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|  | Author: Richard Dawkins
Publisher: Free Press
Category: Book
List Price: $30.00
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Rating:  197 reviews
Sales Rank: 698
Media: Hardcover
Edition: First Edition
Pages: 480
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.8
Dimensions (in): 9.7 x 6.7 x 1.8
ISBN: 1416594787
Dewey Decimal Number: 576.8
EAN: 9781416594789
ASIN: 1416594787
Publication Date: September 22, 2009
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 26-30 of 197
 Nature Neither Kind nor Unkind? January 17, 2010
Kenneth L. Carson
0 out of 4 found this review helpful
I don't think I could add anything to what has already been said in favor of this excellent book. In my view Dawkins is a genius and an incredibly honest and courageous individual. I have found something however, and it's the only thing I've ever found , that I would take issue with Dr. Dawkins about. In the chapter Dawkins titled "Arms Races and "Evolutionary Theodicy"" he writes that in a previous book he said Nature is neither kind nor unkind. Peptides called endorphins secreted by the brain have a pain-relieving effect very similar to morphine. I recall years ago reading about a U.S. Marine who in storming a faraway beachead in WW11 incurred a massive and fatal wound. There was even a painting of this Marine depicting him literally covered with blood from head to toe. Fellow marines attending him recalled that he seemed to feel no pain at all, but rather was simply embarrassed that he could not continue the fight! Likewise a brother of mine suffered a massive and fatal injury in an automoble accident many years ago and witnesses said he had a broad and peaceful smile on his face when they finally freed his body from the wreakage of his car. It's hard to see how great pain and suffering could cause someone to assume such a blissful and smiling countenance at the moment of death.
With regard to fear I think many animals (and humans too) simply don't have the time to experience much fear when death is imminent. They only have time to react in ways that will hopefully spare them the fatal blow, just as we react instinctively when we see a snake or just something that looks like a snake. Years ago while riding a motorcycle on a heavily traveled two-lane highway I suddenly found myself in a head-on collision course with a car traveling at high speed. I had to either get off the road very quickly or collide head-on with this car and face almost certain death as I was traveling at a high speed as well. Amazingly I felt no fear! I instinctively got off the road onto the shoulder as fast as my reactions allowed me. I didn't have time to be afraid. I had time only to react.
Likewise I think it's safe to assume that a Thompson's gazelle, for instance, when faced with a lion chasing it at breakneck speed, has little time to be very afraid. It has time only to react by hopefully running faster than the lion, or at least faster than a fellow gazelle who is also running for its life. And if caught endorphins would surely lesson much of its suffering.
There is certainly fear and suffering in the natural world as natural selection selects but not nearly so much I think as Dr. Dawkins would have us believe.
Fascinating read! The title says it best. January 16, 2010
got2ske
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is (surprisingly/embarrassingly) the first Dawkins book I have read, and I was very impressed, both with content as well as the author's broad knowledge and skill as a writer. Dawkins does a wonderful job of presenting the current body of evolutionary knowledge, showing that it truly is, "The greatest show on earth, the only game in town." If every member of society understood the concepts in this book, our world would be a very different place, indeed. One, I would argue, much more rational and peaceful. Thanks, Prof. Dawkins, for devoting so much of your life to what I view as the most important cause in society today.
 The Good Professor Back In His Element January 12, 2010
M. Richardson (TN)
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
After setting off a firecracker in every church in the West with his wildly controversial "The God Delusion" (a veritable industry of Christian books seems to have popped up in the last few years consisting solely of angry Christians denouncing Richard Dawkins and his book, and sometimes, in much less detail, other "New Atheist" writers), the good professor is returning once more (perhaps for the last time? I certainly hope not, but it seems likely) to the subject which he has built his fame and authorial career on: the theory of evolution. His previous evolution-centric writings have always (naturally) presumed the truth of evolution, and so focus on different aspects of it. This is no fault on his part. Teaching evolutionary biology is something that should ideally be accomplished in the K-12 classroom. Alas, science education is being assaulted non-stop lately by an international coalition of extremist Christians and Muslims who have made it their goal to systematically destroy the teaching of evolutionary biology by spreading misinformation and funding domestic propaganda vehicles. Perhaps due to the recent proliferation of Intelligent Design and Islamic creationism in Europe and the United States wrought by this, Dawkins has written a book on the evidence for evolution.
