Product Description

THE ANCESTOR'S TALE is a pilgrimage back through time; a journey on which we meet up with fellow pilgrims as we and they converge on our common ancestors. Chimpanzees join us at about 6 million years in the past, orang utans at 14 million years, as we stride on together, a growing band. The journey provides the setting for a collection of some 40 tales. Each explores an aspect of evolutionary biology through the stories of characters met along the way. The tales are interspersed with prologues detailing the journey, route maps showing joining lineages, and life-like reconstructions of our common ancestors. THE ANCESTOR'S TALE represents a pilgrimage on an unimaginable scale: our goal is four billion years away, and the number of pilgrims joining us grows vast - ultimately encompassing all living creatures. At the end of the journey lies something remarkable in its simplicity and transformative power: the first, humble, replicating molecules.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6722 in Books
• Published on: 2005-09-01
• Binding: Paperback
• 626 pages

Amazon.co.uk
Just as we trace our personal family trees from parents to grandparents and so on back in time, so in The Ancestor's Tale Richard Dawkins traces the ancestry of life. As he is at pains to point out, this is very much our human tale, our ancestry. Surprisingly, it is one that many otherwise literate people are largely unaware of. Hopefully Dawkins's name and well deserved reputation as a best selling writer will introduce them to this wonderful saga.

The Ancestor's Tale takes us from our immediate human ancestors back through what he calls `concestors,' those shared with the apes, monkeys and other mammals and other vertebrates and beyond to the dim and distant microbial beginnings of life some 4 billion years ago. It is a remarkable story which is still very much in the process of being uncovered. And, of course from a scientist of Dawkins stature and reputation we get an insider's knowledge of the most up-to-date science and many of those involved in the research. And, as we have come to expect of Dawkins, it is told with a passionate commitment to scientific veracity and a nose for a good story. Dawkins's knowledge of the vast and wonderful sweep of life's diversity is admirable. Not only does it encompass the most interesting living representatives of so many groups of organisms but also the important and informative fossil ones, many of which have only been found in recent years.

Dawkins sees his journey with its reverse chronology as `cast in the form of an epic pilgrimage from the present to the past [and] all roads lead to the origin of life.' It is, to my mind, a sensible and perfectly acceptable approach although some might complain about going against the grain of evolution. The great benefit for the general reader is that it begins with the more familiar present and the animals nearest and dearest to us—our immediate human ancestors. And then it delves back into the more remote and less familiar past with its droves of lesser known and extinct fossil forms. The whole pilgrimage is divided into 40 tales, each based around a group of organisms and discusses their role in the overall story. Genetic, morphological and fossil evidence is all taken into account and illustrated with a wealth of photos and drawings of living and fossils forms, evolutionary and distributional charts and maps through time, providing a visual compliment and complement to the text. The design also allows Dawkins to make numerous running comments and characteristic asides. There are also numerous references and a good index.-- Douglas Palmer

Simon Shaw, MAIL ON SUNDAY
'...Dawkins is unequalled in his ability to express complex ideas in layman's terms without sounding patronising.'

Review
'...Dawkins is unequalled in his ability to express complex ideas in layman's terms without sounding patronising.' (Simon Shaw MAIL ON SUNDAY )

'more readable than almost anyone else, a master of liquid-clear prose and revleatory pearls of insight.' (David Smith THE OBSERVER )

Customer Reviews

Dawkins' best!
For the layman, this is perhaps Dawkins' best piece of work.

His readable style is unhindered by complicated genetics, leaving the reader to be hurled through time on a journey towards every living things' common ancestor.

Interweaving engrossing examples of the animal kingdom and fantastic research from around science, Dawkins works the threads of the extant world into an breathtaking tapestry.

Recommended to anyone.

All ancestors are ours
In this tour de force, R. Dawkins brushes not less than the evolution of the tree of man from `the vanity of the present' to the origin of life on earth, thereby showing that `all living creations are cousins'.
It is an itinerary heavily marked by nearly extinctions, drifting continents, geographical barriers, population migrations and climate changes. Darwinian natural selection molded new species, which were more apt to survive in all those different circumstances. Individual living beings, however, were not more than `temporary meeting points on the crisscrossing routes that genes take through history'.
For the author, the origin of life is the origin of heredity, from where `every gene has its own tree'. Overall, `biological evolution has no privileged line of descent and no designated end.'

During his tale, R. Dawkins explains clearly (!) the true nature and the role of, among others, genes, chromosomes, (mitochondrial) DNA, eu- and prokaryote cells, chemical reactions, as well as other important or strange phenomena like the `primitive soup' of the universe, the speed of and the next possible step in the Darwinian evolution, embryonic diversification, the bdelloid sex scandal, the (advantages) of sexual selection, bipedalism, brain size, radioactive clocks and much much more.
Contrary to S.J. Gould, he sees some kind of `progress' during the evolutionary processes.
He gives also outspoken and sharp comments, e.g., on abortion, on race-racism-positive discrimination and on creationists desperately looking for gaps.

This book with beautiful graphic material and an excellent bibliography is the work of a superb free mind. It is a must read for all those interested in the history of life on earth.

A masterpiece of intelligent and accessible science writing
The Ancestor's Tale: A pilgrimage to the dawn of evolution, by Richard Dawkins, is an absolutely fascinating book, and incredibly well written; it is a pleasure to read. The approach taken is novel in that the author walks us backwards through time, much like we would trace back our family tree. But here Dawkins traces back man's family tree through 39 different "concestors" and rendezvous'. He starts with man, and works back through chimpanzees and gorillas, through rodents and marsupials, into fish, down into sponges and fungi, and finally ending up in eubacteria. The writing is compelling and easy, without compromising detail, and the author is clear about what is know and what is informed conjecture.
As we walk backwards through time, I at least was also walking back through my (very limited) understanding of our past and of the principles of evolution more generally. The book is full of facts, anecdotes, speculations and justifiable uncertainty, yet we are left with the idea that nature is working full-tilt behind the scenes. Nevertheless I still have one outstanding question "how did our brain evolve to be what it is today?", and this book does not really answer that; this was not the books objective, but I am surprised that a book on evolution leaves this question unaddressed.
Many of the past reviews have already captured my sentiments about this book, so let me just quote them "Richard Dawkins is a master storyteller", "complex arguments accessible to the non-specialist", "eminently readable book", and "science as high art"; what more can you say! For me this book is up there on my "10 best books" list.