduction
extremely disappointed in Janet Radcliffe Richards
Socrates on evolutionary ethics
Overlooked

Human Nature After Darwin: A Philosophical Introduction
Janet Richards
Manufacturer: Routledge
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0415212448

Book Description

Human Nature After Darwin is an original investigation of the implications of Darwinism for our understanding of ourselves and our situation. It casts new light on current Darwinian controversies, and in doing so provides an introduction to philosophical reasoning and a range of philosophical problems. Janet Radcliffe Richards claims that many current battles about Darwinism, in particular about evolutionary psychology and religion, are based on mistaken assumptions about the implications of the rival views. Her analysis of these implications provides a much-needed guide to the fundamentals of Darwinism and the so-called Darwin-wars, as well as providing a set of philosophical techniques relevant to wide areas of moral and political debate. It also raises philosophical problems of knowledge and certainly, free will and responsibility, altruism, the status of ethics, and the relevance of Darwinism to questions of ethics, politics and religion. The lucid presentation makes the book an ideal introduction to both philosophy and Darwinism, as well as a substantive contribution to topics of intense current controversy. It will be of interest to students of philosophy, science and the social sciences, and critical thinking.

Customer Reviews:

An excellent introduction.......2005-08-02

This book is an excellent introduction to current Darwinian thinking about human nature. As the book discusses the implications of accepting Darwinism it does not put forward an awovedly materialist view backed by arguments, but the author's stance on this issue is nevertheless unequivocal.
The style is admirably clear, and the general claim that in most cases, the often supposed differences between non-Darwinian and Darwinian lines of thinking are only apparent ones is convincing.
However, there are some passages which I disagree with.

1. The distinction between the formal validity of conditionals and the existence of a causal or explanatory relation between the antecedent and the consequent is blurred. Radcliffe writes:

"finding out the truth of the conditional is not a matter of finding out whether the antecedent is true... or whether the the consequent is true. Even if you proved conclusively that either of those was true or false, you would still have no evidence at all for the truth of the conditional... In fact, even if you proved both antecedent and consequent true, or both false, or the consequent true and the antecedent false, that would still have no bearing on the truth of the conditional. In all these cases, the conditional could be either true or false...
This is because a conditional is a statement which is not about the truth of any individual proposition, but a particular connection between the two."(p. 92)

For someone trained in formal logic this should seem puzzling. Formally, the truth table of the conditional does determine when it is false, namely when the antecedent is true and the consequent is false. It may be debated whether this extensional truth table really captures the meaning of natural language conditional statements (many say it gives absurd results in some important cases), but it cannot be denied that it goes some way to achieve that. To consider conditionals as expressing a connection between the two contained propositions is to treat them intensionally, i. e. in a way in which their truth does not depend on their constituent propositions. This distinction is an important one, and it should have been indicated clearly in the text.

2. The discussion of the Divine Command view of ethics is simplistic in one respect. Radcliffe says if you think that the problem of Evil needs to be answered, you cannot consistently accept the Divine Command View, as it considers goodness as dependent on the will of God, moreover, it says that whatever God willed must be good. Thus if God willed that suffering be present in the world, this must be a good thing, too.
I think this line of argument would reduce the DC view to absurdity, and Radcliffe unjustly mocks it by saying "[if the DCV were true]we could just say 'War is a good thing after all'."
Of course, one could obviously point out in defence of the DCV that you need not forego it in order to see a real problem in the existence of Evil. One could deny that God willed the suffering (maybe other people did, or Satan in the case of natural disasters) and hold on to the DCV, and/or work out a theodicy in which all sufferings are eventually justified by some greater good, so one can keep the DCV consistently again.

3. There is another argument in the chapter that I disagree with and which I consider the weakest one of the book. It is about the inconsistency of moral relativism. R. says that relativism in its familiar formulations is incoherent, because "it specifies that no principle should be given precedence over others, but in doing so it gives itself precedence; it says that you should not impose your principles on others, but in doing so attempts to impose itself on the holders of other views, and displace theirs."

I have two objections:

a) relativism as a practical guide may be incoherent, but people often act incoherently, as witnessed by the problem of the weakness of will. In itself, there is nothing problematic with that: if all values are subjective, then perhaps there is no other possible way for us to think and act.

b) In addition to the pratical level, there is the meta-level of justification where moral relativism may well win the day. This issue is independent of whether relativism as a practical view is incoherent or not. Furthermore, I find R.'s claim that we can conduct a 'secular moral enquiry' to discover moral truth by using our reason entirely unconvincing. The proposed means, intuitive reasoning, can only work provided there is something objective to be ascertained. However, R. does not in the least argue that there must be objective moral truths: it is one thing to claim that the existence of objective moral standards does not presuppose the existence of God (I agree on this point), and another to substantiate the claim that there are objective moral standards in the first place. Of course, we could see this argument as one working out an implication of Darwinism (i. e. as arguing for the possibilty of a Darwinist ethics) and not as one for such a substantive claim. But in the light of everthing else R. says about morality, especially in the last chapter where she claims that there ARE some real differences between accepting the Darwininan and the non-Darwinian view (plus materialism), (notably concerning survival of death and the prearranged moral order of the universe), what she had said about objective moral truth beforehand does seem very curious. She concludes the first-mentioned chapter by saying 'there is no reason to think that if materialism is true we must be unable to reason morally'. Well, that may be so, but provided that moral reasoning is done by reflective persons, it may easily lead to its own demise, too, or at least we cannot exclude this possibility a priori.
In my view, if you accept the Darwininan view, the only available choice is moral nihilism, or perhaps a version of an "error theory" of morality.

