Eight Little Piggies: Reflections in Natural History - Couverture souple

Gould, Stephen Jay

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 0140179941 ISBN 13 : 9780140179941

Editeur : Penguin, 1994

Synopsis

This collection of essays ranges from history to the latest theories in biology, from controversies over palaeontology to the origins of language. The title is a pun and as always with Gould, the joke has a point that illustrates the largest pattern of life's history. For millennia, the animals that populated the Earth had four toes on each foot, or six. If evolution had taken a tiny shift - if man's ancestors had inherited a couple of genes in a different form - our canonical number, based on man's fingers and toes, might be eight instead of ten. Stephen Jay Gould has also written "Wonderful Life", "Bully for Brontosaurus" and "Finders Keepers".

A propos du livre

Revue de presse

"Miraculously good" (The Times)

"Remarkable... Gould takes his readers on tough-minded rambles across the visible surface of things... extraordinary" (Guardian)

"Gould has a talent for making the scientific, and particularly the revolutionary, interesting and striking" (Sunday Times)

"A lovely mixture of bizarre facts, nice arguments, clever insights into the workings of evolution and a quality of writing that can make your skin prickle... Gould has given us a feast" (Nature)

"Rather than serving up his science cold, Gould invariably puts a spin on it, taking his readers down the innumerable byways of history, literature and personal anecdote along the route to his theoretical conclusions" (Independent on Sunday)

Présentation de l'éditeur

No one illuminates the wonderful workings of the natural world as perceptively and enjoyably as Stephen Jay Gould. In this volume of reflections on biology, history and culture, Gould addresses the burning issues of ecological crisis and contemporary species extinctions as well as giving us fascinating insights into evolution - such as the fact that the first land vertebrates had up to eight toes on each foot, and that the ichthyosaur had a very significant kink in its tail.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Penguin
• Date d'édition: 1994
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 0140179941
• ISBN 13: 9780140179941
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 480
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
• Personne responsable: Terminal Video; n.pederzini@terminaldistribuzione.com; ; Via Bruno Buozzi, 24/26,; Granarolo dell'Emilia BO,; Italie