Darwin's Universe: Evolution from A to Z |  | Author: Richard Milner
Creators: Ian Tattersall, Stephen Jay Gould
Publisher: University of California Press
List Price: $39.95
Buy New: $24.93
as of 11/24/2009 18:24 CST details
You Save: $15.02 (38%)
New (28) Used (9) from $21.00
Seller: ANGELFIRE
Rating:  9 reviews
Sales Rank: 78484
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Pages: 496
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 3.7
Dimensions (in): 11.2 x 8.9 x 1.6
ISBN: 0520243765
Dewey Decimal Number: 576.803
EAN: 9780520243767
ASIN: 0520243765
Publication Date: July 6, 2009
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
| |
| Similar Items:
| |
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
This alphabetically arranged reference, an immensely entertaining browser's delight, offers a dazzling overview of the life and thought of Charles Darwin and his incredibly wide sphere of influence. Authoritative and abundantly illustrated, it illuminates the ways in which ideas of evolutionary biology have leapt the boundaries of science to influence philosophy, law, religion, literature, cinema, art, and popular culture. Darwin's Universe, a thoroughly revised and updated successor to Richard Milner's acclaimed Encyclopedia of Evolution, contains more than a hundred new essays, including entries on animal behavior (Alex the parrot, Kanzi the bonobo, Digit the gorilla), on women in science (Mary Anning, Rosalind Franklin), and on the latest finds of human fossils. A veritable museum of natural history, it also contains many original discoveries brought to light by Milner's historical sleuthing. Packed with hundreds of rare illustrations, including many new ones, this Darwin Bicentennial edition will appeal to a wide audience of readers.
|
| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 9
An entertaining read that draws many connections... November 21, 2009
J. T. Benoit
Richard Milner's entry in the flood of books written for the Darwin bicentennial - Darwin's Universe: Evolution from A to Z - is an uncommonly entertaining and literate introduction to the myriad aspects of the evolutionary paradigm that at once lays bare its history and, in its choice of content, makes manifest what few (I would imagine) have previously thought about, viz. the remarkable extent to which that paradigm has at once infiltrated, and informed, our literature and our popular culture, and in the process has both shaped them and been shaped by them. Indeed, what Milner has chosen to include is at first glance somewhat surprising: Huxley, Darwin, Russell, and Chambers are here (as expected) but so are Arthur Conan Doyle in his persona of Dr. Challenger, a curious mixture of ape-man and thorough going rationalist; Kropotkin's "Law of Mutual Aid" and social Darwinism; teleology and orthogenesis. Any book so capacious and cosmopolitan that it can with equal ease embrace cladistics and Disney's "Fantasia" clearly means to serve as a bridge between the commonplaces of our cultural experience and the specialized knowledge of the working biologist.
But its broadness of content is only part of the story. The quality of the exposition is uniformly high, the unfolding story an engaging one. Furthermore, all of the entries in this book are very short, easily read in at most a few minutes. I have picked up this book after completing it on several occasions (this evening included) to revisit the universe of ideas contained between its covers. It is truly a feast for the mind, whether eaten as one large and sumptuous banquet or nibbled at over a period of weeks; in either case, it is a repast easily digested, one that stays with the reader, sustaining, entertaining, and illuminating... all of the things that good books are meant to do. Bravo!
Darwin's Universe September 20, 2009
Andrew P. Wilson (Forest Hills, NY USA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
ENTER MILNER'S DELIGHTFUL "UNIVERSE"
Richard Milner is a maestro in "Darwin's Universe," conducting the greatest symphony of evolutionary ideas, fascinating natural history, and bizarre and brilliant characters that has ever been gathered in one beautiful volume. He is the PT Barnum of the evolutionary circus, offering the fruits of his unparalleled research into the theories and people who created evolutionary biology and the history of humanity's quest for its origins. Even the expert will find here previously unknown stories about Charles Darwin, Thomas Henry Huxley, Alfred Russel Wallace, and many others.
"Darwin's Universe" may at first appear to be a coffee table book, with its large format and hundreds of varied, rare, and unusual illustrations, but it is so much more. It is an entertaining masterpiece mixing arcane and elementary knowledge, the profound and the hilarious. I find myself dipping into it every day and being delighted with the bite-size essays that hook the reader for a quickie, and then draw you in for hours of fun reading.
You can ponder the existence of Group Selection, find surprising essays on Science itself and Peer Review, learn about the most recent discoveries of fossil man (Flores, Dmanisi, Atapuerca, Toumai), or explore some of the ways that evolutionary theory has influenced pop culture (Disney's epic of battling dinosaurs; Gertie the brontosaur, the first animal cartoon star; King Kong,; and Jurassic Park--with the backstories of how they were created).
You'll meet Flint Jack, the nineteenth century's greatest faker of prehistoric tools, attend a dinner of famous scientists inside a giant iguanodon, and reflect on a thoughtful introductory essay by the late Stephan Jay Gould, the author's classmate and childhood friend.
Just open the book. You will be immediately transported to a fabulous wonderland of evolutionary adventure. All my friends who have seen it want copies.
A wonderful update of what turns out to be an old friend of a book August 18, 2009
David Haines (Teignmouth, Devon UK)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Recently I won the New York Times Science Songwriting Contest for my song "Mister Darwin," (see
[...]
which has become very popular among school children here inEngland. My prize arrived today: Richard Milner's "Darwin's Universe," which I have found completely engrossing. What a great book! I love it! I had not expected it to be packed with so many meaty, entertaining, and fascinating details about all aspects of natural history, as well as hundreds of rare and wonderful pictures. It's great dipping in at random then following a thread. Belatedly, I realized that I had long been an admirer of the book's predecessor, "The Encyclopedia of Evolution." What a delight to discover I've been a fan of Milner's work for so much longer than I realised - just hadn't taken the name on board!
A Delightful Romp Through the Garden of Evolution July 29, 2009
Robert L. Carneiro (New York, NY)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I've done little more than leaf through "Darwin's Universe," but already I can say it looks wonderful! It's at once illuminating and entertaining--a veritable cornucopia of good things. It will make for hours and hours of delightful browsing. In its pages you'll find entries on serious topics like Allopatric Speciation, the Biogenetic Law, and Catastrophism, but you'll also crack a smile when you read about the Iguanodon Dinner, Hans the "Talking" Horse of Berlin, and the Coprolite Industry. This is, in fact, an incredible compilation, assembled and composed with an unrivaled panoramic knowledge not only of Charles Darwin himself, but of all things evolutionary. And at the very end of the book, a delicious desert awaits you: the devilishly clever lyrics from the author's now-famous Darwin monologues.
Darwin's Universe: Milner's World July 23, 2009
Frank Millspaugh (New York City)
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
Darwin's Universe is that rare creature, both entertaining and sound, not unlike the author himself. Books like this go a long way in exposing the irrelevance of creationism and the centrality of evolution in the biological sciences. The biographical sketches bring the scientists to life with all their contradictions, triumphs, and tragedies intact. If you read only one book this year on science, make it this one.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 9
|
|
|
|
