Dawkins always brilliantly defends evolution . He calims to be writinig for creationists, but any that picked the book up would probably soon desist due to the anger directed at them. It is not necessary to tear down the other side if you have all the evidence on your side. I think he should let it stand for itself.I understand ,however , that the worry is that people are being kept from learning about evolution, which is beautiful in and of itself. What greater argument is needed for peace and conservation than the fact that we, and by we I mean not just all people but all living things, are all related. ( )

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A challenging read. Probably should have not read it at the same time as another book. Definitely one I'll go back and read again. ( )

All stuff in here that I have for the most part, come across before, but presented in some novel ways and mercilessly unforgiving to creationism. The best titbit I found was a brilliantly elegant description of cell differentiation during division. Now I get it! ( )

Delivered with wit and clarity, Dawkins shares the facts of evolution in an easy-to-follow format that’s perfect for anyone looking to learn the basics of how we (and the rest of life) came to be. While he tackles a few common misconceptions and creationist arguments, Dawkins stays focused on the evidence we have and why we know evolution to be true. Turns out, life really is the greatest show on earth. ( )

I might have Dawkins-ed out.(28) ( )

تطور الكائنات بالانتقاء الطبيعي ليس قضية رأي أو وجهة نظر تحتمل الصواب والخطأ (فرضية)، بل حقيقة علمية مثبتة (نظرية) بكمّ هائل من الأدلة والبراهين المتوفرة على بعد كبسة زر من أي فضولي يسعى للمعرفة. لذلك، فإن الجهل في عصرنا هو خيار لا عذر له. ( )

Great book. This and The Ancestor's Tale should be required reading in High School. ( )

Highly recommended read regarding evolution and the evidence for it. RD brilliantly explains how to pay notice to similarities between species, how cells and organisms work or do what they do and how it impacts evolution and growth. Regarding the element of religion and creationism, RD keeps his cool when comparing this to evolution. He is one passionate man about evolution, or as he puts it, the truth. This book is to some extent not complete, as RD has touched upon other subjects/elements in his previous books. But somehow you don't have to have read them to understand TGSOE. ( )

This is one of those books where I have to differentiate between readability and content.

The content, what we know that tells us evolution is right, is very interesting which makes this book well worth reading by someone uncertain or someone that feels they lose out in arguments because they are missing details.

The readability on the other hand is not as great. I don't know if it is intentional but the author keeps repeating himself within a couple of paragraphs. It might be an attempt to hammer something into the mind of the reader, but I found it annoying and it reminded me of some books that are written to a page count rather than a content mass.

I will still give it four stars out of five since I learned a lot through the book.

And a quick spoiler. Things that support evolution include, but are not limited to: Layering of fossils. Dating of fossils. Visible changes in isolated populations in just a few decades. Our ability to modify dogs and cows. The weird mistakes found in body designs. The similarity of species. The lack of similarity between flying mammals (bats) and flying dinosaurs (birds). The weirdness of some animals that seem to have migrated from sea to land and then back to sea. And so on.

The author is quite upset that so few people know about this in certain countries and I can understand him. ( )

A bit repetitive, but excellent, as always. Dawkins explains things several different ways to ensure that his facts are clear.

The book is not really for people who are into a divine explanation of life on earth. He says at the beginning that it isn't for creationists. He cuts some slack to people who want to adhere to some sort of push of a mysterious hand at the very beginning of life. The book makes it very clear that it is for people who are interested in being able to explain evolution and the origin of life to others.

I learned quite a bit. There were things that I didn't fully understand before (like carbon dating) that I know have a much better grasp upon. ( )

Very good albeit it high level review of the evidence for evolution.

