Product Description
With unparalleled wit, clarity, and intelligence, Richard Dawkins, one of the world's most renowned evolutionary biologists, has introduced countless readers to the wonders of science in works such as The Selfish Gene. Now, in The Ancestor's Tale, Dawkins offers a masterwork: an exhilarating reverse tour through evolution, from present-day humans back to the microbial beginnings of life four billion years ago. Throughout the journey Dawkins spins entertaining, insightful stories and sheds light on topics such as speciation, sexual selection, and extinction. The Ancestor's Tale is at once an essential education in evolutionary theory and a riveting read.
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Amazon.com Review
Just as we trace our personal family trees from parents to grandparents and so on back in time, so in The Ancestor's Tale Richard Dawkins traces the ancestry of life. As he is at pains to point out, this is very much our human tale, our ancestry. Surprisingly, it is one that many otherwise literate people are largely unaware of. Hopefully Dawkins's name and well deserved reputation as a best selling writer will introduce them to this wonderful saga. The Ancestor's Tale takes us from our immediate human ancestors back through what he calls ‘concestors,’ those shared with the apes, monkeys and other mammals and other vertebrates and beyond to the dim and distant microbial beginnings of life some 4 billion years ago. It is a remarkable story which is still very much in the process of being uncovered. And, of course from a scientist of Dawkins stature and reputation we get an insider's knowledge of the most up-to-date science and many of those involved in the research. And, as we have come to expect of Dawkins, it is told with a passionate commitment to scientific veracity and a nose for a good story. Dawkins's knowledge of the vast and wonderful sweep of life's diversity is admirable. Not only does it encompass the most interesting living representatives of so many groups of organisms but also the important and informative fossil ones, many of which have only been found in recent years. Dawkins sees his journey with its reverse chronology as ‘cast in the form of an epic pilgrimage from the present to the past [and] all roads lead to the origin of life.’ It is, to my mind, a sensible and perfectly acceptable approach although some might complain about going against the grain of evolution. The great benefit for the general reader is that it begins with the more familiar present and the animals nearest and dearest to us—our immediate human ancestors. And then it delves back into the more remote and less familiar past with its droves of lesser known and extinct fossil forms. The whole pilgrimage is divided into 40 tales, each based around a group of organisms and discusses their role in the overall story. Genetic, morphological and fossil evidence is all taken into account and illustrated with a wealth of photos and drawings of living and fossils forms, evolutionary and distributional charts and maps through time, providing a visual compliment and complement to the text. The design also allows Dawkins to make numerous running comments and characteristic asides. There are also numerous references and a good index.-- Douglas Palmer
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 The perfect gift/get! ( sandy12815 )
I've always loved Dawkins books, so when my son had this on his wish list at birthday time, even though I'd already spent all of my alloted birthday money (and more!), I had to add this one!
I'm glad I did. He's told me how much he enjoyed it, and that, afterall, is the whole point of a gift, giving something the receiver will enjoy.
Of course, now I want the book, but it will have to wait a while. I still have 5 birthdays and Christmas to buy for before there's unspoken for cash in my wallet!
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A Pilgrimage to Where? ( stevensc178 )
In this astonishing display of biological knowledge, Richard Dawkins, with a cue from Chaucer, sees the progression of life forms as a pilgrimage, a pilgrimage that apparently will go on forever. And it will go on forever because life forms have no purpose of their own, their only purpose is to replicate. The book could be entitled: "The March of the Replicators". That is all he sees: a universe of replicators going nowhere.
Even his fellow human beings he sees merely as replicators. In the pilgrimage of life forms, there is no Canterbury, there is only unending replication.
The human mind and intellect, music, literature, the human family, art, science, education, the Symphonies of Mozart and Beethoven, the art of Rembrandt, Raphael and Michelangelo, everything we call civilization and culture, mathematics, the cosmos, the visible world around us, the Bible, great cathedrals, Oxford and Cambridge Universities, the United Kingdom, the Wisdom of Greece and the Religion of the Jews, as well as the Vatican, horseracing - an endless list - exist only so life forms can replicate themselves - and he expects us to take him seriously?
