[.ca] Darwin's Ghost: The Origin of Species Updated (ISBN 0385259093)

From Amazon.com:
Biologists have a dirty little secret: while practically everyone knows of The Origin of Species (and owes much to it), almost nobody has read it. British geneticist Steve Jones wants to make the arguments contained in that great text accessible to modern audiences, and succeeds with the delightful Darwin's Ghost. Approximating the structure of Darwin's opus, Jones uses the original chapter headings and summaries as a scaffolding to build an up-to-date demonstration of the power of a few simple ideas. Heredity, variation, and natural selection are all you need to infer evolution over time, and now that Jones can fill in the gaps in Darwin's pre-Mendelian understanding of genetics, the case becomes airtight. More than a polemic, though, Darwin's Ghost is nearly as pleasurable a read as its ancestor is--one suspects that part of Jones's mission is to inspire today's readers to turn back to the grand but humble Origin of Species. While he may not be able to quite match Darwin's vast erudition or hawk's eye for detail, he still makes the theory of evolution shudder and breathe on the page. Dog breeding, mass extinctions, and weird fossils of tiny elephants all march to his drumbeat and--just when you least expect it--return to the main point that all living things share a common ancestor. Whether you're one of the elite who's had the pleasure of Darwin's literary company or you'd like a taste of what you're missing, Darwin's Ghost will bring the spirit of the great man back into your world of ideas. --Rob Lightner

Ghostwriter Jones:
No great adventure, quest, or mystery here. No assistance with this book from beyond by Darwin himself although Jones does say "helpful though that would have been." No, instead in the best traditions of Ghostwriting, we have a work faithful to it's original with full recognition and even admiration for the author. The original is of course THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES by Charles Darwin, which Jones says is "without doubt, the book of the millennium". Yet it's not a widely read book. Broadening readership is one of Jones' objectives but he also tackles creationism and puts the social sciences in their place. The latter point being that "evolution is to the social sciences as statues are to birds: a convenient platform upon which to deposit badly digested ideas." Attempts to apply the laws of natural science to civilization are, Jones says, "more or less infantile" and are thus not even discussed. That's interesting for two reasons: (1) sociobiology, evolutionary psychology, and attempts to come up with a synthesis of all knowledge are very current topics of debate. Some of it originating with Jones' fellow biologists such as E O Wilson in CONSILIENCE and Jared Diamond's GUNS GERMS AND STEEL. Others by non-scientists may be what he was refering to as "infantile" although recent works such as Robert Wright's NONZERO and historian Felipe Fernandez-Armesto's CIVILIZATIONS are sophisticated, entertaining, and definitely thought provoking. (2) Jones is himself an evolutionary psychologist yet his book doesn't bring up the subject at all. Nor is it only sociobiology and Wilson that is missing from discussion. There's no Dawkins, Gould, or any modern scientist mentioned. Jones has instead stayed very close to Darwin using the chapter titles and structure of the original book and in fact lifting the entire last chapter of Darwin's conclusions and reproducing it here. What Jones adds in this update is current examples of the process of natural selection and a modern, readable writing style (oftentimes very humorous as is the style of so many writers on evolutionary biology. Is there some selection of fitness for humor taking place here?). I can think of a couple of his colleagues who could use a little of Jones' levity and ease up on the debate a bit. Maybe he had them in mind when he said "the sea squirt, after an active life, settles on the sea floor, and like a professor given tenure, absorbs its brain." Jones ranges far and wide with his restatement of how natural selection works. Given his view that "there is no mystery to Darwin's machine: it is no more than genetics plus time" it is to be expected that the illustrations he uses are both meaningful and are explained in a straightforward way. Beginning with a discussion of HIV/AIDS which is shown to contain Darwin's "entire argument" of "variation, a struggle for existence, and natural selection that in time leads to new forms of life" Jones then goes on to use whales, birds, cats, dogs, argiculture, and even zoos to illustrate that this process - "the factory for the almost impossible" - can have some unusual results. Cincinnati zoos breeding of albino tigers at above normal rates being a case in point. Well written with much humor and obviously directed at the generalist as an introduction to Darwin's great thesis, this book accomplishes what it set out to do. It's not perfect - like natural selection there are errors, although with evolution it's through reproduction not from poor editing and cross checking - but the book nevertheless is as close to the original as you could want while bringing it up to date and making this important subject much more readable.

