The Evidence for Evolution - The Greatest Show on Earth

What can you say but bravo to Dawkins for his clear and precise facts on evolution from the genetic evidence,DNA,fossils etc. This book goes in to the detective work of evolution unlike other books this tells you the facts and presents the evidence to back it up. Great book for anyone looking to get the strait facts on evolution.

The examples are solid and the arguments are clear. If you know anyone who is still on the fence this is the book for them. They may get a bit mired in the science at times which is always the case with Dawkins, but you can't escape those moments when he leads you right to the answer. The sections on the works of Richard Lenski and John Endler really drive it home with the kind of information you should pass along. The section on dating is also very clear. Good stuff.

this book is the same as Dawkins' 500 others -- condescending towards opposing views and light on actual science. if you like reading about evolution i would suggest pretty much any other author. im a biologist and so of course i believe in the theory of evolution but his books just make all of us realists look bad. great fire starter, though, it's like 1000 pages of redundant senile ramblings.

As usual, Dawkins is entertaining while being informative. He makes the case for evolution.The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution

I'm a big fan of Prof. Dawkins. His books are always beautifully written, clear and persuasive. This one is no exception. But unfortunately I bought it on my Kindle. I didn't realize how bad this Kindle version is until I happened to come across a printed one in a Tokyo bookstore. I was dumbfounded at the illustrations of dazzling colors and superb quality. It's a shame that I bought a Kindle version without those wonderful pictures. It's absolutely a great loss for such a great book and a serious disadvantage for the store's Kindle device. With Apple's iPad forthcoming, the store has to do more to remain relevant in this market, and do it quickly.

If the statistics are true, half of my neighbors, not to mention half of my family, are idiots. I'm still not sure how someone could read this book (or others like it) and say, "I don't know, it just doesn't seem right. I think I like the Genesis explanation better." Look, I thought the creation story was true. At some point the cognitive dissonance clicks off and you wake up. For some it's early in life. Admittedly it took me until my 30s to see how stupid I was. Please, if you're on the fence, read it again. Or even better, move on to Dawkins' earlier book "The God Delusion." This is important. We'll wait. We want you to join the rational discourse. Crossing your arms and stomping your feet (and closing your mind) only reminds us how brainwashed religious people really are.

It seems science is always enlightening our understanding of the world we see. Astronomy takes over for Astrology. Chemistry takes over for Alchemy. Philosophy takes over for Religion. Or I suppose you could say Mathematics, Biology, Botany, Zoology, Physics, Medicine and Democracy takes over for Religion.

Dawkins is brilliant here, just as always. Buy the book if you haven't. Share it if you have.

Many non-scientists, like me, have wondered, why do 99% of all scientists believe in evolution? Isn't it just a Theory? an opinion? How can the vote be so unanimous? 99% is a huge number.

I have been told that there is no evidence for evolution, it is a theory just made up by people who are angry at God and that it is stupid that people came from monkeys.

If you are like me and really want to understand the evidence for evolution honestly, and objectively, this is an excellent book.

Richard Dawkins's ability to lucidly explain complicated scientific information to anyone willing to take the time to listen and understand is impressive.

Once I started reading this book, I couldn't put it down.

Based on the mountain of evidence presented in this book, I now understand that the people telling me that evolution is stupid must be completely unaware of the evidence. I am thinking of giving this book as a Christmas gift for the members of my family that believe that there is no evidence for evolution.

It is a great AudioBook, it goes explaining with great detail , how evolution works. if you don't like science don't buy this book. the reason why i didn't give 4 o 5 stars was that this book it is not as good as the god delusion!!

Dawkins has done it again. This book should grace every Biology class in the USA. You should not even be able to take a Biology class without having read this book since without understanding Evolution, Biology makes no sense. Get it, Read it, Share it. I would give ten stars if I could.

I gave this book a threes stars because its was a hysterical read. i found myself laughing while reading this book. The book is a long diatribe trying to convince the reader and sometimes I think themselves that we evolved from some type of primordial soup. There presuppositions and circular arguments are based on bits and prices of evidence, connected to pure bias. It's a darn shame that at their level of education they can still believe the fallacy of Darwin. Modern-day science in biology, DNA and chemistry have proven without a doubt that there is more to the theory of Macro Evolution. The book is a roller coster filled with humor, foolishness and even has its interesting points. I would recommend this book, but I warn you to read it early in the day, becuase it can put you to sleep.

