Evolution Variation 7 Acknowledgments Foreword Imagine 1 2 Evidence from the Earth 12 3 How Fossils Form 16 4 Layers of Rock Layers of Past Life 19 5 The Adventures and Discoveries of Charles Darwin 23 6 28 7 32 8 Nature's Bounty 35 36 38 9 Competition 10 Natural Selection 11 After Darwin 12 Telling Time 41 43 13 Genetics 46 14 More and More Fossils 15 Missing Links Found 16 Moving Continents 17 On Faraway Islands 18 Coevolution 19 Origin of Species 20 Evolution Going On Right Now Afterword Glossary Sources Periodicals 5 9 10 Image Credits Index 52 56 63 70 74 80 84 92 94 99 100 101 102 Contents
selection given idea anyone ever That selection natural by evolution of theory Darwin 9 Charles evolution has been called the best that had seems about right to me For that theory has us the correct explanation of our origins and by our I mean not just human beings but every species that ever lived Evolutionary biology tells us that we're related to greater or lesser degrees to every creature on Earth today to monkeys and apes to ferns to squirrels and even to tiny creatures that you can see only under the microscope And evolution explains all the marvelous adaptations of animals and plants the grasping trunk of the elephant the sturdy beak of the woodpecker the prickly spines of the cactus as the results of a very simple process natural The idea of evolution is not only one of the greatest triumphs of the human mind but it has become the central organizing idea of biology Whenever you look at any feature of an animal or plant whether it involves body structure behavior or biochemistry you can ask yourself Where did it come from How did it get there The answer is evolution and usually natural selection As the biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky once said Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution I was exposed to a lot of science when I was young By the time I was twelve years old I already had a big library of books about dinosaurs geology and all varieties of animals and plants But I didn't have any books on evolution because they weren't written for young people then And although I became an evolutionary biologist I still regret not having learned earlier how evolution ties biology together You are luckier for in your hands is the book I wish I had read when I was your age Laurence Pringle has written a wonderful account of evolution that does tie it all together He explains the modern scientific view clearly and summarizes all of the fascinating evidence that has convinced scientists as I hope it convinces you that evolution is true Enjoy JERRY A. COYNE PHD Professor of Ecology and Evolution University of Chicago Foreword