Dawkins never fails to disappoint and this book is no exception. A high level review of the evidence four the theory of evolution is well formed and explained for all. Even though very high level it does suffice as an introduction. The resources cited are wonderful and extensive. ( )

This book presents some of the evidence for evolution.
Chapter one Defines theory, hypothesis, fact and theorem and coins theorem; putting evolution alongside heliocentrism.
Chapters two and three How men bred breeds by selecting what was desired. Compared what man has achieved in a few 1000 years to what might be possible in millions of years.
Chapter 4 How do we know how much time was available? Radioactive clocks.
Chapter 5 Gives examples of evolution we can see eg in bacteria, guppies, lizards and hunted elephants.Chapter 6Considers various objections to evolution including gaps in the fossil records and missing links.Chapter 7Examines fossil ancestors of humans and chimpanzees.Chapter 8 Embryology shows what can be achieved in small steps from a single cell. Cells do what they do internally and externally in relation with others in accordance to local rules.
Chapter 9 The importance of islands in developing strains and new species.
Chapter 10 Skeletal similarities indicate common ancestry as do genetics. Molecular clocks.
Chapter 11 Tells evolutionary history read from the bodies of current animals.
Chapter 12 How resource limits cause inter- and intra-competition of species by wasteful arms races. Evolutionary rationale for pain and suffering.
Chapter 13 Dawkins summaries his book using the final paragraph of Darwin's Origin of Species which he extols and interprets like a favourite verse of scripture. He chooses to refer to the first edition which misses out the phrase "by the Creator"
Appendix: Laments evolution is still not generally accepted

Dawkins, Richard (2009). The Greatest Show on Earth. New York: Free. 2011. ISBN 9781439164730. Pagine 470. 18.00 $

Durante il mese di dicembre del 2009 ho scritto due post (Pensare e studiare e Analogo e omologo) in cui anticipavo che stavo leggendo The Greatest Show on Earth, che stavo accumulando ritardi nelle mie recensioni su questo blog ma che avrei presto recuperato il ritardo. Eccomi qui: più di 2 anni.

Naturalmente, non sono più in grado di darvi le mie impressioni a caldo, e siete anche liberi di dubitare che mi ricordi tutti i dettagli del libro.

È ormai parecchio tempo che la produzione di Dawkins, anche quella rivolta al pubblico non specialistico, si è via via allontanata dalla frontiera della scoperta scientifica (The Selfish Gene, tanto per capirci, presentava idee piuttosto nuove al di fuori della cerchia degli addetti ai lavori, e infatti fece piuttosto discutere alla sua uscita: ne abbiamo parlato, anche se un po’ obliquamente, a proposito del recente libro di Trivers) per diventare un elegante apologeta delle teorie evoluzionistiche, anche e soprattutto contro l’attacco della destra religiosa americana e dei “creazionisti.”

Nei suoi libri precedenti sull’evoluzione – spiega l’autore nella prefazione – si era concentrato su temi quali la proposta di un punto di vista “non familiare” sulla familiare teoria dell’evoluzione (The Selfish Gene e The Extended Phenotype), la rimozione di ostacoli specifici alla comprensione dell’evoluzione stessa, cercando di rispondere a domande del tipo “a che serve mezzo occhio o mezza ala? come può funzionare l’evoluzione, se la maggior parte delle mutazioni sortisce effetti negativi?” (The Blind Watchmaker, River Out of Eden e Climbing Mount Improbable) e un pellegrinaggio chauceriano alla ricerca dei nostri antenati (The Ancestor’s Tale), in tutti i casi e sempre dando per scontati il fatto e la verità dell’evoluzione. In questo libro, Dawkins spiega che quella evoluzionistica non è “solo una teoria”, ma un fatto incontrovertibile:

This book is my personal summary of the evidence that the ‘theory’ of evolution is actually a fact – as incontrovertible a fact as any in science. [p. vii]

Dawkins stesso illustra molto bene il senso del suo libro in questa (lunga) intervista rilasciata in occasione dell’uscita del libro:

Come sempre con Dawkins, la lettura è appassionante anche se – a tratti – l’argomentazione è meno densa che in precedenti occasioni. Ma non saprei dire, sinceramente, se la stanchezza è la mia o la sua.

Non aggiungo altro di mio se non una serie di passi che (ormai oltre 2 anni fa) mi ero segnato. Vi invito a leggerli, però, questa volta, perché così vi renderete conto di come continuino a brillare la sua argomentazione scintillante e il suo talento per la spiegazione.