Dawkins while knowledgeable, he can also be very condescending. If this book were not required for my class, it is not something I would have continued reading after the first chapter. God forbid should you believe in well God.

The font is large and the actual science is thin. Couple these with the sassy and cute tone that Dawkins takes throughout the book and it's clear who the intended audience is: the undeducated masses of conservative Christians who rarely read anything other than the Bible. The problem is these people aren't going to read Dawkins book because it's about evolution and Dawkins is the antichrist.

Unfortunately (or is it fortunately?) I'm not in the intended audience. So the sassy and cute tone, the large font, and the lack of hard science turned me off. Yeah, yeah, yeah - the book provides a convincing argument - actually several convincing arguments - for evolution. But by trying to address every facet of evolution, Dawkins has written a largely unsatisfying book for those of us who love science. There are several better books available that cover the science of evolution in more depth. Leave me a comment if you want recommendations.

I've enjoyed reading, and have learned from, all of Richard Dawkins' books. He's an excellent writer, and a recognized expert in his field. This book is no exception. It delivers a slam-dunk critique of creationism and "Intelligent Design" and proves its case that EVOLUTION IS A FACT! Period. Get over it. It is sad that a book like this has to be written, but that is the unfortunate reality of the situation. If it were up to me, this book would be required reading for every high school student in the US.

Clinton Richard Dawkins (born 1941) is an English ethologist and evolutionary biologist, as well as an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford. He has written some of the most creative and challenging defenses of evolutionary theory [e.g., The Blind Watchmaker,Climbing Mount Improbable,The Selfish Gene] of anyone other than the late Stephen Jay Gould. He also recently wrote The God Delusion.

[NOTE: page nuimbers below refer to the 470-page hardcover edition.]

He wrote in the Preface to this 2009 book, “The evidence for evolution grows by the day, and has never been stronger. At the same time, paradoxically, ill-informed opposition is also stronger than I can remember. This book is my personal summary of the evidence that the ‘theory’ of evolution is actually a fact---as incontrovertible as any in science.” (Pg. vii) Later, he adds, “The history-deniers themselves are among those that I am trying to reach in this book. But, perhaps more importantly, I aspire to arm those who are not history-deniers but know some---perhaps members of their own family or church---and find themselves inadequately prepared to argue the case… Evolution is a fact, and this book will demonstrate it. No reputable scientists disputes it, and no unbiased reader will close the book doubting it.” (Pg. 8-9)

He states, “If the history-deniers who doubt the fact of evolution are ignorant of biology, those who think the world began less than ten thousand years ago are worse than ignorant, they are deluded to the point of perversity. They are denying not only the facts of biology but those of physics, geology, cosmology, archaeology, history and chemistry as well.” (Pg. 85)

He argues, “We don’t NEED fossils---the case for evolution is watertight without them; so it is paradoxical to use GAPS in the fossil record as though they were evidence against evolution. We are, as I say, lucky to have fossils at all. What WOULD be evidence against evolution, and very strong evidence at that, would be the discovery of even a single fossil in the wrong geological strata… All the fossils that we have, and there are very very many indeed, occur, without a single authenticated exception, in the right temporal sequence. Yes, there are gaps, where there are no fossils at all, and that is only to be expected. But not a single solitary fossil has ever been found BEFORE it could have evolved… Evolution could so easily be disproved if just a single fossil turned up in the wrong date order… Sceptics of evolution who wish to prove their case should be diligently scrabbling around in the rocks, desperately trying to find anachronistic fossils.” (Pg. 146-147)

He gives examples: “Acanthostega was largely a water-dweller, but it had lungs and its limbs strongly suggest that it could cope with land as well as water if it had to. Again, it looked pretty much like a giant salamander. Moving back now to the fish side of the divide, Panderichthys, also from the late Devonian, is also slightly more amphibian-like, and slightly less fish-like, than Eusthenopteron. But if you saw it you would surely want to call it a fish rather than a salamander. So, we are left with a gap between Panderichthys, the amphibian-like fish, and Acanthostega, the fish-like amphibian. Where is the ‘missing link’ between them?” (Pg. 168)