Wallace's Ghost:
As I was coming to the end of this book I came across the sentence "Many sociologists (and a few biologists) hope for a comparative anatomy of the mind; but that can never succeed." Jones thinks "the human intellect stands alone". He gives no good reasons for this, but states it anyway, shades of Alfred Russel Wallace. Why should scientists give up hope for understanding the evolution of the human brain from an evolutionary perspective? Does the books dedication provide us with an answer? "To Dick Lewontin, who showed me what evolution can and cannot explain." The previous review by CW is right on, saying the Origin is clearer. And I agree with mturks review that there is a lack of clarity in "Darwin's Ghost". If you want to read the Origin, it is slow going, maybe worth it, but you will only learn part of what is now known. My recommendations for an update of Darwin are Ernst Mayrs "One Long Argument"(1991) and "What Evolution Is" (2001) for lucid and non-technical treatments.

Great subject, tough read:
I've recently become very interested in theories of evolution and have read quite widely in this space. I can't recommend this book because, although its aims in bringing Darwin up to date are laudable, it is just too hard to read. Every fourth or fifth sentence you have to ask yourself "just what is he really saying here?" The style is almost wilfully difficult. Why struggle with such tough material when you can cover the same ground effortlessly with other authors such as Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett, both of whom write quite beautifully? Forget Darwin's Ghost, try Dawkins's "The Blind Watchmaker" or Dennett's "Darwin's Dangerous Idea."

Better Than the Original!:
Having never read "Origin of a Species", I found this book invaluable. It laid out the arguments and descriptions of evolution all in one place, in a very readable format. It is naturally superior to Origin in that it is an update of 150 years of science, especially genetics and plate tectonics. But this isn't a mere rewriting in modern English or with modern scientific arguments added in. As Jones himself states, it is more a rewriting of the *ideas* within Origin, in Jones' voice and with his own arguments. Steve Jones writes with a wonderful style, similar to dearly departed Stephen Jay Gould, merging science with popular culture and limitless trivia. (My friends are quickly getting tired of me quoting much of the trivia from the book- like the percentage of genetic variation between individuals and "races", or the male ability to lactate!) I must however disagree with Jones on one point- Darwin was not a great writer. Summaries and the final chapter of The Origin are reprinted here- and with good reason!- Darwin's arguments were profound and instrumental, and should be included in his own words in part in a book that is a rewriting of those ideas. But Darwin's wordiness and vagueness only serve to highlight both his much superior abilities as a scientist, and Jones' much superior writing skill.

A Great Intellectual Feast:
This book purports to "update" Darwin's Origin of Species. But, as Jones says, "It would be presumptuous to present this essay as more than a shadow of its original, in content or in form." Moreover, "The Origin is...a work of high Victorian seriousness, with no concession to any desire to be entertained. In these more flippant times I yield to the temptation to leaven a scientific narrative with tales from the curious history of evolution and those who study it." Ok, fair enough. So, what is this book's intended audience? In Darwin's case, he was writing to the educated lay person of his day, which mostly meant Victorian gentlemen of conventional morality and religion, but interested in science, and with minds that could follow an argument and be changed. But he was writing to scientists mainly, and was acutely conscious of the need to be comprehensive, clear, and conservative as regards the evidence, and rigorous in argument. Jones is not writing to convince his audience that all the variety of life that we see about us arose out of simpler forms (or, even, just one simple type of proto-creature) by descent with modification over eons of time, with the environment doing the selective breeding, as it were. His audience should already believe that. (Those that most vehemently do not are certainly not addressed here.) Rather, he is giving us an informal survey of natural history in its great and entertaining variety, using Darwin's great argument as a "scaffolding" upon which to hang his discussions. Throughout he implicitly assumes that you accept the reality of evolution. What he is doing is guiding you through its implications and outcomes in a great number of ways. Thus, for example, Darwin used the chaotic nature of the geologic strata to argue for various events that could fold rocks or raise ancient seabeds up to the tops of mountains by referring to Lyell's theories, which were still controversial. Jones simply assumes we believe the by-now-well-established facts of geology, and uses these to discuss the spottiness and contrariness of the fossil record. Thus, Jones has a much easier task than Darwin had, so can have more fun with his material. And he does have fun, and so will you. This book is entertaining and enlightening: if you are familiar with the main arguments for evolution, it will remind you of them, and enrich your feeling for them. Jones talks widely about nature and the issues raised by natural selection. However, if you have never before encountered arguments for natural selection ("descent with modification"), then perhaps you should consult some more diagrammatic and focused work that lays bare the logic behind it. And then read this book.