The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution

I found the book easy to read but fascinating due to the simplicity,originality and lucidity of the text, the closely weaved and compelling argument and wit. I read in disbelief in the appendix that a mere 40 per cent of my Cypriot compatriots found true the proposition that "human beings, as we know them today, developed from earlier species of animals." But this is precisely the kind of ignorance that rendered the book a necessity. The book was written on the bicentennial year of Darwin's birth and the 150th anniversary of the publication of "On the Origin of Species." At the time of its publication in 1859, Darwin considered evolution as a theory in the sense of hypothesis while today both the serious scientific community and many informed individuals consider it a fact in the ordinary meaning of the word. The author argues convincingly that it has the same validity as the proposition that the earth is not flat or that our planetary system is heliocentric. The book is self sufficient in that it does not presuppose a prior knowledge in bilogy. And the beauty of the book is that it is attractive even for people with prior knowledge. The author has as a point of departure the general case for evolution namely the non-random survival of randomly varying genetic material and builts his case gradually, compellingly and comprehensively. The fossil record in geological strata of varying age is of paramount importance in evolution and intimately linked with it is dating. Dating presents the evidence that the timescale on which life has operated on this planet is measured not in thousands years but in hundreds of millions years. Fortunately we have available radioisotope clocks which cover an astonishingly wide range of timescales, and we need this because evolutionary timescales span seven ot eight orders of magnitude. The fast end of natural clocks (decades or centuries) - tree rings and carbon dating - is useful for archaeological purposes and domestication. At the other end of the scale, we need and have natural clocks that can time hundreds of millions, even billions of years. Invariably without a single exception evolutionarily earlier biological forms are found in older geological strata while evolutionarily more advanced forms are found in more recent geological strata. Not even a single fossil was discovered in the wrong geological stratum. Further evidence for evolution is derived from speciation - different species do not interbreed - which takes place in island isolation. A famous Darwinian example are the Galapagos islands species. These islands are 600 miles away from mainland Argentina while they are separated from each other by 60 miles. The species on the islands resemble those on the mainland and even more so species on neighbouring islands as reasonably expected due to proximity and unmistakeably pointing to a common ancestor. Evidence for evolution is also provided from embryology in that every animal of every animal species changes during embryological development, far more drastically than the typical adult form changes from generation to generation. And early embryos resemble strikingly ancestral forms. Further evidence is derived by comparing modern animals with each other, looking in the distribution in the animal kingdom and this becomes more compelling when comparing the sequences in their genetic code. The skeleton of modern animals e.g mammals unmistakeably point to a common ancestor because the array of bones comprising it is the same with individual bones differentiated to serve specific purposes. The vertebrate skeleton is a lovely example of an invariant pattern linking variable detail. The only rational interpretation is that all these have inherited the plan of their skeleton from a common ancestor. Just as the vertebrate skeleton is invariant across vertebrates while the individual bones differ, so the DNA code is invariant while the individual genes themselves differ. This is a truly astonishing fact which shows more clearly than anything else that all living creatures are descendants from a single ancestor. The final chapter of the book is paying homage to Darwin in that it cites the concluding paragraph of "On the Origin of Species" and constructing whole parts from individual phrases to illuminate the clarity, depth of thought and prescience of Darwin. It is my personal judgement that the book is destined to become a classic.