Despite the above critical remarks, in my overall assessment this is a superb book which everyone interested in evolutionary thinking should read. I hope I have not misrepresented the author's arguments in my criticism of them. I would appreciate if you shared your comments with me.

extremely disappointed in Janet Radcliffe Richards.......2004-05-14

I am a huge fan of Radcliffe Richards book "The Skeptical Feminist" which is an excellent presentation of logical arguments for feminism.

So I was extremely disappointed that Radcliffe Richards has joined the forces of Darwinian reductionism and evolutionary psychology. She claims she is simply presenting non-partisan logical arguments for Darwinian theories for our sober consideration, but her own biases come through fairly often - and she thanks a leading proponent of evolutionary psychology, Helena Cronin, in the front of the book.

Cronin wrote a paper "The Evolved Family" (available online) and in this paper she argues (based not on empirical evidence but rather on 'Darwinian logic') that since women as a group have evolved to value men almost exclusively for their income; and to prefer to spend time with their children to spending time at work, there should be a two-tiered system of employment - one for men and one for women - an official mommy track:

"Rather than taking male standards as the universal measure, or expecting both sexes to adopt androgynous working 'roles', the government should design family-friendly employment practices that reflect the different preferences of women and men."

She does not differentiate between mothers and childless women when discussing feminine preferences, so you can't tell if the Cronin plan calls for all women to be pushed into the mommy track, or just all fertile women or just women with children. And she doesn't bother to suggest a system in which a woman might plead for a special dispensation to join the male work force - perhaps the Queen could grant titles of 'honorary male.'

And it's striking how Radcliffe Richards chides those opposed to Darwinian reductionism for emotion-ridden criticisms of her side, when Cronin never mentions feminists without expressing biting contempt.

I can't believe Radcliffe Richards would countenance this radical right-wing social philosopher. Perhaps she became more conservative over the years. Feminism has lost a valuable friend.

Socrates on evolutionary ethics.......2002-05-25

If you have any interest in the ethical or political implications of evolutionary theory, read this book.

If you ever wished you could spend a week with Socrates, discussing a topic of contemporary interest, read this book.

If you have ever, are now, or intend in the future to write or talk about about evolutionary ethics, and you have not read this book, please quit wasting my time!

Overlooked.......2002-01-15

The publishers seem to have misunderstood (or at any rate, underrated) this superb book, which would profit from exposure to a wider audience. It's as if someone in a suit smelled a whiff of the lamp around here and exiled it to the ghetto of academic writing. This is a pity, but it is perhaps in part understandable. The nominal topic is "evolution," but the real subject is the activity of clear thinking. More directly -- no one excels Janet Radcliffe Richards in demonstrating how to use the tools of philosophy in the analysis or understanding of every day problems. There is an audience for this sort of thing. The publisher seems not to have found it and both auther and audience (saying nothing of the publisher) are the losers.

The Voyage of the Beagle: Journal of Researches into the Natural History and Geology of the Countries Visited During the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle Round the World (Modern Library Classics)

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A sentimental scientists
Insight into the mind of Darwin
Charles Darwin-Naturalist, Poet, Adventurer
Charles Darwin as Indiana Jones
Darwin

The Voyage of the Beagle: Journal of Researches into the Natural History and Geology of the Countries Visited During the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle Round the World (Modern Library Classics)
Charles Darwin
Manufacturer: Modern Library
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0375756809
Release Date: 2001-03-13

Book Description

In 1831, Charles Darwin embarked on an expedition that, in his own words, determined my whole career. The Voyage of the Beagle chronicles his five-year journey around the world and especially the coastal waters of South America as a naturalist on the H.M.S. Beagle. While traveling through these unexplored countries collecting specimens, Darwin began to formulate the theories of evolution and natural selection realized in his master work, The Origin of Species. Travel memoir and scientific primer alike, The Voyage of the Beagle is a lively and accessible introduction to the mind of one of history's most influential thinkers.

Customer Reviews:

A sentimental scientists.......2007-05-09

The Voyage of the Beagle is filled with exquisite detail about the plants, insects, animals, and people that Darwin encountered during his journey. I was amazed at how much he had observed and compared/contrasted. My favorite parts, however, were for the most part not these descriptions. I most enjoyed the comments Darwin made that showed how he felt and what personal obstacles he encountered. Despite having the purpose of sharing his observations (which it most successful accomplishes), The Voyage showed a more personal side of Darwin. The personal comments that Darwin included and the poetic imagery he so often used gave the impression that Darwin had a sentimental side beyond the pure scientist. Even the depth of the many observations demonstrated his child-like curiosity and excitement about science, nature, and seeing the world.

If you were looking for a fast-paced plot, this is not your book. If you were looking for wonderful descriptions made by a keen observer and to gain a better understanding of the scientist, this book is definitely for you.

Insight into the mind of Darwin.......2007-05-06

This book is an excellent source of knowledge on Darwin's thought process. He describes everything in very exact detail, and in some cases the reader can see the beginnings of his ideas on evolution, such as when he compares the bird species of Argentina and Chile, or the variety of finches on the Galapagos. However, he did not pay as much attention to the importance of the finches as he did in later years. Some of his observations point to problems that only became apparent later- he describes in his visit to St. Helena how much of the flora and fauna was introduced from England, and the native plants only existed on high ridges. He also spends quite a bit of time describing the formation of coral reefs and a number of other things that after a page no longer seem interesting to most of us. However, these descriptions and his lists of species clearly show how much he valued precision and accuracy, and how deeply he became involved in his endeavors.

