Explaining Life through Evolution

Explaining Life through Evolution

Author: Prosanta Chakrabarty

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2023-08-08

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 0262375478

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A broad overview of the science of evolution, and why understanding it matters in our everyday lives. Explaining Life through Evolution tells the origin story of life on this planet and how we arrived at the tremendous diversity among organisms that we see around us today. Prosanta Chakrabarty explains evolution in a concise, accessible, and engaging way, emphasizing the importance of understanding evolution in everyday contemporary life. Weaving his own lived experience among discussions of Darwin and the origins of evolutionary thought, Chakrabarty also covers key concepts to our understanding of our current condition, including mutation; the spectrum of race, sex, gender, and sexuality; the limitations of ancestry tests; and the evolution of viruses like SARS-CoV-2, the virus at the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic. Offering a contemporary update to classic popular evolution books by Stephen Jay Gould, Jerry Coyne, and others, Explaining Life through Evolution is not only an illuminating read, but also an essential guide to the kind of scientific literacy that we need in order to face the challenges of our collective future.


Life Ascending

Life Ascending

Author: Nick Lane

Publisher: Profile Books

Published: 2010-10-01

Total Pages: 353

ISBN-13: 1847652220

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Winner of the 2010 Royal Society Prize for science books Powerful new research methods are providing fresh and vivid insights into the makeup of life. Comparing gene sequences, examining the atomic structure of proteins and looking into the geochemistry of rocks have all helped to explain creation and evolution in more detail than ever before. Nick Lane uses the full extent of this new knowledge to describe the ten greatest inventions of life, based on their historical impact, role in living organisms today and relevance to current controversies. DNA, sex, sight and consciousnesses are just four examples. Lane also explains how these findings have come about, and the extent to which they can be relied upon. The result is a gripping and lucid account of the ingenuity of nature, and a book which is essential reading for anyone who has ever questioned the science behind the glories of everyday life.


Story of Life

Story of Life

Author: Catherine Barr

Publisher: Frances Lincoln Children's Books

Published: 2018-02

Total Pages: 40

ISBN-13: 9781786033420

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At first, nothing lived on Earth. It was a noisy, hot, scary place. Choking gas exploded from volcanoes and oceans of lava bubbled around the globe... Then in the deep, dark ocean, something amazing happened. This is an exciting and dramatic story about how life began and developed on Planet Earth, written especially for younger children. The authors explain how the first living cell was created, and how the cells multiply and create jellyfish and worms, and then fish with bendy necks, which drag themselves out of the water into swampy forests. They tell the story of the biggest creatures that have ever walked on land - the dinosaurs. Long after that, hairy creatures who have babies, not eggs, take over, stand on two legs and spread around the world, some of them living through cataclysmic events such as ice ages and volcanic eruptions. Everyone living today is related to these survivors. With delightful illustrations including lots of detail and humour, all carefully researched and checked, this book shows the development of life on Earth in a truly accessible and simple way. CLICK HERE to download Teachers' Notes specially written by the authors, Catherine Barr and Steve Williams, to assist teachers and librarians in the promotion and teaching of The Story of Lifein schools and to help foster a love of good books, literature and reading in children.


Walking with Comrades

Walking with Comrades

Author: Arundhati Roy

Publisher: Penguin UK

Published: 2011-05-15

Total Pages: 85

ISBN-13: 8184755899

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‘The terse, typewritten note slipped under my door in a sealed envelope confirmed my appointment with “India’s single biggest internal security challenge”. I’d been waiting for months to hear from them...’ In early 2010, Arundhati Roy travelled into the forests of Central India, homeland to millions of indigenous people, dreamland to some of the world’s biggest mining corporations. The result is this powerful and unprecedented report from the heart of an unfolding revolution.


Evolution for Everyone

Evolution for Everyone

Author: David Sloan Wilson

Publisher: Delacorte Press

Published: 2007-03-27

Total Pages: 402

ISBN-13: 0440336805

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With stories that entertain as much as they inform, renowned evolutionist David Sloan Wilson outlines the basic principles of evolution and shows how, when properly understood, they can illuminate the length and breadth of creation, from the origin of life to the nature of religion. What is the biological reason for gossip? For laughter? For the creation of art? Why do dogs have curly tails? What can microbes tell us about morality? These and many other questions are tackled by Wilson in this witty and groundbreaking new book. Now everyone can move beyond the sterile debates about creationism and intelligent design to share Darwin’s panoramic view of animal and human life, seamlessly connected to each other. Evolution, as Wilson explains, is not just about dinosaurs and human origins, but about why all species behave as they do—from beetles that devour their own young, to bees that function as a collective brain, to dogs that are smarter in some respects than our closest ape relatives. And basic evolutionary principles are also the foundation for humanity’s capacity for symbolic thought, culture, and morality. In example after example, Wilson sheds new light on Darwin’ s grand theory and how it can be applied to daily life. By turns thoughtful, provocative, and daringly funny, Evolution for Everyone addresses some of the deepest philosophical and social issues of this or any age. In helping us come to a deeper understanding of human beings and our place in the world, it might also help us to improve that world.


