Bookshelf
| Remarkable Creatures, Sean B. Carroll |
|
Remarkable Creatures, by Sean B. Carroll **** For those of you that think Science is boring and scientists even more boring, this is the book for you. Dr. Carroll, an evolutionary biologist, takes you on wonderful journeys of adventure and discovery while revealing some of the greatest discoveries of the past 200 years and the wonderful pioneers that made them. Starting in the early to mid 1800s we get to join Darwin and Wallace on their remarkable expeditions around the world and their struggles to present their theories of evolution and natural selection. We are introduced to folks like Eugene Dubois and Charles Walcott whose early discoveries in paleontology inspired later giants like Louis and Mary Leakey. Seriously, every new chapter presented yet another of my scientific heroes including Linus Pauling, who was one of the most amazing figures of the 20th century. Dr. Carroll manages to present all of this material (and there is a ton of information in a small space) in a way that you pour through it. Each chapter is a story of adventure, not a boring treatise on the merits of a theory or procedure. These folks were the Indiana Jones's of their time and made world-changing discoveries. The romance and exotic locales (from the Artic circle to the Amazon jungle to the Gobi Desert and the Kenyan Rift Valley) are dizzying in their scope. There is even a section outlining the latest discoveries in molecular genetics that have led to the soon-to-come revelation of the Neanderthal genome. This is an extremely well-written and enjoyable book. Even if you are not well-versed in scientific history, or science, or history, you will like this book. If you are a scientist, you will appreciate the manner in which this is presented and enjoy the concise offering of great stories. A must read.
|
|
| Last Updated on Friday, 07 August 2009 09:07 |