Later, he observes, “Homo ergaster/erectus, of which we have many fossil specimens, is a very persuasive halfway link, no longer missing, between Homo sapiens today and Homo habilis two million years ago, which is in turn a beautiful link back to Australopithecus three million years ago, which… could pretty well be described as an upright-walking chimpanzee. How many links do you need, before you concede that they are no longer ‘missing’? And can we also bridge the gap between Homo ergaster and modern Homo sapiens? Yes: we have a rich lode of fossils, covering the last few hundred thousand years, which are intermediate between them…. the links are no longer missing. Intermediates abound.”
(Pg. 197)

He suggests, “Whatever else God does, he certainly doesn’t MAKE glowing colours and tiny wings. If he did anything at all, it would be to supervise the embryonic development of things, for example by splicing together sequences of genes that direct a process of automated development… God… never made a tiny wing in his eternal life. If he made anything (he didn’t in my view, but let it pass, that’s not what I’m about here), what he made was an embryological RECIPE, or something like a computer program for controlling the embryonic development of a tiny wing… Of course, God might claim that it is just as clever … to design a recipe or a program for a wing, as to make a wing. But… I just want to develop- the distinction between MAKING something like a wing, and what really happens in embryology.” (Pg. 212-213)

He critiques the notion of Noah’s Ark: “Shouldn’t there be some sort of law of decreasing species diversity as we move away from … Mount Ararat? … why would all those marsupials … have migrated en masse from Mount Ararat to Australia? … Why did the entire order Edenta [armadillos, sloths, anteaters]… troop off unerringly for South America… leaving no hide nor hair nor armour plate of settlers somewhere along the way?... Why did an entire sub-order of monkeys, the platyrrhine monkeys, end up in South America and nowhere else? Shouldn’t at least a few of them have joined the rest of the monkeys … in Asia or Africa? … Why did all the penguins undertake the long waddle south to the Antarctic, not a single one to the equally hospitable Arctic?” (Pg. 268-269)

He asks, “If feathers are a good idea within the bird ‘theme,’ such that every single bird, without exception, has them whether it flies or not, why do literally no mammals have them? Why would the designer not borrow that ingenious invention, the feather, for at least one bat? The evolutionist’s answer is clear. All birds have inherited their feathers from their shared ancestor, which had feathers. No mammal is descended from that ancestor. It’s as simple as that.” (Pg. 297-298)

He also critiques the so-called “molecular clock” idea: “what gives us the right to hope that we can find evolutionary processes that go at a fixed rate? Indeed, much evidence suggests that evolutionary rates are highly variable… If rates of evolution are so variable, how can we hope to use them as a clock? This is where molecular genetics comes to the rescue… If legs and beaks undergo change at rates ranging from microdarwins to kilodarwins, why should molecules be any more reliable as clocks? The answer is that genetic changes that manifest themselves in outward and visible evolution---of things like legs and arms---are a very small tip of the iceberg, and they are … heavily influenced by varying natural selection. The majority of genetic change at the molecular level is NEUTRAL, and can therefore be expected to proceed at a rate that is independent of usefulness and might even be approximately constant within any one gene. A neutral genetic change has no effect on the survival of the animal, and this is a helpful credential for a clock.” (Pg. 330-332)

He points out, “Not all birds fly, but all birds carry at least relics of the apparatus of flight… as a legacy from remote flying ancestors. Ostrich wing stubs, moreover, have not completely lost their usefulness… they seem to have some sort of balancing and steering role in running, and they enter into social and sexual displays…” (Pg. 344) Later, he adds, “Evolutionists… need to come up with an explanation for the loss of eyes where they are no longer needed. Why not, it might be said, simply hang on to your eyes, even if you never use them? Might they not come in handy at some point in the future? Why ‘bother’ to get rid of them? Notice, by the way, how hard it is to resist the language of intention, purpose and personification… Well, eyes are almost certainly not cost-free… a moist eye socket, which has to be open to the world to accommodate the swiveling eyeball with its transparent surface, might be vulnerable to infection.” (Pg. 351)

In the final chapter, he summarizes, “Natural selection is an improbability pump: a process that generates the statistically improbable. It systematically seizes the minority of random changes that have what it takes to survive, and accumulates them… until evolution eventually climbs mountains of improbability and diversity, peaks whose height and range seem to know no limit, the metaphorical mountain that I have called ‘Mount Improbable.’ The improbability pump of natural selection… is a kind of statistical equivalent of the sun’s energy raising water to the top of a conventional mountain. Life evolves greater complexity only because natural selection drives it locally away from the statistically probable towards the improbable.” (Pg. 416)

This is one of the best, and most comprehensive, presentations of the evidence for evolution currently available. It will be “must reading” for anyone seriously studying evolutionary theory.

