Friday, May 04, 2007
Connecting the dots
In the process of how we came about, i would recommend the six following books to be read in sequence. I read these books at different times and altogether they connect the dots of how our world came about. They make me passionately a believer in the rational and scientific explanations of our evolution. It is amazing that 'creationists' even exist in today's so-called modern word. I mean isnt the scietific evidence for all of us to see ? Its like still believing that the earth is flat when man has reached the moon. There really is no end to superstition and credulity in our world.
I would recommend the following six books to be read in sequence however each of them is a complete entity in itself and you will be able to connect the dots of each segment even if you read it separately. Though written by people from different backgrounds each is a gem in it's own right.
1. A Brief History of everything - By Bill Bryson. Though Bryson is a brilliant travel writer, this is in my opinion his tour de force. Bryson writes engagingly from the time of the inception of the universe to the present date. His book is a fast-forward of the entire history and is a great overview.
2. The first three minutes - By Steven Wienburg. Starts from the very begining of the universe and explains how the universe behaved in the first three minutes. Of course deals heavily with theories of qunatum mechanics and may be a little heavy for the layman. I am told that recently Simon Singh has written a full fledged book on the Big Bang.
3. The Earth (an Autobiography) - By Richard Fortey is a an account of how the earth has been shaped since it's inception. Talks about how from earlier supercontinents the current continents have been shaped. How slow natural processes are able to form the highest mountains and how the tide of time can dry even the largest ocean. A little pedantic at times but good fast-reading.
4. The Ancestor's Tale :- By Richard Dawkins. My favourite among the six. Talks about how entire living world has come about from the smallest microbe onwards. The best part of the book is that it beautifully illustrates the linkages between the different animal families and when they diverged from each other along the path of evolution. Clearly explains the various concepts of evolution and natural selection. Gives a very good overview of the different geological eras till now. (did you know that we are living in the Holocene era ?) A classic.
5. Before the Dawn :- By Nicholas Wade. Takes off from where the aforementioned book leaves it. How humans evolved from Chimpanzees and Bonobos some five million years ago. I like it for the genetic analysis done recently after the human genome was decoded in 2003. It demonstrates the most possible hypothesis of human population migrations from our ancestral population of around estimated 150 individuals from Africa. It is humbling to note that EVERYBODY outside Africa has been descended from these 150 individuals. Has a couple of fascinating chapters on language families and races which have mirrored these human migrations.
6. Guns, Germs and Steel - Jared Diamond. The final book in the series traces the important question of why human societies have evolved so differently in different parts of the world. Since the ancestral humans who emigrated out of africa had the equal capabilities when they divereged, why then in the relatively short period of 50000 years have human destinies been so different (fromt the aborgines to the post-Industrial societies of the west). The answer as Jared persuasively argues is geography. Availibility of domesticable plants and animals have led say Europe and pre-colonised Americas to evolve very differently.
These six books will of course become outdated in time as new research may make some of the theories in these books redundant. Howver, together they are a fascinating exploration and after reading them, one may see the world with "new eyes"...Happy Reading !
I would recommend the following six books to be read in sequence however each of them is a complete entity in itself and you will be able to connect the dots of each segment even if you read it separately. Though written by people from different backgrounds each is a gem in it's own right.
1. A Brief History of everything - By Bill Bryson. Though Bryson is a brilliant travel writer, this is in my opinion his tour de force. Bryson writes engagingly from the time of the inception of the universe to the present date. His book is a fast-forward of the entire history and is a great overview.
2. The first three minutes - By Steven Wienburg. Starts from the very begining of the universe and explains how the universe behaved in the first three minutes. Of course deals heavily with theories of qunatum mechanics and may be a little heavy for the layman. I am told that recently Simon Singh has written a full fledged book on the Big Bang.
3. The Earth (an Autobiography) - By Richard Fortey is a an account of how the earth has been shaped since it's inception. Talks about how from earlier supercontinents the current continents have been shaped. How slow natural processes are able to form the highest mountains and how the tide of time can dry even the largest ocean. A little pedantic at times but good fast-reading.
4. The Ancestor's Tale :- By Richard Dawkins. My favourite among the six. Talks about how entire living world has come about from the smallest microbe onwards. The best part of the book is that it beautifully illustrates the linkages between the different animal families and when they diverged from each other along the path of evolution. Clearly explains the various concepts of evolution and natural selection. Gives a very good overview of the different geological eras till now. (did you know that we are living in the Holocene era ?) A classic.
5. Before the Dawn :- By Nicholas Wade. Takes off from where the aforementioned book leaves it. How humans evolved from Chimpanzees and Bonobos some five million years ago. I like it for the genetic analysis done recently after the human genome was decoded in 2003. It demonstrates the most possible hypothesis of human population migrations from our ancestral population of around estimated 150 individuals from Africa. It is humbling to note that EVERYBODY outside Africa has been descended from these 150 individuals. Has a couple of fascinating chapters on language families and races which have mirrored these human migrations.
6. Guns, Germs and Steel - Jared Diamond. The final book in the series traces the important question of why human societies have evolved so differently in different parts of the world. Since the ancestral humans who emigrated out of africa had the equal capabilities when they divereged, why then in the relatively short period of 50000 years have human destinies been so different (fromt the aborgines to the post-Industrial societies of the west). The answer as Jared persuasively argues is geography. Availibility of domesticable plants and animals have led say Europe and pre-colonised Americas to evolve very differently.
These six books will of course become outdated in time as new research may make some of the theories in these books redundant. Howver, together they are a fascinating exploration and after reading them, one may see the world with "new eyes"...Happy Reading !