Plants have an energy economy and, as with any economy, trade-offs may favour different options under different circumstances. That’s an important lesson in evolution, by the way. Different species do things in different ways, and we often won’t understand the differences until we have examined the whole economy of the species. [p. 49]

Lenski’s research shows, in microcosm and in the lab, massively speeded up so that it happened before our very eyes, many of the essential components of evolution by natural selection: random mutation followed by non-random natural selection; adaptation to the same environment by separate routes independently; the way successive mutations build on their predecessors to produce evolutionary change; the way some genes rely, for their effects, on the presence of other genes. [p. 130]

It is hard to measure degrees of resemblance. And there is in any case no necessary reason why the common ancestor of two modern animals should be more like one than the other. If you take two animals, say a herring and a squid, it is possible that one of them resembles the common ancestor more than the other, but it doesn’t follow that this has to be the case. There has been an exactly equal amount of time for both to have diverged from the ancestor, so the prior expectation of an evolutionist might be, if anything, that no modern animal should be more primitive than any other. we might expect both of them to have changed to the same extent, but in different directions, since the time of the shared ancestor. [...] Notice especially that ‘primitive’ in the sense of ‘resembling ancestors’ does not have to go with ‘simple’ (meaning less complex). A horse’s foot is simpler than a human foot (it has only a single digit instead of five, for example), but the human foot is more primitive (the ancestor that we share with horses had five digits, as we do, so the horse has changed more). [p. 157]

In animals, unlike bacteria, gene transfer seems almost entirely confined to sexual congress within species. Indeed, a species can pretty well be defined as a set of animals that engage in gene transfer among themselves. [...] My colleague Jonathan Hodgkin, Oxford’s Professor of Genetics, knows of only three tentative exceptions to the rule that gene transfer is confined within species: in nematode worms, in fruit flies, and (in a bigger way) in bdelloid rotifers.
This last group is especially interesting because, uniquely among major groupings of eucaryotes, they have no sex. Could it be that they have been able to dispense with sex because they have reverted to the ancient bacterial way of exchanging genes? [p. 303]

[...] two organs – for example, bat hand and human hand – are homologous if it is possible to draw one on a sheet of rubber and then distort the rubber to make the other one. Mathematicians have a word for this: ‘homeomorphic’.
Zoologists recognized homology in pre-Darwinian times, and pre-evolutionists would describe, say, bat wings and human hands as homologous. If they had known enough mathematics, they would have been happy to use the word ‘homeomorphic’. In post-Darwinian times, when it became generally accepted that bats and humans share a common ancestor, zoologists started to define homology in evolutionary terms. Homologous resemblances are those inherited from a shared ancestor. The word ‘analogous’ came to be used for resemblances due to shared function, not ancestry. [pp. 312-313]

The often-quoted figure of about 98 per cent for the shared genetic material of humans and chimps actually refers neither to numbers of chromosomes nor to numbers of whole genes, but to number of DNA ‘letters’ (technically, base pairs) that match each other within the respective human and chimp genes. [p. 318]

A new mutation, if it is genuinely new, will have a low frequency in the gene pool. If you revisit the gene pool a million years later, it is possible that the mutation will have increased in frequency to 100 per cent or something close to it. If that happens, the mutation is said to have ‘gone to fixation’. [...] The obvious way for a mutation to go to fixation is for natural selection to favour it. But there is another way. It can go to fixation by chance [...] , given a large enough number of generations. And geological time is vast enough for neutral mutations to go to fixation at a predictable rate. The rate at which they do so varies, but is characteristic of particular genes, and, given that most mutations are neutral, this is precisely what makes the molecular clock possible. [p. 335]

When we are talking about natural selection, we think in terms of rare beneficial mutations turning up and being positively favoured by selection. But most mutations are disadvantageous, if only because they are random and there are many more ways of getting worse than there are ways of getting better.
Note: This is especially true of mutations of large effect. Think of a delicate machine, like a radio or a computer. Al large mutation is equivalent to kick it with a hobnailed boot, or cutting a wire at random and reconnecting it in a different place. It just might improve its performance, but it is not very likely. A small mutation, on the other hand, is equivalent to making a tiny adjustment to, say, one resistor, or to the tuning knob of a radio. The smaller the mutation, the more closely the probability of improvement approaches 50 per cent. [p. 352]