As a biologist (and evolutionist), I am one of those who did not need to be convinced by this book. I am already there. So, I was at somewhat of a disadvantage in trying to estimate how this book might affect the average creationist and IDer. One problem is that creationists come in several stripes----and I don't mean the usual division of creationists into young-Earth vs old-Earth etc. I mean the professional creationists such as some clergy (including TV evangelists) and foundation employees etc with a financial or power stake in maintaining creationism vs some people who have an ignorant, but honest, attachment to creationism for what might be called religious reasons (in spite of Dawkins and everything else) vs the hard-core religionists who care not a whit about evidence and who think that "faith" is faith, no matter what the evidence against it. Dawkins probably will not reach the first and third of these groups. Whether he is able to reach the second remains to be seen. Those people with an ignorant but honest attachment to creationism are largely unlikely to read (much less buy) a book such as this. I am at somewhat of a loss to know who this book targets. The Hell-fire and Damnation preachers will just ignore it and go on preaching---they have too much of a good thing in power and money flow to give it up by becoming honest. Dawkins needs to target the mainline Christian clergy. But then, who goes to church to listen to sermons on evolution?
As for the book itself, it took me a while to get used to the chatty style, mostly in first person, that characterizes Dawkin's later books. What Dawkins presents is only PART of "The Evidence for Evolution". He mentions once or twice that he had to jettison discussion on some point or another that would have added to the discussion (and to the length of the book). But if there is a lot of evidence, why not present all of it? He leaves out, for example, the embryologic evidence for skeletal homologies. Basically he only presents pictures of several skeletons and expects hard-core creationists to accept that bone X in a bat is homologous to bone X in a whale, etc. The creationist would say they these bones only appear to be homologous because are used in similar ways. Show the embryologic homologies and even the DNA evidence and the case is unassailable (to an honest mind). But Dawkins does not do this. Also, he does not present a detailed discussion of branchial arch homologies in fish and higher vertebrates. It may be mentioned (I don't recall), but a full discussion would have been unanswerable. Ditto for jaw and earbone homologies. Dawkins did not discuss retroviruses and missed a big opportunity there. Perhaps he thought that at some point he had reached overkill. I think the book is approximately a 90% effort, with too much good stuff left out.

This book and author kneel in front of the nude body of Satan and pay oral homage, and it sort of punches Jesus in the face. But I'm giving it 5 star anyhow because it made me laugh. How exactly do animals change into other animals? There is no proof, yet Dawkins promotes the big Lie by making up evidence that contradicts what people like me already believe.

Dawkins should ask himself:

1) If evolution is true, how come Asian people always have Asian babies rather than some kind of evolved post-Asian baby. The baby always has the same number of arms and legs as the parents! It never has gills or protective spikes on its head or any of the other features that evolution supposedly creates, this shows it is false.

2) If evolution is true, why did we evolve to think it's not true? Why do me and my friends not believe it, when we evolved too supposedly. Evolution is pretty stupid if it creates people who don't believe it.

3) If evolution is true, God's word is not true. God's word is true, so evolution is not true and Darwin lied.

4) If evolution is true, it means that all animals and humans were born from other animals. But God impregnated the Virgin Mary through the Holy Spirit, who blew through her orifice and planted a God-baby, so that means evolution is false. If I were to accept evolution, I'd have to accept that Joseph lied on top of Mary's nude body and placed his dingus inside of her, and that's contrary to what I feel like thinking about.

For all of these reasons, Dawkins and his ilk mess up our faith with their facts and bring hot devil love to us, reject them and stay true to Jesus.

Clinton Richard Dawkins (born 1941) is an English ethologist and evolutionary biologist, as well as an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford. He has written some of the most creative and challenging defenses of evolutionary theory [e.g., The Blind Watchmaker,Climbing Mount Improbable,The Selfish Gene] of anyone other than the late Stephen Jay Gould. He also recently wrote The God Delusion.

