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Loading... River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life (1995)by Richard Dawkins
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. As always extremely clear. Especially interesting were various naive fallacies when thinking about evolution: "Eve", number of ancestors, etc. I also liked the extension to "replicators" and information expanding through the galaxy. Richard Dawkins himself narrates most of the book. ( ) Wonderful little book - I like Dawkins best when he doesn't write for academia. Excellent overview for Darwinian evolution...simple, logical explanations that should serve most receptive readers, and really dispels the "not possible for an intermediate stage" arguments. There are nice turns of phrase throughout (I especially liked "embryological origami"). And he points out an outstanding counter to the "you can't answer 'why' questions": The mere fact that it is possible to frame a question does not make it legitimate or sensible to do so. Well worth the read, and likely a re-read.
The book breaks no new ground but, as usual, it abounds with metaphors that make things brilliantly clear. Mr. Dawkins is often portrayed as the village reductionist, the man who thinks there is nothing to life but selfish genes. But this is less than fair. . . He is above all a masterly expositor, a writer who understands the issues so clearly that he forces his readers to understand them too. "River Out of Eden" displays these virtues to the full. It is a thinner book than his others, with no special message to deliver, but it maintains his high standards of clarity and excitement. Belongs to Publisher SeriesAwardsDistinctionsNotable Lists
How did the replication bomb we call ”life” begin and where in the world, or rather, in the universe, is it heading? Writing with characteristic wit and an ability to clarify complex phenomena (the New York Times described his style as ”the sort of science writing that makes the reader feel like a genius”), Richard Dawkins confronts this ancient mystery. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)575Natural sciences and mathematics Life Sciences, Biology Physiological systems in plantsLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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