Another aspect that I liked about this book was his descriptions of various people and how they differed. He clearly thought very highly of the gauchos of Argentina, but found their Chilean counterparts to be decidedly less friendly. He admired the Tahitian men (not the women) and thought that the people of Tierra del Fuego, who were hardly any less "civilized" than many of the Tahitians, were quite inferior. His references to slavery are also interesting; he recounts stories of abuse of slaves, including that of a strong man who thought that Darwin was about to strike him and was too scared to do anything but turn away. He also described a situation in which a man whom he believed to be very kind sold apart members of a family.

While long and at times difficult to get through, this book is well worth reading for those who want to learn about Darwin, or who enjoy reading travelers' accounts. I found that while it did generally take several pages for me to become engaged in the book, that afterwards I was content to read several chapters in one sitting.

Charles Darwin-Naturalist, Poet, Adventurer.......2006-11-09

I learned a lot about Darwin in this book that I simply didn't know beforehand. The most important is what an exceptional writer he was. If he had never published his Origin of Species and become famous by it, this book would still be a classic, if not of science, than certainly of literature. His prose, while necessarily more pedestrian, reminds me more than anything of the prose of another famous naturalist, Thoreau (who actually quotes the "Naturalist Darwin" in Walden from this book regarding the natives of Tierra Del Fuego).

The "scientific detail" cited by another reviewer did not bog down the prose at all, a remarkable feat....a talent also found in Thoreau. The famed passage on The Galapagos was indeed interesting. But the most scientifically intriguing passages, I found, had to do with barrier reefs and atolls and how they come to be...I almost said "evolve"....But perhaps that would be premature for this book. In any event, I've never read a scientific account so riveting and fascinating as Darwin's on this subject given herein.

But, as I say, I learned quite a bit about Darwin as a young man, ready for adventure, risks, and brimming with curiosity. He is almost as much a poet as scientist in some passages, quoting Shelley at one point, and he fortifies his narrative with a poignancy absent in most scientific accounts. This stylistic flavour is evident in many passages, but I'll just proffer one from the end of the narrative:

"In my walk I stopped again and again to gaze upon these beauties, and endevoured to fix in my mind and for ever, an impression which at the time I knew sooner or later must fail. The form of the orange-tree, the cocoa-nut, the palm, the mango, the tree-fern, the banana, will remain clear and separate; but the thousand beauties which unite these into one perfect scene must fade away: yet they will leave, like a tale heard in childhood, a picture full of indistinct, but most beautiful figures." (P.444, in my edition)

Whether as poetic or scientific, this work is virtuosic and unsurpassed in its seamless melding of the two. I'll leave the reader to decide which s/he enjoys the most.

Charles Darwin as Indiana Jones.......2004-09-28

We all know Charles Darwin as a scholarly bearded old English gentleman, and like Leonardo da Vinci, Darwin has this image defining him for all future generations. Even though most everyone knows Darwin spent five years traveling the oceans on the HMS Beagle, the image of a young dynamic Darwin never takes over. Reading this book will change this.

Darwin sailed on the Beagle, a small three-mast sailing ship, and circumnavigated the globe. Over five years, he visited numerous islands in the Atlantic and Pacific and extensively surveyed the east and west coasts of South America. He hiked up and down mountains, traveled on horseback across the arid Argentinean plains, crossed the lonely Peruvian desert, and trekked the grandiose Chilean Cordilleras. He thought nothing of packing a train of mules for a two-month overland journey across the Andes going from Chile to Argentina and back again. On all his land expeditions he hired local guides, from Gauchos in Argentina to South Pacific islanders in Tahiti. Darwin's accounts of his expeditions are not only interesting adventures, they are also good portraits of the people he met. These include Latin American governors and generals, Argentinean ranchers, very primitive natives on Tierra del Fuego, and so on.

The journal begins with an account of Cape de Verd islands, then most of the book is spent on Brazil, Argentina, and Chile, and we have to wait until Chapter 17 before we get to what all Darwin fans really want to read, namely the account of his visit to the Galapagos. Though short, the account does not disappoint. We read of Darwin's finches, of two allied species of lizards, and of the giant turtles. Darwin also presents his great insight: that geographical isolation contributes to speciation. He came by this insight when it was pointed out to him that nearly identical species were seldom found on the same island. Another insight was that the fauna and flora an island depends more on that of the nearby mainland than on latitude. For example the plants of the Galapagos Islands were similar to those of the American west coast, while those of Cape de Verd, at the same latitude but in the Atlantic, resembled plants found in Africa. Darwin then continues with accounts of Tahiti, New Zealand and Australia, where we read how he thought coral reef islands were formed.

In the last chapter Darwin tells us of his visit to St-Helena and he does in fact mention its most famous resident, Napoleon Bonaparte. Though the French Emperor had already died, his remains had not yet been moved to Les Invalides in Paris. Darwin writes of the grave only in passing and is explicitly careful not too make too much of it. Apparently visitors in those days had a habit of overdoing their descriptions of Napoleon's rather simple headstone.

Travel notes like these and the descriptions of the people he met, were for me the most charming aspect of the book. The portraits Darwin paints are invariably sympathetic to human nature. Certainly Darwin was a man of his times and valued civilization very highly, but he was no racist and believed that all men could find happiness and enlightenment, and that all men had a right to be free. He despised slavery, and wrote eloquent passages attacking the prevalent institution. From this journal, we come to know a dynamic, adventurous young man, and a thoughtful liberal one who would only later shake our view of our place in the world.