He wrote in the Preface to this 2009 book, “The evidence for evolution grows by the day, and has never been stronger. At the same time, paradoxically, ill-informed opposition is also stronger than I can remember. This book is my personal summary of the evidence that the ‘theory’ of evolution is actually a fact---as incontrovertible as any in science.” (Pg. vii) Later, he adds, “The history-deniers themselves are among those that I am trying to reach in this book. But, perhaps more importantly, I aspire to arm those who are not history-deniers but know some---perhaps members of their own family or church---and find themselves inadequately prepared to argue the case… Evolution is a fact, and this book will demonstrate it. No reputable scientists disputes it, and no unbiased reader will close the book doubting it.” (Pg. 8-9)

He states, “If the history-deniers who doubt the fact of evolution are ignorant of biology, those who think the world began less than ten thousand years ago are worse than ignorant, they are deluded to the point of perversity. They are denying not only the facts of biology but those of physics, geology, cosmology, archaeology, history and chemistry as well.” (Pg. 85)

He argues, “We don’t NEED fossils---the case for evolution is watertight without them; so it is paradoxical to use GAPS in the fossil record as though they were evidence against evolution. We are, as I say, lucky to have fossils at all. What WOULD be evidence against evolution, and very strong evidence at that, would be the discovery of even a single fossil in the wrong geological strata… All the fossils that we have, and there are very very many indeed, occur, without a single authenticated exception, in the right temporal sequence. Yes, there are gaps, where there are no fossils at all, and that is only to be expected. But not a single solitary fossil has ever been found BEFORE it could have evolved… Evolution could so easily be disproved if just a single fossil turned up in the wrong date order… Sceptics of evolution who wish to prove their case should be diligently scrabbling around in the rocks, desperately trying to find anachronistic fossils.” (Pg. 146-147)

He gives examples: “Acanthostega was largely a water-dweller, but it had lungs and its limbs strongly suggest that it could cope with land as well as water if it had to. Again, it looked pretty much like a giant salamander. Moving back now to the fish side of the divide, Panderichthys, also from the late Devonian, is also slightly more amphibian-like, and slightly less fish-like, than Eusthenopteron. But if you saw it you would surely want to call it a fish rather than a salamander. So, we are left with a gap between Panderichthys, the amphibian-like fish, and Acanthostega, the fish-like amphibian. Where is the ‘missing link’ between them?” (Pg. 168)

Later, he observes, “Homo ergaster/erectus, of which we have many fossil specimens, is a very persuasive halfway link, no longer missing, between Homo sapiens today and Homo habilis two million years ago, which is in turn a beautiful link back to Australopithecus three million years ago, which… could pretty well be described as an upright-walking chimpanzee. How many links do you need, before you concede that they are no longer ‘missing’? And can we also bridge the gap between Homo ergaster and modern Homo sapiens? Yes: we have a rich lode of fossils, covering the last few hundred thousand years, which are intermediate between them…. the links are no longer missing. Intermediates abound.”
(Pg. 197)

He suggests, “Whatever else God does, he certainly doesn’t MAKE glowing colours and tiny wings. If he did anything at all, it would be to supervise the embryonic development of things, for example by splicing together sequences of genes that direct a process of automated development… God… never made a tiny wing in his eternal life. If he made anything (he didn’t in my view, but let it pass, that’s not what I’m about here), what he made was an embryological RECIPE, or something like a computer program for controlling the embryonic development of a tiny wing… Of course, God might claim that it is just as clever … to design a recipe or a program for a wing, as to make a wing. But… I just want to develop- the distinction between MAKING something like a wing, and what really happens in embryology.” (Pg. 212-213)

He critiques the notion of Noah’s Ark: “Shouldn’t there be some sort of law of decreasing species diversity as we move away from … Mount Ararat? … why would all those marsupials … have migrated en masse from Mount Ararat to Australia? … Why did the entire order Edenta [armadillos, sloths, anteaters]… troop off unerringly for South America… leaving no hide nor hair nor armour plate of settlers somewhere along the way?... Why did an entire sub-order of monkeys, the platyrrhine monkeys, end up in South America and nowhere else? Shouldn’t at least a few of them have joined the rest of the monkeys … in Asia or Africa? … Why did all the penguins undertake the long waddle south to the Antarctic, not a single one to the equally hospitable Arctic?” (Pg. 268-269)

He asks, “If feathers are a good idea within the bird ‘theme,’ such that every single bird, without exception, has them whether it flies or not, why do literally no mammals have them? Why would the designer not borrow that ingenious invention, the feather, for at least one bat? The evolutionist’s answer is clear. All birds have inherited their feathers from their shared ancestor, which had feathers. No mammal is descended from that ancestor. It’s as simple as that.” (Pg. 297-298)