Life on a Young Planet

Life on a Young Planet

Author: Andrew H. Knoll

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 300

ISBN-13: 9780691120294

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Knoll explores the deep history of life from its origins on a young planet to the incredible Cambrian explosion, with the very latest discoveries in paleontology integrated with emerging insights from molecular biology and earth system science. 100 illustrations.


The Vital Question

The Vital Question

Author: Nick Lane

Publisher:

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781781250372

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A game-changing book on the origins of life, called the most important scientific discovery 'since the Copernican revolution' in The Observer.


The Physics of Life

The Physics of Life

Author: Adrian Bejan

Publisher: Macmillan

Published: 2016-05-24

Total Pages: 274

ISBN-13: 1250078822

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An empowering new view of the nature of physics and the constant evolution of our physical and social world


Evolution

Evolution

Author: Carl Zimmer

Publisher: Harper Collins

Published: 2010-11-23

Total Pages: 530

ISBN-13: 0062038230

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“This brilliant book is a virtual Voyage of the Beagle! Carl Zimmer shows, with the benefit of a hundred and fifty years of hindsight, how right Darwin was.” —Steve Jones, author of Darwin’s Ghost Darwin’s The Origin of Species was breathtaking—beautifully written, staunchly defended, defiantly radical. Yet it emerged long before modern genetics, molecular biology, and contemporary findings in paleontology. In this remarkable book, a rich and up-to-date view of evolution is presented that explores the far-reaching implications of Darwin’s theory. At a time when controversies surrounding creationism and education are bursting into public consciousness, this book’s emphasis on the power, significance, and relevance of evolution will make it a catalyst for public debate. Evolution marks a turning point in the 150-year debate and will be an indispensable asset to any serious reader with an interest in the life sciences, a passion for truth in education, or a concern for the future of the planet. “The evolution of life over four billion years is a grand narrative, full of plots, intrigues, surprises and deaths. Carl Zimmer tells the tale with zest and style.” —Matt Ridley, New York Times–bestselling author “Proceeding from the flurry of preparations for Darwin’s famous voyage, Carl Zimmer leads us off on a journey of our own, tracking the development—and the implications—of one of the most powerful ideas in the biological sciences.” —Scientific American “Science writer Zimmer does a superb job of providing a sweeping overview of most of the topics critical to understanding evolution, presenting his material from both a historical and a topical perspective.” —Publishers Weekly “Popular science that will truly be popular.” —Booklist


Evolution

Evolution

Author: Donald R. Prothero

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2017-08-22

Total Pages: 891

ISBN-13: 0231543166

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Donald R. Prothero’s Evolution is an entertaining and rigorous history of the transitional forms and series found in the fossil record. Its engaging narrative of scientific discovery and well-grounded analysis has led to the book’s widespread adoption in courses that teach the nature and value of fossil evidence for evolution. Evolution tackles systematics and cladistics, rock dating, neo-Darwinism, and macroevolution. It includes extensive coverage of the primordial soup, invertebrate transitions, the development of the backbone, the reign of the dinosaurs, and the transformation from early hominid to modern human. The book also details the many alleged “missing links” in the fossil record, including some of the most recent discoveries that flesh out the fossil timeline and the evolutionary process. In this second edition, Prothero describes new transitional fossils from various periods, vividly depicting such bizarre creatures as the Odontochelys, or the “turtle on the half shell”; fossil snakes with legs; and the “Frogamander,” a new example of amphibian transition. Prothero’s discussion of intelligent design arguments includes more historical examples and careful examination of the “experiments” and observations that are exploited by creationists seeking to undermine sound science education. With new perspectives, Prothero reframes creationism as a case study in denialism and pseudoscience rather than a field with its own intellectual dynamism. The first edition was hailed as an exemplary exploration of the fossil evidence for evolution, and this second edition will be welcome in the libraries of scholars, teachers, and general readers who stand up for sound science in this post-truth era.