Darwin.......2001-08-16

If you like science and the little details that go with it-you will really enjoy this book. It reads easily yet contains much detail.

Beasts of the Modern Imagination: Darwin, Nietzsche, Kafka, Ernst and Lawrence

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Beasts of the Modern Imagination: Darwin, Nietzsche, Kafka, Ernst and Lawrence
Margot Norris
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Darwin Undone
At Long Last!

Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution
Gertrude Himmelfarb
Manufacturer: Ivan R. Dee, Publisher
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Book Description

A biographical, historical, and philosophical study of the impact of Darwinism on the intellectual climate of the nineteenth century, challenging the conventional view of Darwin's greatness. A thorough and masterly book. --Times Literary Supplement

Customer Reviews:

Darwin Undone.......2003-05-15

This is an excellent book written by a brilliant author. It details the line of progenitors leading up to Darwin's theory as well as the historical milieu in which Darwin swam during his lifetime and some of the forces, social and otherwise, that influenced him prior to Origin of Species and beyond. Himmelfarb gives an insightful criticism of Darwin's theory working simply from the internal organization of Darwin's thoughts. Himmelfarb is so brilliant in her analysis that my only criticism of the book is that she didn't critcize the theory in a more detailed fashion.

But it is a very readable and accessible book, and one that clearly points out some of the failings of Darwinian theory, many of which have been picked up by other critics over the years. However, I suspect that for the more sophisticated critic of Darwin, this book lacks sufficient scientific evidence--though it remains a fine history of the person, his theory, and its reception at the time of publication.

At Long Last!.......1999-12-24

All of the books I have ever read about Darwin either extoll him a a perfect, God-like creature, or vilify him as a demon. This book provides a comprehensive view of Darwin as he was, that is, as he saw himself and as others saw him. I was surprised to read that Darwin had many predecessors in the development of his theory, and that the flaws of the theory (which are significant) were generally recognized long before the challenges of modern science pointed them out. If you want your fancies about Darwin tickled, read others. If you want the facts, read Himmelfarb. I strongly recommend this book.

Render Unto Darwin: Philosophical Aspects of the Christian Right's Crusade Against Science

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Render Unto Darwin: Philosophical Aspects of the Christian Right's Crusade Against Science
James H. Fetzer
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One Long Argument: Charles Darwin and the Genesis of Modern Evolutionary Thought (Questions of Science)

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The Darwin Credo Reaffirmed
The Darwin credo reaffirmed
Modern evolutionary thought
You must understand the title to not be disappointed
Darwin & The Old Earth Creationists

One Long Argument: Charles Darwin and the Genesis of Modern Evolutionary Thought (Questions of Science)
Ernst Mayr
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Book Description

Evolutionary theory ranks as one of the most powerful concepts of modern civilization. Its effects on our view of life have been wide and deep. One of the most world-shaking books ever published, Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, first appeared in print over 130 years ago, and it touched off a debate that rages to this day.

Every modern evolutionist turns to Darwin's work again and again. Current controversies in the life sciences very often have as their starting point some vagueness in Darwin's writings or some question Darwin was unable to answer owing to the insufficient biological knowledge available during his time. Despite the intense study of Darwin's life and work, however, many of us cannot explain his theories (he had several separate ones) and the evidence and reasoning behind them, nor do we appreciate the modifications of the Darwinian paradigm that have kept it viable throughout the twentieth century.

Who could elucidate the subtleties of Darwin's thought and that of his contemporaries and intellectual heirs--A. R. Wallace, T. H. Huxley, August Weismann, Asa Gray--better than Ernst Mayr, a man considered by many to be the greatest evolutionist of the century? In this gem of historical scholarship, Mayr has achieved a remarkable distillation of Charles Darwin's scientific thought and his enormous legacy to twentieth-century biology. Here we have an accessible account of the revolutionary ideas that Darwin thrust upon the world. Describing his treatise as "one long argument," Darwin definitively refuted the belief in the divine creation of each individual species, establishing in its place the concept that all of life descended from a common ancestor.

He proposed the idea that humans were not the special products of creation but evolved according to principles that operate everywhere else in the living world; he upset current notions of a perfectly designed, benign natural world and substituted in their place the concept of a struggle for survival; and he introduced probability, chance, and uniqueness into scientific discourse.

This is an important book for students, biologists, and general readers interested in the history of ideas--especially ideas that have radically altered our worldview. Here is a book by a grand master that spells out in simple terms the historical issues and presents the controversies in a manner that makes them understandable from a modern perspective.

Customer Reviews:

The Darwin Credo Reaffirmed.......2006-02-08

Mayr belongs to the select company who devised, in the Forties, the reconciliation of Darwinism to Mendelian genetics called Neo-Darwinism. One monument to this synthesis is the University of Chicago Centenary volumes published in 1959, where leading lights exalted the vindication of Darwin's theory. In the intervening decades enormous advances in all the sciences bearing on evolution have been made. Does Neo-Darwinism survive? Mayr believes that it does. To establish this improbable case, he begins his effort with a characterization of Darwin's achievement in terms compatible with what he takes to be the current state of evolutionary theory.

A fundamental historical component of the Darwinist credo is that the publication of the Origin marks an abrupt break, styled the Darwinian Revolution, in European thought, not merely in science but across the board, starting with religion and theology. Mayr's proposed characterization of this transformation is specified by four claims.