In a typical mature forest, the canopy can be thought of as an aerial meadow, just like a rolling grassland prairie, but raised on stilts. The canopy is gathering solar energy at much the same rate as a grassland prairie would. But a substantial proportion of the energy is ‘wasted’ by being fed straight into the stilts, which do nothing more useful than loft the ‘meadow’ high in the air, where it picks up exactly the same harvest of photons as it would – at far lower cost – if it were laid flat on the ground.
And this brings us face to face with the difference between a designed economy and an evolutionary economy. in a designed economy there would be no trees, or certainly no very tall trees: no forest, no canopy. Trees are a waste. Trees are extravagant. Tree trunks are standing monuments to futile competition – futile if we think in terms of a planned economy. But the natural economy is not planned. Individual plants compete with other plants, of the same and other species, and the result is that they grow taller and taller, far taller than any planner would recommend. Not indefinitely taller, however. There comes a point when growing another foot taller, although it confers a competitive advantage, costs so much that the individual tree doing it actually ends up worse off than its rivals that forgo the extra foot. It is the balance of costs and benefits to the individal trees that finally determines the height to which trees are press to grow, not the benefits that a rational planner could calculate for the trees as a group. And of course the balance ends up at a different maximum in different forests. The Pacific Coast redwoods (see them before you die) have probably never been exceeded.
Imagine the fate of a hypothetical forest – let’s call it the Forset of Friendship – in which, by some mysterious concordat, all the trees have somehow managed to achieve the desiderable aim of lowering the entire canopy to 10 feet. The canopy looks just like any other forest canopy except that it is only 10 feet high instead of 100 feet. From the point of view of a planned economy, the Forest of Friendship is more efficient as a forest than the tall forests with which we are familiar, beacause resources are not put into producing massive trunks that have no purpose apart from competing with other trees.
But now, suppose one mutant tree were to spring up in the middle of the Forest of Friendship. This rogue tree grows marginally taller than the ‘agreed’ norm of 10 feet. Immediately, this mutant secures a competitive advantage. Admittedly, it has to pay the cost of the extra length of the trunk. But it is more than compensated, as long as all other trees obey the self-denying ordinance, because the extra photons gathered more than pay the extra cost of lengthening the trunk. Natural selection therefore favours the genetic tendency to break out of the self-denying ordinance and grow a bit taller, say to 11 feet. As the generations go by, more and more trees break the embargo on height. When, finally, all the trees in the forest are 11 feet tall, they are all worse off than they were before: all are paying the cost of growing the extra foot. But they are not getting any extra photons for their trouble. And now natural selection favours any mutant tendency togrow to, say, 12 feet. And so the trees go on getting taller and taller. Will this futile climb towards the sun ever come to an end? Why not trees a mile high, why not Jack’s beanstalk? The limit is set at the height where the marginal cost of growing another foot outweighs the gain in photons from growing that extra foot.
We are talking individual costs and benefits throughout this argument. The forest would look very different if its economy had been designed for the benefit of the forest as a whole. In fact, what we actually see is a forest in which each tree species evolved through natural selection favouring individual trees that out-competed rival individual trees, whether of their own or another species. [pp. 378-380] ( )

This is not so much a book about what evolution is, or even about how it works. It is much more a book about why evolution is true (as in, why it is a fact of life), though, to get the point across, Dawkins obviously has to explain a fair bit about the mechanics behind the process (natural selection, mutation, biochemistry - protein folding etc).

Each chapter presents a group of evidence for evolution, which ranges from dating methods to fossil records, genetic similarities between species, tectonic composition of the Earth, the "armament race" between predators and prey, and so on.

Though sometimes prone to getting a bit distracted in protracted lambasting of evolution-deniers (or as he likes to call them, history-deniers), "Like a detective reconstructing a crime", Dawkins lays out the arguments in a convincing and captivating fashion, complete with breathtaking examples from the animal (and plant) world, which are my favorite parts of the book and are often the subject of the beautiful accompanying color illustrations and photos, sadly a bit too small (and of course black & white) in the Kindle edition.

Do you know why a dolphin has a tail that moves in the up-down direction instead of left-right like a fish? Or why there are trees and why do they grow tall? Find out in this persuasive celebration of one of human kind's greatest discoveries. ( )

Estamos cercados por infindaveis formas belissimas e fascinantes, e nao e por acidente, e sim uma consequencia direta da evolucao pela selecao natural nao aleatoria unica na vida, o maior espetaculo da Terra. Nao ha interpretacoes alternativas para a existencia da vida neste planeta. Richard Dawkins decidiu escrever um livro para defender essa tese e convencer a todos sem excecao de que Darwin tem razao. Depois de oito obras que revolucionaram o pensamento evolucionario, ele traz a publico o que chama de seu elo perdido, ligando todos os seus escritos: uma sintese pessoal das evidencias cientificas de que a evolucao e, mais do que uma teoria, um fato estabelecido.

