The Genetic Book of the Dead: A Darwinian Reverie

In this book Dawkins suggests that, some time in the future, technology and science will allow a biologist to unravel the complete history of an organism through detailed analysis of its genes. Today we see the very early stages of this capability. Dawkins uses many examples, some new and some very familiar, to show how an examination of the DNA of an organism and its known relatives and ancestors can reveal much about how it lives today and how it, or its ancestors, lived long ago.

This is familiar territory for Dawkins who has championed the pivotal role of the gene in the Darwinian processes of natural selection. I will say that this is at times a very technical argument, assuming some background knowledge in natural selection and show more Dawkins’ own position on it.

Dawkins has said this will be his last new work to be published.

A shout-out also for Jana Lenzova whose simple, but clear and informative, line drawings help to illuminate Dawkins’ argument. show less

Every now and again I find it enjoyable to tour the lineaments of biological evolution. Few people are able to take you through these wonders as well as Richard Dawkins. Take the the time to go on what will probably be Dawkins' final book length tour of the story of life.

Dawkins uses the idea that organisms' genomes evolved in their ancestors' past environments to discuss several aspects of natural history and evolution. The first chapters are like a modernized version of my old comparative vertebrate anatomy course but with beautiful illustrations and no need to do cluster analysis on bone measurements. Subsequent chapters include discussion of the evolution of behavior, revisiting The Selfish Gene and The Extended Phenotype, a fascinating chapter about the evolution of parasitic birds (and fish), the historical significance of the sex chromosomes, and the importance of a gene's companion genes. The endnotes can be read through for many interesting asides and speculations.

This one dodged my reviewing habit so it's a while since I read it. While Dawkins is always elegant and informative, this made less impact on me than some of his others. Only a vague memory of the content remains. Mea culpa.

A well-produced book. The illustrations are not outstanding, but they are good. Some of the photographs are astonishing. p.43 is the first interesting use of math, though, and I stalled thinking about the Euclidian proof of the geometric statement on that page.