Claim 1. Darwin >refuted the belief in the individual creation of each species, establishing in its place the concept that all of life descended from a common ancestor <. The wording mirrors Darwin's claim that at the time he published Origin, he knew of no naturalist who disbelieved in special creation. There was an outcry against this historical perversity, including objections from the true originator of natural selection theory (Patrick Matthew, in 1831), and the Oxford mathematics professor (Baden Powell) who from 1835 published philosophical essays defending naturalistic evolution against special creation. By 1850 the concept of naturalistic evolution including the origin of the human species had thoroughly penetrated theology, literature, polite conversation, and even the working class. Darwin was the late-comer whose disciples stole the credit on his behalf.

Claim 2. Mayr states that >Victorian notions of progress and perfectability were seriously undermined by Darwin's demonstration that evolution ...does not necessarily lead to progress... < He produces not a single contemporary witness to this sense of Darwin's meaning. The facts are that the Origin equated adaptation with >improvement < (non-improvers are displaced). The book owed its celebrity in large measure to its scientific >proof < of the nearly universal belief in progress. Indeed the French translation of the Origin bore the title, De l'Origine des especes, ou Des Lois du progress chez les etres organizes. In her Introduction, translator Clemence-August Royer stated that >the doctrine of Darwin is the rational revelation of progress, pitting itself in its logical antagonism with the irrational revelation of the fall <. She related the survival of the fittest theory of organic change to the theory of change developed by free market economics. The same notion was promoted in England by Herbert Spencer. Darwin never repudiated these, for Mayr, gross misunderstandings. Why not? Perhaps because these views were his own.

Claim 3. Darwin pioneered a new concept of science based on >concepts of probability, change, and uniqueness < as against the then dominant methodology based on physical laws and determinism. Oh dear! Darwin's comments on high level methodological issues are sparse. They are also conventional. Far from challenging the Newtonian model, he was anxious to bathe his theory in its prestige, especially after he was directly challenged (and thoroughly intimidated) by Briton's leading physicist, Lord Kelvin. Darwin didn't quantify because he had no head for maths. His one attempt, intended to relate species diversification to geographic distribution, was a flop, from which he was rescued by his friend John Lubbock. He was oblivious to advances in statistical demography, despite their direct relevance to his theory. The quantification of inheritance data was carried out by Mendel in his experimental work on peas and by Francis Galton in his writings on inheritance, whose sophisticated mathematical analysis Darwin admitted he could not follow. The struggle for existence did not figure in Mendel's theory, which was the first statement of the laws of evolutionary stasis. The development of electromagnetism and statistical mechanics owed nothing to the Great Mind.

Claim 4. Darwin was >the first person to work out a sound theory of classification, one which is still adopted by the majority of taxonomists <. Crikey! Darwin's theory of classification amounts to little more than the proposal that it be based on evolutionary descent. The proposal was made by numerous evolutionists and sketches of plausible lines of descent, including the pithacoid origin of our species, were readily available. The first edition of the Origin presented but one descent scenario-of whales from bears-but it attracted such ridicule that Darwin withdrew it in the second printing. His few subsequent proposals of descent, eg, the origin of mammals and of the human species, reiterated proposals made by others. The first attempt at an evolutionary phylogeny stems from Darwin's ardent discipline, Ernst Haeckel, which he based on the >biogenic law < (long since abandoned). Systematics has undergone profound change since 1959, first through Willi Hennig's reconceptualization of classification as cladistics, and then the elaboration of cladism by molecular analysis. (When Mayr wrote this book, his own earlier contributions to systematics had been superseded). To suggest a connection of this development with Darwin's modest contribution is to genuflect before the Holy Father.

These criticisms address statements made in but two pages of the text. The remainder of the book is of like character: Mayr pays no mind to the recent outpouring of history/philosophy of science literature that has placed Darwin in context. Thanks to these advances, we know that his original contributions were few, that his errors and oversights were many, and that he and his True Believer disciples relentlessly campaigned to promote the Cult of Evolution, whose dogmatism sometimes retarded or distorted the growth of evolutionary science. It is sad that this book is a living fossil.

The Darwin credo reaffirmed.......2004-10-20

Mayr belongs to the select company who devised, in the Forties, the reconciliation of Darwinism to Mendelian genetics called Neo-Darwinism. One monument to this synthesis is the University of Chicago Centenary volumes published in 1959, where leading lights exalted the vindication of Darwin's theory. In the intervening decades enormous advances in all the sciences bearing on evolution have been made. Does Neo-Darwinism survive? Mayr believes that it does. To establish this improbable case, he begins his effort with a characterization of Darwin's achievement in terms compatible with what he takes to be the current state of evolutionary theory.

A fundamental historical component of the Darwinist credo is that the publication of the Origin marks an abrupt break, styled the Darwinian Revolution, in European thought, not merely in science but across the board, starting with religion and theology. Mayr's proposed characterization of this transformation is specified by four claims.

Claim 1. Darwin >refuted the belief in the individual creation of each species, establishing in its place the concept that all of life descended from a common ancestor<. The wording mirrors Darwin's claim that at the time he published Origin, he knew of no naturalist who disbelieved in special creation. There was an outcry against this historical perversity, including objections from the true originator of natural selection theory (Patrick Matthew, in 1832), and the Oxford mathematics professor (Baden Powell) who from 1835 published philosophical essays defending naturalistic evolution against special creation. By 1850 the concept of naturalistic evolution including the origin of the human species had thoroughly penetrated theology, literature, polite conversation, and even the working class. Darwin was the late-comer whose disciples stole the credit on his behalf.