He also critiques the so-called “molecular clock” idea: “what gives us the right to hope that we can find evolutionary processes that go at a fixed rate? Indeed, much evidence suggests that evolutionary rates are highly variable… If rates of evolution are so variable, how can we hope to use them as a clock? This is where molecular genetics comes to the rescue… If legs and beaks undergo change at rates ranging from microdarwins to kilodarwins, why should molecules be any more reliable as clocks? The answer is that genetic changes that manifest themselves in outward and visible evolution---of things like legs and arms---are a very small tip of the iceberg, and they are … heavily influenced by varying natural selection. The majority of genetic change at the molecular level is NEUTRAL, and can therefore be expected to proceed at a rate that is independent of usefulness and might even be approximately constant within any one gene. A neutral genetic change has no effect on the survival of the animal, and this is a helpful credential for a clock.” (Pg. 330-332)

He points out, “Not all birds fly, but all birds carry at least relics of the apparatus of flight… as a legacy from remote flying ancestors. Ostrich wing stubs, moreover, have not completely lost their usefulness… they seem to have some sort of balancing and steering role in running, and they enter into social and sexual displays…” (Pg. 344) Later, he adds, “Evolutionists… need to come up with an explanation for the loss of eyes where they are no longer needed. Why not, it might be said, simply hang on to your eyes, even if you never use them? Might they not come in handy at some point in the future? Why ‘bother’ to get rid of them? Notice, by the way, how hard it is to resist the language of intention, purpose and personification… Well, eyes are almost certainly not cost-free… a moist eye socket, which has to be open to the world to accommodate the swiveling eyeball with its transparent surface, might be vulnerable to infection.” (Pg. 351)

In the final chapter, he summarizes, “Natural selection is an improbability pump: a process that generates the statistically improbable. It systematically seizes the minority of random changes that have what it takes to survive, and accumulates them… until evolution eventually climbs mountains of improbability and diversity, peaks whose height and range seem to know no limit, the metaphorical mountain that I have called ‘Mount Improbable.’ The improbability pump of natural selection… is a kind of statistical equivalent of the sun’s energy raising water to the top of a conventional mountain. Life evolves greater complexity only because natural selection drives it locally away from the statistically probable towards the improbable.” (Pg. 416)

This is one of the best, and most comprehensive, presentations of the evidence for evolution currently available. It will be “must reading” for anyone seriously studying evolutionary theory.

Dawkins work here is very intense, lots of science along with much speculation. He shows why he is called an ultra-Darwinist. He definitely sees Charles Darwin as real genius. Along with a lot of great information on how species have evolved over the billions of years, you also get some barely concealed opinions that muddy up the waters a bit.

He has convinced me that evolution is fairly well a proven scientific fact, but some of this DNA stuff is over my head and a tough slog. I liked the last part of the book better than the first, showing how organs like the eye and others are not so perfectly designed and had to be improved over many centuries to function at all, some--like lungs and gills--have left their traces in bodies that have no use for them. Hence, 'intelligent design' is not so intelligent.

Let the arguments end with this!

For anyone out there that still needs proof of evolution, here it is. Dawkins is famous for his very strong opinions, especially about religion. This book does not focus on religion at all. Instead, he uses this book as a pure explanation of evolutionary proofs and a history of evolutionary work directed at the doubters. In many of his other books he makes some arguments for evolution, but here he dedicates the entire book to proving evolution once and for all. This is his one book that you can look to if you need an all-encompassing proof of evolution. So whenever you have a friend or family member that tells you they do not believe in evolution, you can point them to this book. Today, it's not a matter of believing or disbelieving; rather, it's a matter of being informed vs. ignorant.

Dawkins can get a bit feisty at times and you may feel as though he is talking down to you for being an ignorant buffoon. But, if you can open your mind, looks at the facts, and think about the arguments he presents, then you will be better for the experience. To be a well-informed member of society about evolution you must read this book. It is no longer acceptable in today's day and age to continue to ignorantly refute evolution. This is an important issue because science classes in private and public schools are affected by people's opinions on the topic. To deny children the ability to learn about evolution in school is like denying them the ability to learn physics or math.

All in all, this is a must read. Anyone who still doubts or denies evolution needs to read this to change their mind. Anyone who wants facts to help them prove the theory of evolution to their friends, family, or coworkers needs to read this book. This book will give you the necessary ammunition to fire at the doubters and nonbelievers. Anyone who can make it through this book will be wiser for the experience.