He has even discovered new replicators: memes. He has a whole chapter on them in "The Selfish Gene". They are his version of the human mind and intellect, and there is one for religion, too, which he posits as an invader of the meme pool, or at least a mysterious intruder. And how does this religion meme replicate itself: by the spoken and written word, by art, music, literature, in other words, by culture. He apparently came upon this meme colony on the Starship Enterprise. It is his way of dismissing the rational foundation for the existence of God, and the human and rational structure of human civilization and culture.
He seems not to have reflected that if his meme pool is true, his evolutionary biology is only a meme, a fiction inserted into the human mind so that life can replicate itself ad infinitum.
"The Ancestor's Tale" is an astonishing collection of evolutionary and biological information, but it is a procession of life going nowhere, replicating itself - to what end? That is the question that emerges from Richard Dawkins evolutionary encyclopedia. Infinite replication is not something most people can get excited about. It is Reductio ad Absurdum, ad Absurdum, ad Absurdum.........
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 Not without its flaws, but a must-read for anyone interested in the subject ( twilight1 )
"The Ancestor's Tale," Richard Dawkins's engaging look into the reverse-chronology of evolution, is based upon Chaucer's "Cantebury Tales;" we get various chapters revolving around certain organisms (or, rather, the earliest common ancestor of the modern-day organism), most chapters featuring a "tale" that deals with some aspect of evolution.
"Tale" is not perfect, though it is helped out by the fact that Dawkins readily admits his book isn't perfect. If he's uncertain of who came first in his backward trek through time, he admits it. If there is something scientists are still unsure of, Dawkins doesn't throw an answer our way--he describes to us the problem, and how future scientists might unravel it. There are a few other flaws, however, inherent in his writing: he is often wordy (especially in the sections co-written with Yan Wong, some of which Dawkins even tells the casual reader to just skip), and his various invented phrases ("concestor" being the prominent one) become hard to follow. Then there is his needless political skewering; he goes off-topic frequently to talk about the (mainly American) political climate of today's world. He also makes his opinions about Creationists plain; he often goes out of his way to mock them, to the extent of deterring the reader (most of whom, we must assume, believe in evolution) from his points.
His snide remarks (and occasional wordiness) aside, Dawkins's "The Ancestor's Tale" is an enjoyable, thoroughly informative romp through evolution. It is an admitably-biased approach (evolution through a human perspective; it could just as easily have been told through that of an elephant, which even Dawkins admits would be interesting), but that is unavoidable; humans can only tell human stories. Taken as such, "The Ancestor's Tale" is a must-read for anyone with an interest in evolution, or scientific writing in general. It may be a bit more than the most casual reader can handle, but if you've done some general-science reading before (I'm not expert, believe me; hell, I'm an English major!), you are more than prepared. Strap yourselves in for a journey back to the beginning of life...you'll find quite a few surprises along the way, I guarantee you.
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A great introduction to the science of Evolution ( steve37370 )
A lot has already been said about this book, and I just thought I would throw in my two cents!
This is a great book! This book is Dawkins' best book for the masses. If you're curious about how evolution actually works and exactly how we know evolution by natural selection works, this is a great introduction.
Dawkins has a clear and easy to read style of writing, and he keeps the pace brisk and entertaining!
A lot has been said about how Dawkins rants and how long the book is. First, Dawkins keeps his rants to a bare minimum, and most of them are funny asides in the footnotes, don't believe the hype!
Second, the length of the book: this book is over 600 pages long! But it's not long and rambling, considering the scope and breadth of what the author is trying to do here, this book is actually quite condensed and to the point. Dawkins manages to tell the story of human and primate evolution in about 100 pages, which is no mean feat. This chapter in itself could easily fill up volumes!
Given the episodic structure of this book, I could easily imagine it being adapted (pun intended) into a great Cosmos style TV series!
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Evolutionary Biology
Great read for anyone interested in evolutionary biology - from an academic or a curiosity standpoint.
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