Claim 2. Mayr states that >Victorian notions of progress and perfectability were seriously undermined by Darwin's demonstration that evolution ...does not necessarily lead to progress...< He produces not a single contemporary witness to this sense of Darwin's meaning. The facts are that the Origin equated adaptation with >improvement< (non-improvers are displaced). The book owed its celebrity in large measure to its scientific >proof< of the nearly universal belief in progress. Indeed the French translation of the Origin bore the title, De l'Origine des especes, ou Des Lois du progress chez les etres organizes. In her Introduction, translator Clemence-August Royer stated that >the doctrine of Darwin is the rational revelation of progress, pitting itself in its logical antagonism with the irrational revelation of the fall<. She related the survival of the fittest theory of organic change to the theory of change developed by free market economics. The same notion was promoted in England by Herbert Spencer. Darwin never repudiated these, for Mayr, gross misunderstandings. Why not? Perhaps because these views were his own.

Claim 3. Darwin pioneered a new concept of science based on >concepts of probability, change, and uniqueness< as against the then dominant methodology based on physical laws and determinism. Oh dear! Darwin's comments on high level methodological issues are sparse. They are also conventional. Far from challenging the Newtonian model, he was anxious to bathe his theory in its prestige, especially after he was directly challenged (and thoroughly intimidated) by Briton's leading physicist, Lord Kelvin. Darwin didn't quantify because he had no head for maths. His one attempt, intended to relate species diversification to geographic distribution, was a flop, from which he was rescued by his friend John Lubbock. He was oblivious to advances in statistical demography, despite their direct relevance to his theory. The quantification of inheritance data was carried out by Mendel in his experimental work on peas and by Francis Galton in his writings on inheritance, whose sophisticated mathematical analysis Darwin admitted he could not follow. The struggle for existence did not figure in Mendel's theory, which was the first statement of the laws of evolutionary stasis. The development of electromagnetism and statistical mechanics owed nothing to the Great Mind.

Claim 4. Darwin was >the first person to work out a sound theory of classification, one which is still adopted by the majority of taxonomists<. Crikey! Darwin's theory of classification amounts to little more than the proposal that it be based on evolutionary descent. The proposal was made by pre-Origin evolutionists and sketches of plausible lines of descent, including the pithacoid origin of our species, were readily available. The first edition of the Origin presented but one descent scenario-of whales from bears-but it attracted such ridicule that Darwin withdrew it in the second printing. His few subsequent proposals of descent, eg, the origin of mammals and of the human species, reiterated proposals made by others. The first attempt at an evolutionary phylogeny stems from Darwin's ardent discipline, Ernst Haeckel, which he based on the >biogenic law< (long since abandoned). Systematics has undergone profound change since 1959, first through Willi Hennig's reconceptualization of classification as cladistics, and then the elaboration of cladism by molecular analysis. (When Mayr wrote this book, his own earlier contributions to systematics had been superseded). To suggest a connection of this development with Darwin's modest contribution is to genuflect before the Holy Father.

These criticisms address statements made in but two pages of the text. The remainder of the book is of like character: Mayr pays no mind to the recent outpouring of history/philosophy of science literature that has placed Darwin in context. Thanks to these advances in historical knowledge, we now know that his original contributions were few, that his errors and oversights were many, and that he and his True Believer disciples relentlessly campaigned to promote the Cult of Evolution, whose dogmatism sometimes retarded or distorted the growth of evolutionary science. This book is a living fossil.

Modern evolutionary thought .......2003-08-01

The title of One Long Argument can be a bit misleading, as an earlier reviewer mentioned - it is in reference to Darwin's Origin of Species, and Mayr really does not make an argument himself; the book, nonetheless is interesting, if a bit dry.Mayr begins by picking apart Darwin's evolutionary theories (its not one single theory, but actually 5 inter-dependent theories that relate to evolution as a system), before addressing its impact on the scientific community up until the mid - 1970's. Yes, Darwin is still being scrutinized, and not just by the religious set.I found the book a bit dry and difficult to keep my attention. Far too little is discussed about the thinkers before Darwin, and too much is spent on the scientific debate the 50 years after Origins was published. I would have preferred Mayr exploring the implications and impact of the discovery of DNA and microbiology on modifications of natural selection, specicies variation and adaptation instead. Therefore I can only give it 4 stars. In my opinion, a far better book on a related subject is Loren Eisley's Darwin's Century.

You must understand the title to not be disappointed.......2003-03-11

The title "One Long Arguement", it is a reference to part of Darwin's introductory description to The Origin of Species (appearing within Origin itself). This book is not about arguing with Creationists (Thank God ;). I suspect the above reviewers were misled to the point that they felt rating stars must be subtracted. Don't be fooled by title bashers. This is an excellent history and theory primer for the novice and a nice knowledge gap filler for those well-read in the science of evolution and biology.

Darwin & The Old Earth Creationists.......2003-01-22

Creationists have claimed that geology has conspired to support evolution. This book just shows how ridiculous that claim really is. Geologists tossed out the idea of "Flood Geology" long before Darwin arrived on the scene. The idea of an old Earth was developed independently of Darwin. Also interesting is that Darwin was well respected among his fellow scientists, even though they did not initially accept his idea of evolution. His work on the Beagle was considered important, and it alone was sufficent to establish Darwin's scientific reputation. He was already famous (in his day) before his landmark work.