Of course, Dawkins goes on to compare this to the creationists refusing to believe in evolution. Yes, he does attack them, but I totally agree with him: evolution is an established fact (or nearly one) from all the evidence we have collected, and the evidence right in front of our eyes. And I really think that anyone who only believes that the world is 6,000 years old is blind, refusing to admit the discoveries the human race has made. You can believe that evolution was created by God for some unfathomable purpose, and that's perfectly reasonable if you're religious, but it's difficult to rationally not believe that evolution does exist. I would agree that there's plenty to be said about this topic, but it is tiresome when there are so many people who refuse to acknowledge even its possibility. Fossil evidence shows that the world is much, much more than 6000 years old.

In The Greatest Show on Earth, Dawkins has written another excellent book defending evolution. He has written against religion before; this book is not about that. Using amazing analogies and examples, Dawkins piece by piece takes apart the creationism arguments, to strip it to the bare truth: evolution is real. All scientific evidence points to it. I know that really religious people can say that mysteriously, God altered the world to look like evolution had happened, but that argument has no basis in fact, or even reasonable conjecture.

Back to the book. Again, I really love the analogies and examples Dawkins uses. They're easy for the layman to understand, but also highly scientific, and rooted in fact. It's not like he's dumbing anything down; he's just showing clearly the evidence. Dawkins provides examples of natural selection over millions of years, and of natural selection that we've seen happen literally in front of our eyes. He also goes over artificial selection to set up explaining natural selection, and time clocks that can be used to date igneous rocks, and thus, fossils. Basically, Dawkins covers many, many ways of looking at how to explain and/or "prove" evolution. He outlines some of the greatest natural/artificial selection experiments: for example, the foxes in Russia (I love that one) and the famous guppies.

I also love the 4 sections of color plates; they really add a lot to the book, and they're also very beautiful to look at. There are some lovely photos there.

I'd actually read the first half or so of the book while in Miami Beach 2 or 3 years ago, but when I left, I had to abandon it. At the time, I didn't really understand the chapter on clocks for dating the age of something. I still don't understand it completely, as it's a mind-blowing and extremely complicated concept but now, having learned a bit of chemistry last year, it does make a lot more sense. And I definitely learned a lot of new things from that particular chapter (and other chapters too, of course).

The last thing I want to touch on is Dawkins's style. He adds humor to the book; it's not just a dry science textbook-like concoction. Instead, it is a highly engaging work that keeps your interest the whole time (I might even do it for my book talk eventually). I would highly recommend this amazing science book, and I think perhaps I'll read Dawkins's The God Delusion soon.

My blog is at novareviews.blogspot.com.

Richard Dawkins' book "The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution" is a thorough treatment of evolution for the casual reader. The book traces out the various scientific arguments in favor of evolution, roughly corresponding to the following:

1. Evolution's support as a theory (in the same way that gravity is a theory) in the scientific community
2. The existence of unnatural selection such as domestication and breeding of livestock
3. How natural selection is an extension of unnatural selection
4. Various geological dating techniques confirm the age of fossils
5. Observable evolution of organisms such as bacteria
6. The fossil record gives evidence of many transitional species
7. Likewise, the fossil record includes mankind's early descendants
8. Evidence from embryology
9. Evidence from islands and plate tectonics
10. Evidence from the similar features of evolutionary "cousins"
11. Evidence from genetics
12. Reasons that creationism is extremely unlikely

This list does not exhaust the arguments that Dawkins makes, but rather gives an idea of what this book is about. He writes clearly and at an understandable level for non-scientists. Every idea is explained clearly using relatable examples and a clear explanation of difficult science. Many of the ideas in this book are complicated and it is to Dawkins' credit that he is able to convey his ideas so well.

Many people will dislike this book for a number of reasons. For some it is that it conflicts with their beliefs, some will be put-off by Dawkins' uncompromising tone, and others just won't enjoy the topic. If you think you fall into one of these categories, then you probably won't like this book and can without shame avoid reading it. If on the other hand, you are curious about evolution, interested in challenging your biases and beliefs, and want to read something both challenging and increasingly relevant for today's world, I recommend this book without reservation.