Or has he?
Certainly there is evidence here, but the title led me to believe this would be a rigorous and systematic presentation of the evidence for evolution. This is not what this book is. It is, rather, a chatty introduction to evolution. Specific examples are fairly scant, and instead of referencing technical articles, as one would expect from a former professor. he quotes more informal sources, many from the internet. If you're getting this because you're expecting a formal presentation of the evidence for evolution, I would give this a pass (while I have yet to read it, I hear Jerry Coyne's "Why Evolution is True" is excellent in this regard). If you want a relatively non-technical introduction to evolution, however, or if you just enjoy the good professor's style and find that he is always compelling, then I whole-heartedly recommend this book.
Do not read this expecting another "The God Delusion." While he does take a fair number of shots at creationists in this (or "history deniers," as he calls them, alluding to the ridiculous anti-semitic tendency to deny the Holocaust in the face of all contrary evidence and common-sense), this book is about evolution, not atheism. As he says in the book, he has already worn that T-shirt.
The beginning of the book is a 'softening-up' program, designed to lead the reader from the obvious (artificial selection) to the less obvious (natural selection). Dawkins explains how we know the age of the Earth. And then he gets into the meat of the book.
I think this will suffice as a brief overview of the book's content:
Only a Theory? - Evolution is just a theory in the same way the theory of heliocentrism is just a theory. Scientific theories are not mere conjectures.
Dogs, Cows, and Cabbages - Covers domestication and artificial selection by human breeders
The Primrose Path of Macroevolution - Artificial selection occurs in nature, too
Silence and Slow Time - The age of the Earth and how we know it
Before Our Very Eyes - Observable evolution of microbes
Missing Link, What Do You Mean Missing? - The fossil record and what it tells us
Missing Persons, Missing No Longer - Fossils relating to human evolution
You Did It Yourself in Nine Months - Bottom-up assembly in the womb
The Ark of the Continents - Continental drift and the geographical dispersion of different species
The Tree of Cousinship - The tree of life
History Written All Over Us - Clues to our evolutionary history in our bodies
Arms Races and Evolutionary Theodicy - Competition and the role of suffering in nature
There is Grandeur In This View of Life - In-depth examination of final paragraph of Darwin's On the Origin of Species and how it describes the natural world as a way to wrap up the book.
There is an appendix as well, which contains some frightening statistics about the spread of creationism throughout the world.
None of this is going to convince creationists, of course, and some people who have an adequate understanding of modern evolutionary biology will be bored by this rather simplistic overview, but this is perfect for the intelligent layman who doesn't really understand the science behind evolution and for the Dawkins fan who just appreciates getting another chance to read his clear and lucid prose.
EDIT: added 02/14/10 - I neglected to mention the BEAUTIFUL full-color photographs in this book. But they deserve mention. They're sublime.
 Good but not the best one out there January 11, 2010
andris virsnieks (Seattle, WA USA)
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
If you want a more long-winded explanation of evolution and colored photographs this is the book for you. But if you want a more concise (233 vs. 437 pages) and clear explanation, read Why Evaluation is True by Jerry A. Coyne. And when Richard Dawkins is concise Jerry A. Coyne quotes him: "Richard Dawkins provided the most concise definition of natural selection: it is 'the non-random survival of random variants.'"
Richard Dawkins Hardcover Book Review January 9, 2010
E. Mcguire (Wisconsin)
0 out of 7 found this review helpful
This book was in great shape when I received it and it arrived in a very timely manner (even before Christmas).
Showing reviews 26-30 of 197
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