As evidencias da evolucao sao tao validas e irrefutaveis quanto, por exemplo, as evidencias historicas de que existiu o Imperio Romano: Tambem os seres vivos trazem a historia escrita em todo o corpo. Sao repletos de equivalentes biologicos das estradas, muralhas, monumentos, cacos de ceramica e ate inscricoes antigas romanas, tudo esculpido no dna vivo, pronto para ser decifrado por estudiosos. Para Dawkins, a visao da vida pelo prisma da evolucao guiada pela selecao natural e grandiosa, sublime, e ele nao mede esforcos para levar o leitor a compartilhar seu arrebatamento. Nem para fulminar com argumentos inatacaveis e humor sarcastico as ideias dos que tentam defender interpretacoes sucedaneas vale dizer, os criacionistas da Terra Jovem, para quem os seres vivos foram criados por volta de 10 mil anos atras, e os proponentes do design inteligente, que ate acreditam que houve evolucao, porem gracas a um empurraozinho divino.

Dawkins mostra-se, como sempre, incomparavel na arte de traduzir a ciencia para nao especialistas. Em sua prosa premiada, a embriologia, o sequenciamento do codigo genetico e o sistema de genes/proteinas que rege a vida ganham clareza e, mais do que isso, fascinio. Suas analogias e metaforas invariavelmente se tornam classicas

Dawkins presents the very compelling evidence for evolution and its existence in this book, from biogeography to the shared language of DNA among all living organisms. Fossils are a nice bonus. This book is both a rebuttal to the (as of 2008) 44 % of Americans who believe species have remained in their present forms since 10k years ago and a celebration of the anniversaries of Charles Darwin's birthday and Origin's publication (200 and 150 respectively). The first examples are of artificial selection as a transition into discussion, and that is an excellent introductory point to begin. By the end we're discussing the commonality of DNA amongst carbon-based life forms (which is to say all life as we know it) and debunking people who assume the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics disproves evolution. Dawkins does get snarky which may be off putting to some readers, though. ( )

There seems to be a large disconnect between what this book purports to be and what it actually is. Presumably, to judge by the book's subtitle, 'The Evidence for Evolution,' its intention is to summarize the reasons why evolution is now accepted as a scientific fact. According to this criteria the book fares pretty badly - the narrative is too rambling, too digressive, and at times too speculative, to present a clear and coherent case - and anyone skeptical of evolution would be better off reading Jerry Coyne's far more compact volume, "Why Evolution is True."

Taken however, as a general overview of evolution, with some interesting bits of theory, exposition, and explanation along the way, the book does a much better job. If you are doubtful of the scientific fact of evolution to begin with, this book is probably not the one that's going to change your mind. In fact in the first hundred pages hardly any evidence for evolution is presented at all. Not because the evidence doesn't exist - it's all there, in both this book and many others - but Dawkins definitely takes his sweet time getting there - far longer in fact, than an incredulous critic would be willing to sit down and wait for.

Instead we find distinctions between facts, theories, and Dawkins' new 'theorums', differences in philosophical approaches to nature, allusions to his favorite old computer programs, and a chapter on artificial selection which closely parallels Darwin's original treatment of the subject.

There's nothing wrong with any of this really - the computer simulations are a bit stale by now - except again, it is not the book readers will be expecting and I imagine a good number will be put off by the whole thing. Take away the subtitle, and everything holds together much better.

As far as the content goes, its treatment of clocks is better than any I've seen so far, and its chapter on embryology more thorough than I've seen in any scientific popularization (I haven't read any real biology texts myself.) Dawkins is also admirably punctilious in the attribution of credit to the writers and scientists whose ideas he borrows or works he cites. Several times he recommends Jerry Coyne's own book on evolution and goes so far to credit individual anecdotes, jokes, and turns of phrase to their appropriate originators. Say what you like about him as a person, I don't think he would ever knowingly steal a single sentence not his own.