Many scientists in Darwin's time were old earth creationists. In time, many of them were persuaded by the mass of evidence that Darwin had collected, although it would be a long time before natural selection was accepted as the mechanism. So, it is possible to not accept natural evolution and still accept the idea of common descent. Creationists try to argue that evolution is a package deal, that if one idea is out of place or not quite right, then the whole thing should be tossed out. This notion is just wrong, and reading this book will help the reader understand why. In general, creationists exploit the public's poor understanding of the scientific method. While one fact can be enough to completely toss out a theory, what often happens is that old theories get revised to accomdate the new facts. Successful, powerful theories (like Darwins) tend to evolve.

The Origin of Species (Modern Library)
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Elegantly brilliant

More Christian propaganda to seperate people

Great edition

One of the Greatest Books ever written

A Handy Edition of this Vital Classic

The Origin of Species (Modern Library)
Charles Darwin
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Amazon.com

It's hard to talk about The Origin of Species without making statements that seem overwrought and fulsome. But it's true: this is indeed one of the most important and influential books ever written, and it is one of the very few groundbreaking works of science that is truly readable.

To a certain extent it suffers from the Hamlet problem--it's full of clichés! Or what are now clichés, but which Darwin was the first to pen. Natural selection, variation, the struggle for existence, survival of the fittest: it's all in here.

Darwin's friend and "bulldog" T.H. Huxley said upon reading the Origin, "How extremely stupid of me not to have thought of that." Alfred Russel Wallace had thought of the same theory of evolution Darwin did, but it was Darwin who gathered the mass of supporting evidence--on domestic animals and plants, on variability, on sexual selection, on dispersal--that swept most scientists before it. It's hardly necessary to mention that the book is still controversial: Darwin's remark in his conclusion that "Light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history" is surely the pinnacle of British understatement. --Mary Ellen Curtin

Book Description

Perhaps the most readable and accessible of the great works of scientific imagination, The Origin of Species sold out on the day it was published in 1859. Theologians quickly labeled Charles Darwin the most dangerous man in England, and, as the Saturday Review noted, the uproar over the book quickly "passed beyond the bounds of the study and lecture-room into the drawing-room and the public street." Yet, after reading it, Darwin's friend and colleague T. H. Huxley had a different reaction: "How extremely stupid not to have thought of that."
Based largely on Darwin's experience as a naturalist while on a five-year voyage aboard H.M.S. Beagle, The Origin of Species set forth a theory of evolution and natural selection that challenged contemporary beliefs about divine providence and the immutability of species. A landmark contribution to philosophical and scientific thought, this edition also includes an introductory historical sketch and a glossary Darwin later added to the original text.

Charles Darwin grew up considered, by his own account, "a very ordinary boy, rather below the common standard of intellect." A quirk of fate kept him from the career his father had deemed appropriate--that of a country parson--when a botanist recommended Darwin for an appointment as a naturalist aboard H.M.S. Beagle from 1831 to 1836. Darwin is also the author of the five-volume work Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle (1839) and The Descent of Man (1871).

From the Trade Paperback edition.

Download Description

In the Origin of Species (1859) Darwin challenged many of the most deeply held beliefs of the Western world. Arguing for a material, not divine, origin of species, he showed that new species are achieved by 'natural selection'. Development, diversification, decay, extinction and absence of plan are all inherent to his theories. Darwin read prodigiously across many fields; he reflected on his experiences as a traveller, he experimented. His profoundly influential concept of 'natural selection' condenses materials from past and present, from the Galapagos Islands to rural Staffordshire, from English back gardens to colonial encounters. The Origin communicates the enthusiasm of original thinking in an open, descriptive style, and Darwin's emphasis on the value of diversity speaks more strongly now than ever.

Customer Reviews:

Elegantly brilliant.......2007-09-17

I had read The Voyage of the Beagle first. It is easy to see how Darwin's theory of evolution was growing as he traveled and saw how plants and animals adapted to different environments. Then he invented a theory to explain what he had observed.
This book is a 300 page definition of the theory of natural selection. Darwin goes through a detailed explanation of how evolution must have occured. He is very methodically, very detailed. When he doesn't understand something, he says he doesn't. He is humble in his presentation, giving credit to other scientists. I was amazed at how many experiments he performed himself, growing generations of plants and insects, watching how they developed and changed.
There is a quote in the book from Darwin's gardener who said, "He's really a sad little man. Sometimes he stands and stares at a flower for hours. I really think he'd be better off if he had something to do."
We are so lucky that Darwin inherited money and could spend his early years traveling and his later years in contemplation and writing.

More Christian propaganda to seperate people.......2007-07-31

Darwin was a born again Christian. Few people know that. And if there's one thing you need to know about Christians it's the fact that they are always trying to put one group of people against another. Divide and conquer. Darwin's plan(actually the plan of the intelligentsia that Darwin was a member of) was to create a new theory for the creation of man and then use Christian beliefs to blow it out of the water. It didn't work though. Even though Darwin picked the most crazy idea he came up with, man coming from monkeys!!!, people began to believe it. The powers that be saw that Science could very well be a new religous dogma and people would believe anything as long as a man in a white coat said it. Besides everyone knows that Allah created man in his supreme mercy, Allah Akhbar!!

Great edition.......2007-06-02

I liked the edition very much. Its legibility is very nice and it's a lightweighted version, dispite its 470 pages. I was just disapointed with the illustrations, that have very little relation to the text. But this fact doesnt compromise the quality of the whole. And the content... well, it's darwin world changing work, very readable.