Richard Dawkins' 'Greatest Show On Earth' is one of the first titles I bought for my new Kindle. It's nicely formatted and reads well, with good links to all footnotes. Where the format struggles slightly is with its photos - many of which are shuffled off in the book and must be searched for, but I userstand that the hard copy also has many of its images assigned to a special section of colour plates, so - aside from having to slum it in black and white - I don't feel like the poor relation. As for the content, I'll start by saying that I have very mixed views on Dawkins. Most people know him as a self-appointed spokesperson for the Atheist community. He clearly loves the role and the limelight that it brings, and even though I don't disagree too strongly with the assertions and arguments he conveys, I can't help but see him as a tedious, evangelical bore. I'm not religious - and the reason for this is because I hate being preached to. In that respect, the 'News Soundbite Dawkins' raises my hackles just as much as any Hellfire and Brimstone religious twonk. What we need to remember, though, is that Dawkins doesn't approach subjects like evolution purely from the perspective of an angry old man wanting to stick it to the God Squad. Evolution is his pet subject. The man has devoted decades to its study, and his enthusiasm and passion for the subject is colossal. A huge part of the author's beef with religious fundamentalists comes, I feel, from their refusal to even look at (or acknowledge as real), something so incredible as the process of evolution through natural selection. If this book has a downside, it's a personal one for me. Simply that I'm fascinated with the scientific content, and want to know more about evolution and the work that's gone into its study and consolidation from hypothesis to scientific theory. I am not - however - remotely interested in religion, or what the most orthodox members of the religious community think. The fact that they have so much political influence in the UK - and moreso over the Pond - is worrying, but I really don't want to be reminded of quite how silly they are. Dawkins regularly compares the findings of biological and geological clocks with God Squad assertions, but despite my annoyance, it's not a habit that I can mark the book down on, as the author's perspective is well known, and the whole reason for spelling out the 'evidence' for evolution is largely to counteract the ignorant mantra that it's 'only a theory' or 'a position of faith'. Thankfully, there are whole chapters that don't mention religious twits at all, and concentrate on the science itself. And those pages are an absolute joy to read. For me, the biggest shame of the last decade is that - in the mainstream public eye - Mr Dawkins has become synonymous with his beef against religion. What he does best, however (and what he's been doing well for decades), is present science in an accessible, digestible and exciting context for the layperson. the sheer passion that Dawkins has for his subject beams from every page of his books, and it's highly contagious! If the sense of utter wonderment that accompanies books like this could be bottled and given to children, academic scores would skyrocket over the next few years. So, look past any preconceptions you might have of Dawkins based on his news coverage and secular tub-thumping. Accept that he's going to use this book, in part, as a platform to poke fun at deluded creationists. Read it for the science - and, more importantly than that - the author's love of science. It's electric.

Todo bien. Es paperback, papel delgado, pero todo bien...

Yes: superb. I was one of those guys who always believed in evolution because of fossils, mutating bacteria and viruses that become resistant to medication, and simply because academics said it was true. So really, I was quite ignorant about a strongly held belief of mine, which is not good - it's the type of thinking religious folk display. Dawkins presents such an enormous weight of evidence for evolution in this book it can even affect you at an emotional level. And when you finish you will be ignorant no longer :)

Chiunque abbia un pur vago interesse a capire la teoria dell'evoluzione non può non leggere questo volume ricco di informazioni ma assolutamente non noioso. Non è certo narrativa, ma non è nemmeno un asettico saggio scientifico. Traspare da ogni pagina la passione di Dawkins per gli argomenti trattati e la sempre viva ammirazione quasi fanciullesca per la straordinaria complessità degli organismi viventi e dei meccanismi che legano chimica, biologia, evoluzione. Filo conduttore sono i frequenti riferimenti all'assurdità delle tesi creazioniste, che si mostrano tanto più insostenibili e prive di spessore man mano che vengono esposti i meccanismi biologici che corroborano le intuizioni di Darwin. Ritengo che per apprezzare il volume sia sufficiente una preparazione scientifica di base (scuola superiore).

Tek kelimeyle harika. Evrimi, biyolojiyi ve türlerin varlığın çok açık ve akıcı bir dille aktarıyor. Dawkins'in ne anlattığını anlamak için çevresinde ne olup bittiğine azıcık meraklı olmak yeterli.

And since you probably haven not, it is a must-read. You will have fun and you will be much closer to understand natural evolution. A theory so simple to outline, and yet so beautifully intricate in its consequences. Not to mention the breadth of what it explains: life on earth. You want to understand how come we are here?, read on.