The book is at its worst in its last few chapters. It dwells far too morosely on the cruelty of nature and the futility of things, points I'd rather not bother much with or at least let readers decide. I'm an atheist and I think here he says too much that would alienate deists and more optimistic readers. Picking apart a quote by Darwin in the final chapter constitutes the absolute low point of the book. Dawkins insists on explaining it line by line, poetic imagery and all, and so we're left in the absurd position of reading explanations of how gravity works, how the planets orbit the sun, what human memory is, and how culture transmits information. It all seems a bit out of place and left-field of nowhere. Dawkins might argue that polls prove a vast proportion of people are actually ignorant on all these points - but they wouldn't exactly pick his book up, would they? and they certainly wouldn't have made it to the end. ( )

As good as Dawkins' writing is, as interesting as many of the analogies and examples in the book are, this feels like a rather unnecessary rehashing of the basics of evolution. Dawkins has had more novel things to say, and I just can't buy the idea that this book will convince or convert anyone who actually needs the information contained within it. ( )

Though Dawkins' style is not to everyone's liking, and his humour is generally more miss than hit, this is nonetheless a tremendous book both for its treatment of evolution and for the way that the theory's detractors are addressed. More a book for the choir, so to speak, than one that will convince anyone who holds dear to the creationist view of life on Earth, I do hope that those somehow still on the fence will find themselves more and more convinced. ( )

A timely book which presents the evidence for evolution in a considered and thoughtful manner. It starts with an explanation of why the book is necessary and then turns to background material about establishing dates. Then it follows Darwin in beginning first with animal breeding by humans (artificial selection) and gradually transitioning to examples of more and more canonical natural selection, demonstrating how sensible and compelling the idea is. It follows all this by presenting the evidence from embryology, DNA, anatomy, the fossil record, and deliberate evolutionary experiments. Dawkins uses excellent analogies and metaphors to get his points across. He feels, probably correctly, that he must remind the reader of the more basic science as he proceeds; he gave me far more chemistry background than I really needed while I was a bit lost in the embryology. He anticipates and refutes arguments nicely and in a lively manner.

All this excellent work is unfortunately marred by the occasional personal remark; in which he intrudes irrelevant, seemingly ignorant and somewhat alienating literary opinions, or makes a dumb dig at creationists. This was the book he wrote after "The God Delusion" and he seems to have been still a bit worked up as a consequence. The next book he wrote was "The Magic of Reality" in which, as far as I remember, the tone improved, while the metaphors and analogies were still quite compelling.

It is really helpful when he gives technical details about the things that make their way, a little too vaguely into the newspapers. I seem to have known about carbon-14 dating all my life, but not really to have understood what makes it work. The same is true for those remarks about sharing 98% of our DNA with chimpls...Dawkins explains several techniques for measuring that similarity. ( )

In this very readable primer on evolution, Dawkins lays out in detail the overwhelming diverse, bountiful and frequently astounding genetic, biological, physiological and geological evidence pointing to its veracity. Highly recommended -- science is real. And awesome. ( )

Dawkins has a true talent for making complex scientific principles clear. In this book, he reviews basic and not so basic scientific principles and evidence concerning evolution. I appreciated the use of detailed examples and also the references to reliable sources of further information. Yes, he does include some snarky and totally unnecessary anti-religious remarks, but I didn't read the book to learn about theology from a biologist. I read the book to review biology with a biologist and Dawkins does a magnificent job. ( )

Darwin’s Discovery

Charles Darwin was one of the first of many scientists to study and describe the naturally occurring process of biological evolution. Living organisms have been evolving on earth for more than 3 billion years, and their on-going evolution brings us the remarkable diversity of life forms we see today. In his book The Greatest Show on Earth, Richard Dawkins provides an up-to-date report on what researchers have learned about biological evolution. ( )

Richard Dawkins is obviously a rational, concerned, and passionate man. He sees the great diversity of life as The Greatest Show on Earth, and he is upset that so many people (about 40% in the U.S. and 20% in Britain) are willfully blind to the process that brought it about. I can understand his dismay. It's a bit like bringing some friends to the most wonderful movie you ever saw, and they close their eyes so they can't see it and plug their ears so they won't hear the score. You implore them to look, plead for them to listen, but they simply refuse. How frustrating that would be. Now imagine it's not a movie you want them to see, but something far more important, something real—a fact of life—THE fact of life.

