Synopses & Reviews
Unprecedented in its approach, the number and diversity of the species presented, and the quality of the photographs, Evolution is the book on how we came to be what we are. Spectacular, mysterious, elegant, or grotesque, the skeletons of the vertebrates that inhabit the earth today carry within them the imprint of an evolutionary process that has lasted several billion years. This book is the result of a dual approach, scientific as well as aesthetic, rigorous yet accessible. Each chapter is made up of a short text that illuminates one theme of the evolutionary process--repetition, adaptation, polymorphism, sexual selection--and a series of exquisitely composed photographs of skeletons against a black background. Approximately three hundred photographs of whole skeletons or details have been made possible by the French National Museum of Natural History. The reader learns, by experiencing each text and photograph together, how the structure of every creature has been shaped by its environmental and genetic inheritance.
Author Jean-Baptiste de Panafieu, a professor of natural sciences and a doctor of biological oceanography, has published a number of popular scientific works for younger readers and written and directed documentaries.
Photographer Patrick Gries has photographed over two thousand artworks for the new Quai Branly Museum and collaborated with the Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art, among other recent projects.
Linda Asher, a former fiction editor for The New Yorker, has translated into English Victor Hugo, Georges Simenon, and Milan Kundera. Her translation of Martin Winckler's The Case of Dr. Sachs (La maladie de Sachs) won the French-American Foundation Translation Prize in 2000.
Synopsis
Now updated and presented in a smaller format with fifteen new gorgeous photographs,
Evolution steps beyond the debate and presents the undeniable truth of Darwin's theory, showing through skeletons both obscure and commonplace, but always intriguing, the process by which life has transformed itself, again and again.
Here is a powerful pairing: two hundred stark black-and-white photographs produced by Patrick Gries in collaboration with the Museum of Natural History in Paris are accompanied by text from scientist and documentarian Jean-Baptiste de Panafieu. The result is a revealing collection that profoundly illustrates the key themes of evolution--homology, convergence, adaptation, polymorphism, and more.
Spectacular, mysterious, elegant, or grotesque, the vertebrate skeletons of Earth's fossil record carry within them the traces of several billion years of evolution. Evolution, a resounding success on its initial publication in 2007, is a unique and beautiful attempt to provide a map of those billion years in time.
Synopsis
Charles Darwinand#8217;s On the Origin of Species appeared a little more than 150 years ago. Although Darwin had been developing his theory for over 20 years, and before him others had advocated evolutionary views, the book was transformative. Nonetheless, it was only the beginning of the development of evolutionary biology.
The story of evolutionary theory over the last 150 years is fascinating and conceptually rich. It involves modification, clarification, experimentation, and frustration. In the end a robust, vibrant, and deeply descriptive theory emerged. The tortuous path, from Darwinand#8217;s original brilliant formulation to todayand#8217;s model, is filled with intrigue and philosophical richness. In many respects, the story documents the maturing of biological science, a science with evolutionary theory at its centre. As evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky stated in 1973, and#8220;nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.and#8221; The truth of this assertion is even more evident today than it was more than 40 years ago.
This book is a historical narrative of the conceptual and theoretical discoveries and debates, the experimentation and field work that became the evidential base on which the theory rests, the systematic assembling of these into an elegant and powerful science, and the elements that increasingly won over the biological and the scientific community more generally. The book will appeal to all interested in the history of science, as well as the current thought on how our species came to be.
Synopsis
Charles Darwin published
On the Origin of Species a little over one hundred and fifty years ago, and it changed everything. But many donand#8217;t realize that it took Darwin over twenty years to develop his theory, that others had been advocating a similar theory before him, and many others have been developing it since. In
A Remarkable Journey, R. Paul Thompson tells the story of evolutionary theory, of the empirical and theoretical discoveries and the endless heated debates that have led to our understanding of it today.
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As Thompson shows, the tortuous path from Darwinand#8217;s brilliant formulation to todayand#8217;s robust and vibrant model is filled with intrigue. Evolutionary theory has become, in many respects, the center of biological science, and its maturation is an indication of a larger and more sophisticated scientific understanding more generally. But this development was not easily won, a point Thompson makes clear as he takes readers from one stage of the theoryand#8217;s maturation to the next, detailing all that went into the development of what most of us now take for granted as a basicand#151;and beautifuland#151;principle of life.and#160;
About the Author
JEAN-BAPTISTE DE PANAFIEU is a professor of natural sciences and a doctor of biological oceanography, as well as a documentarian and author. Photographer PATRICK GRIES has photographed over two thousand artworks for the Quai Branly Museum and collaborated with the Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art. LINDA ASHER is a former fiction editor at the New Yorker and the translator of works by writers such as Victor Hugo, Georges Simenon, and Milan Kundera.