One of the Greatest Books ever written.......2007-05-12

Darwin was one of the most brilliant men who ever lived. He was perhaps the greatest observer the world has known. In 1831, he set sail on the Beagle, a tiny little ship, for a five-year cruise around the world, and without pay, as naturalist. He had studied theology, medicine, and, finally, biology and geology. He saw how organisms change with time and environment and how Biblical events simply could not have happened as stated. He spent twenty-three years going over his notes, rethinking, and agonizing over the results. In 1859, he published Origin of Species, and it upset the world. He demonstrated evolution as no one had. Uneducated religious leaders may ridicule it, but evolution is a fact, accepted by any intelligent, educated, honest person.

A Handy Edition of this Vital Classic.......2007-05-11

There are many different versions of Darwin's "The Origin of Species" available, but I found this one particularly helpful. First, while it is nicely printed and easy to read on good paper, it is not terribly expensive. Second, it reprints the first or original version of the book which Darwin subsequently modified substantially in the the further five editions he published. Third, it also includes Darwin's "Historical Sketch" and "glossary" which had not appeared in the first edition. Fourth, the color cover illustration by the Victorian artist Henry de la Beche is an important indicator of why the Victorians were so into prehistoric studies. However, the thing that really distinguishes this Penguin Books edition is the incredibily incisive and invaluable introduction by the editor, J.W. Burrow. Burrow is beyond question one of the most significant intellectual historians of our time. Among other things he has written extensively on the concept of evolution in Victorian thought in his classic "Evolution and Society: A Study in Victorian Social Theory." In 37 crisp pages, Burrow incomparably sketches the Victorian intellectual background against which Darwin wrote. Although the essay is nearly 40 years old, it has stood the test of time very well. It alone is worth the price of the book. Altogether, a very nice introduction to this critical event in scientific and intellectual history.

Average customer rating:

BACKGROUND AND BASIS (THE EVOLUTION OF EVOLUTION)
Fun to read
Accurate, clever, well done
The best introduction to Darwinism you can buy
Fatuous and grossly inaccurate

Darwin for Beginners
Jonathan Miller
Manufacturer: Pantheon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0679725113
Release Date: 1990-01-03

Book Description

The Beginner Books -- "Their cartoon format and irreverent wit make difficult ideas accessible and entertaining."

-- Newsday

aking us through the upheavals in biological thought which made The Origins of Species possible, Jonathan Miller introduces us to that odd revolutionary, Charles Darwin -- a remarkably timid man who spent most of his life in seclusion; a semi-invalid riddled with doubts, fearing the controversy his theories might unleash; yet also the man who finally undermined belief in God's creation. Along the way we meet a fascinating cast of characters: Darwin's scientific predecessors, his contemporaries (including Alfred Russell Wallace, whose anticipation of natural selection forced Darwin to publish), his opponents, and his successors whose work in modern genetics provided necessary modifications to Darwin's own work.

Splendidly illustrated, this clever, witty, highly informative book is the perfect introduction to Darwin's life and thought.

Customer Reviews:

BACKGROUND AND BASIS (THE EVOLUTION OF EVOLUTION).......2005-12-21

Basic facts on how religious creationism developed bit by bit into more falsifiable methods. Good for a high school senior to a college undergrad.
This book is not for kids nor for people with no knowledge of Darwin whatsoever. It is ONLY for those interested in scant tidbits of how his theories accreted (historcal context). The text can be confusing, alternating between pure sarcasm and bland fact so it might do not much but muddle an amateur.

Fun to read.......2002-08-29

This is a great lightweight book on Darwin's life and the development of the idea of evolution. Though it would be a shame to stop an exploration of natural selection here, it's a great starting point because it provides the context in which Darwin's thoughts came to be. It also discusses objections and criticisms of natural selection, how it has been misunderstood and abused, and how Darwin himself treated problematic aspects of the theory. I don't know that the illustrations and such are very revealing or useful, but they definitely make the book easy and fun to read, though the last few pages become more text-based. Overall, it's a well executed introduction to a very influential and oft misinterpreted person. But though this book is for beginners, please don't stay one... go and read "Origin of Species."

Accurate, clever, well done.......2000-07-12

This lively, clever, humorous little book IS accurate -- "scientifically correct," in the words of Dr. Tim M. Berra of Ohio State University (author of "Evolution and the Myth of Creationism," 1990, Stanford University Press). I agree with him that it would be a great gift for students to give to their parents to help them understand evolution. The illustrations, many of which are worth a thousand words, are at once engaging, informative, and great fun. Solid history and science in superlative format.

The best introduction to Darwinism you can buy.......1998-07-17

An illustrated narrative tells, all too briefly, the story of Darwin the man and his revolutionary discovery of how the living world came to be. Thanks to its amusing, but informative, cartoon style exegesis, this little gem is a uniquely powerful antidote to creationist propaganda in the classroom. The best introduction to Darwin and his ideas you're likely to see.

Fatuous and grossly inaccurate.......1998-07-02

It is a great shame the authors ruined such a good idea by doing no historical research. It is quite clear that the authors are ignorant of the wealth of research produced by the Darwin industry and of course the Correspondence of Charles Darwin. I could spend a long time doing a hatchet job on the book but I prefer to spend my time going to Snowdonia and walk over the mountains Darwin did his geology and read his geological notes where he wrote them. In all a silly book on a great scientist.. We desperately need a good simple book on Darwin, which avoids all the hype and inaccuracy

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