This book is Dawkins' attempt to explain the process of evolution by natural selection to those who apparently do not understand it, especially to those who willfully refuse to understand it. He provides examples, analogies, and summarizes the overwhelming amount of supporting evidence. There are even color pictures. He undoubtedly thinks this will help. He is a rational person, after all.

The Greatest Show on Earth is an excellent summation of what we know about the evolution of life. If the book has a shortcoming, it's that it can't do what he wants it to do. I doubt logic and evidence are capable of swaying the opinions of young Earth creationists. They hold their views based on faith, not on reason, and evidence is entirely beside the point. Creationism isn't amenable to scientific evaluation since it is not a scientific theory, and I found his occasional digressions into refutations of it little more than a distraction from the science he was otherwise explaining so well. Still, I would recommend this book to anyone interested in the subject of evolution. I can't see it as being much help to those who aren't interested in it, though.

Dawkins is clearly dismayed that so many people are either ignorant of evolution or refuse to acknowledge that it occurs because of theological presumptions. In fact, he seems almost obsessed with it, but he may be upsetting himself unduly. Yes, opinion polls conducted over the last twenty years or so suggest that about 40% of Americans might be under the impression that life on Earth appeared suddenly in all its current and varied forms less than 10,000 years ago, but so what? Even if everyone believed the whole world popped into existence last Thursday (complete with a full set of false memories and a bunch of annoyingly deceptive fossils) it wouldn't affect reality. Life has evolved and will continue to evolve much as it has done for the last several billion years, whether anyone wants to believe it or not.

We could hope it was otherwise, but cultures change slowly. I'm sure that if a similar poll were conducted a hundred years ago the results would have been far worse. Progress has been made. It just seems stalled among some populations. How long did it take until most people accepted that the Earth orbited the Sun or that continents rode on tectonic plates and shifted position over time? I'm sure there are still people (even a few from industrialized nations) who believe the world is flat. Scientific understanding has never been universal and, for the most part, this hasn't mattered. People can live productive and happy lives without knowing why things are the way they are. A farmer doesn't need to know that axial tilt causes seasons in order for him to grow vegetables. An understanding of how gravity creates tides is not necessary for a fisherman to bring his boat back to the dock. If you think Poseidon causes tides and that seasons shift from spring through winter by divine decree, it doesn't stop them from happening. What does matter is that those who work in scientific fields understand what is actually happening, and this is almost universally the case.

I'm sure Dawkins would agree with this, but I'm also sure he would point out that, in a democracy, scientifically ignorant people can and sometimes do elect scientifically ignorant representatives. Laws and regulations these politicians enact can have negative consequences if they base them on poor or erroneous understandings of the issues at hand. I confess that this also concerns me.

From a political standpoint, Dawkins' concern about people who refuse to accept the simple fact that life evolves has merit, but it points to a more general failure of our culture and of our politicians to adapt to our rapidly expanding knowledge of the universe. A general understanding of science and scientific principles is far more important now than it was a mere century ago because of how much we depend on science and technology in our daily lives. Unfortunately, basic scientific literacy lags far behind what it should be. Without it, we only have unquestioned assumptions, uninformed opinions, and gut feelings to help us make decisions, and these seldom provide a good basis for wise choices.

I'm American, so I would like America to continue to be a leading force in science and technology. A scientifically literate population seems to me to be a necessary precursor of that. But America isn't the world. There are other nations, and some of them seemingly do a far better job of providing a basic scientific understanding to their general populations. This is likely to yield more scientists and engineers, better political decisions, and a greater likelihood of continued technological advancement and economic prosperity. I don't want to sound like a cultural Darwinist, but nations that can adapt their cultures to our growing understanding of the world will prosper. Those that do not won't. If American doesn't lead, some other nation undoubtedly will.

So, whereas opinion polls may be a cause for concern, they don't imply an end to human advancement, and they certainly don't affect how nature actually works. The only real question is how well people and the societies they live in will deal with scientific discoveries that challenge previously held beliefs. Those better able to adapt their worldviews to accommodate new knowledge will have an advantage over those that do not. It's not exactly the same, but this is something like how evolution works.
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