Niles Eldredge

For most of us outside the scientific community, our understanding of evolution begins and ends with Charles Darwin. But, as paleontologist and evolutionary biologist Niles Eldredge shows us in his well-written, well-documented, and extremely interesting book, Eternal Ephemera, Darwin is only part of the story albeit a very important part. Eldredge takes us through two hundred years of evolutionary theory beginning with French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck who, in 1801, first began to show more ponder the question of how new species developed and continues right up to the present including Eldredge’s own contributions to the theory on punctuated equilibria which he helped to develop along with Stephen Jay Gould. He provides the reader with a view of not only the ephemeral lives of species but of the evolution of the ideas on evolution. Along with the science and the history, Eldredge makes the story more personal by writing about his own journey following Darwin’s footsteps literally through many of the places Darwin visited on the HMS Beagle. Eternal Ephemera provides a highly readable and highly cogent read for anyone who is interested in both the history and the science of evolution written by one of the most important thinkers in the field and I recommend it highly. show less

Primo caso in cui pur conoscendo personalmente l'autore mi innamoro a prima vista del suo modo di scrivere. Non vedevoo l'ora di tornare a casa per continuare a leggere!
Un libro molto utile per avvicinarsi alla figura di Darwin, anche in vista del bicentenario della nascita nel 2009. Sempre entusiasticamente coinvolto e coinvolgente, Eldredge non si limita a raccontare una favoletta, ma introduce il lettore a un mondo complesso come quello vittoriano del pre-darwinismo, permettendo di show more assaporare la storia di uno dei più grandi pensatori di tutti i tempi. show less

This book was an interesting experience, since I started out agreeing with the author's main thesis, and in spite of that, he couldn't convince me. Throughout the book, I continually kept asking myself, "Yes, but where's the evidence?" The author supports his thesis with a parade of anecdotes, all of which taken together do not constitute evidence. In addition, his writing style, which I usually like, lapses into annoying vernacular, continually referring to human reproduction as "making show more babies", thereby making this learned and erudite author sound like a kindergarten teacher searching for a suitable euphemism for a scientific term that should not be offensive or difficult to understand. I don't recommend it at all. show less

Intelligent, interesting, well-illustrated with photographs. The historical notes are a really good effort, placing Darwin's life in the context of other events, and only a little bit sloppy.