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The first chapter begins by inviting the reader to imagine that they're a teacher of Roman history, and that they have to waste their time with a rearguard defense against people who try to persuade your pupils that there never was a Roman empire (which is akin to how biologists today have to spend their time).

The rest of the book is devoted to laying out the actual evidence for evolution, while debunking some claims against it (for instance, that there are missing links, which is simply based on a Victorian misunderstanding). I found the chapters dealing with radiometric dating and dendrochronology especially enlightening.

The last chapter takes the last paragraph of Darwin's On the Origin of Species and unpacks and explains it, with each sentence being a sub-heading.

Review:

Dawkins says in the book that he wrote this book, a book about the evidence for evolution, because none of his other books explicitly lay this out (they only assume evolution is true). In contrast, this book lays it all out, in meticulous detail.

It's a relatively light read, but as with most books of this kind, you have to pay close attention when reading, or you might miss important points. I definitely recommend it.

Has read?

Yes

Debut?

Images:

High-res images:

[Back flap (3.83 MB)] [Back (5 MB)] [Spine (1.3 MB)] [Front (6.1 MB)] [Front flap (3.75 MB)]

Table of Contents:

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Preface
Chapter 1 Only a theory?
Chapter 2 Dogs, cows and cabbages
Chapter 3 The primrose path to macro-evolution
Chapter 4 Silence and slow time
Chapter 5 Before our very eyes
Chapter 6 Missing link? What do you mean, 'missing'?
Chapter 7 Missing persons? Missing no longer
Chapter 8 You did it yourself in nine months
Chapter 9 The ark of the continents
Chapter 10 The tree of cousinship
Chapter 11 History written all over us
Chapter 12 Arms races and 'evolutionary theodicy'
Chapter 13 There is grandeur in this view of life
Appendix: The history-deniers
Notes
Bibliography and further reading
Picture acknowledgements
Index

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