Just finished reading an epoch in popular science books. 'The Ancestor's Tale' by Richard Dawkins. No, this is not a tirade against religion, which by the way is getting a bit stale off late- 'The God Delusion' becomes painfully redundant from the middle through the end, especially if you have read some of his previous books or discourses. No, this is pure Science. And yes, Science in every sense.
The book is a journey in time. We start off from the present and march backward in time through hundreds, thousands and millions of years to the beginning of life on earth. On the way, we meet 'pilgrims'- organisms/group of organisms- who join us at a commonly shared ancestor. At each rendezvous point, selected pilgrims tell a tale of how they came about. The structure is inspired from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. A total of 40 Rendezvous points before we finally reach the Canterbury of life- the primordial replicating machine 4 billion years ago. 614 pages of an epic journey, and not one of them you would want to skip in haste. Dawkins, with his well known wit and clarity, forces the reader to see what he sees. Every distinctive piece of biology and every idea that's worth mentioning is given an thorough analysis that it deserves. And Dawkins does this with a judicious and brilliant use of all the tools of Science available under the sun- from Bio-Chemistry to Anthropology, from Quantum Mechanics to Computer Science. In short, this book is the biology-equivalent of Stephen Hawking's 'A Brief History of Time'. Its a Brief History of Life.
Toward the end of the last chapter, when the pilgrims return back to the present (and even that is not a simple retracing of steps forward in time, but a far more fascinating study of what kind of organisms would statistical reruns of evolution MIGHT produce in 4 billion years time!), Dawkins, in the voice of the host bidding farewell, expresses the exhilaration after having traversed the journey, which every avid reader would share, summarizing the spirit of the book-
If, as returning host, I reflect on the whole pilgrimage of which I have been a grateful part, my overwhelming reaction is one of amazement. Amazement not only at the extravaganza of details that we have seen; amazement, too, at the very fact that there are any such details to be had at all, on any planet. The universe could so easily have remained lifeless and simple- just physics and chemistry, just the scattered dust of the cosmic explosion that gave birth to time and space. The fact that it did not- the fact that life evolved out of nearly nothing, some 10 billion years after the universe evolved out of literally nothing- is a fact so staggering that I would be mad to attempt words to do it justice. And even that is not the end of the matter. Not only did evolution happen: it eventually led to beings capable of comprehending the process, and even of comprehending the process by which they comprehend it. The very fact that we have evolved the brain power to understand our evolutionary genesis redoubles the amazement and compounds the satisfaction.
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4 comments:
Funny.. even Dawkins-ians (if i may use it for you) are finding it stale! ;)
@karthik: then may be im not a Dawkinian :D
You left the God Delusion book with me. It couldn't keep me awake. That book needed about half the number of pages to get the point across, with no revelations to dissuade someone whose beliefs are based on pure faith.
I have to check this book out. Seems fascinating and much more aligned with Dawkins' strengths. It does become depressing when you think that all of this fantastic evolving, and we could become stardust with a simple extinction event. I wonder if we will leave an informational trace when that happens.
@ram: Well, I guess it just shows pop-science writers must just stick to science! The problem with Dawkins is that he has a very narrow attack base which makes his efforts quickly boring. I read a bit of Christopher Hitches and Sam Harris, they bring in a wide variety of arguments and colorful debates which are far more fascinating and lasting.
Regarding extinction, well, it shouldn't really depress you if you consider the fact the 95% of all the species that ever existed have gone extinct. extinction is the most probable fate of any species that exists, especially those which are quite successful and dominant. whatever exists today is but the descendant of a very very thin line of survivors. And as far as informational trace, we will leave it in some form or the other- cities preserved in volcanic ash, or simply the 50/60 Hz hum that we generate from our electrical distribution networks which could probably be picked up by some intelligent life.
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