Let me start my saying I did not actually read this book. I listened to it via Audiobook. I wanted to start my paper with this disclaimer not because it would stir the pot but because reflecting on the book afterwards I was correct in the assumption that reading the book in a traditional manner would have lessened the experience for me, as I would be struggling through some of the harder pronunciations. That being said I would endorse this book whole-heartedly to anyone and everyone I meet.
The book is voiced by both Mr. Dawkins and his wife, Juliet. From the start, the high-class British accents put this image in my head that we were sitting in a lounge on London on a cold night in front of a fire (there might or might not be a bear skin rug) having an intellectual conversation about Darwin, evolution, genomes, and rabbits.

Dawkins approach is subtle at first. He lulls the reader in with talk of scientific theory and its purposes, outlines different fallacies, and explains what happens when those fallacies are used. The first chapter is really a textbook of definitions that have to do with science and luckily many were repeats of what we learned in class. He makes a point to take his time with the difference between construct and theory, as this is key to all of his evolution argument.

Dawkins wastes no time from the second chapter on. He brings out the big guns, discussing evolution and animal linage while using good examples with wolves and rabbits to explain how evolution subtly makes tiny changes with each generation. Dawkins states that it is something you would not notice if you lined 4-5 generations of female rabbits up, but that if you took thousands of years of generations you would see the evolutionary tweaking. Ancient rabbits would more closely resemble some other animal — a fox or skunk — rather than what we know modern rabbits to be. What I like most about this example is that it is relevant to my first paper on Adnan Oktar.

In that paper, I reflected on how Oktar’s main argument for creationism is that he does not believe in evolution since there is not a single fossil that shows it existence. What Dawkins does here is blow Oktar’s construct out of the water by proving that evolution exists in a series of fossils and it is not possible to prove it with just one. In half a chapter, Dawkins destroys the main argument for one of the biggest intelligent design advocates. Dawkins does not stop there with Oktar, he directly criticizes Islam’s role in the spread of creationism. I can understand how this thought would not be popular with many people in the world, and while he is over-generalizing the problem as a whole, if you know the background he has with creationists (or more specifically Islamic creationists), you can see why he mentions them here. But his editor probably should have had him soften the blow a bit.
I only have two complaints about the book. The first is that it is hard to follow. Even listening to the book and minimizing environmental distractions, I found myself having to rewind sections to be able to grasp what was going on. I have no problem doing this, but the average person reading the book who has no back knowledge would be confused and would probably stop reading. This is a bucket of water from a stream of debate. That makes the book inaccessible to someone not already swimming in the stream, and seems to defeat the purpose of writing the book in the first place, at least to some extent. Because the purpose of the book should not be to educate people who are already on your side of the argument — a proposition Dawkins admits in the first chapter. Rather, the book should give people the evidence they need in order to be able to make an educated decision about where they stand on the issue of creationism v. evolutionism.

My second complaint, is more a personal preference. At many points in the book, Dawkins is down-right rude to anyone who does not subscribe to the theory of evolution. He calls them names and talks down to them, making him look like a bully with a superiority complex. Again this is just a personal opinion, but acting that way would cause people to put down the book and stop reading, resulting in a counter-productive outcome to writing the book. Rather than trying to educate the ignorant, Dawkins panders to the initiated. And that is unfortunate.

On the other hand, I did enjoy Dawkins’ use of dry humor and well-placed examples to explain many of his tougher concepts (such as carbon dating) so he could later explain how the Earth was dated. I especially liked his points on natural selection and how mutations sometimes lead to strong, faster, better animals who then have the advantage and survive to breed the next generation.

Overall, I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone I could convince to read it. It was informative and well put together with a certain flow of topics that make it easy to jump from one topic to the next. I would like to go as far as saying it should be standard reading for budding biologist or scientist in general, provided they are given some guidance through the denser sections of the book and some prior reading to familiarize them with the context of the topic in which this book resides. I will be listening to Dawkins’ other books.

For anyone who wonders about the validity of evolution let this book forever teach you the many observable facts that show us its truth. This book not only makes evolution concrete in your mind but it also shows how man derives observable information from the world. Many scientific practices that show the age of the Earth and show the history of the Earth as well.

This book should be mandatory reading for anyone who is coming of age in this world or anyone who is willing to learn how we got here.

Dawkins minces no words confronting those who propagate the idea that all life was created thousands of years ago, in spite of the mountains of evidence to the contrary -- from geology to species distribution, from radioactive clocks to skeletal morphology, from molecular biology to computer science. His point is clear and well-argued: to deny the evidence of evolution is to be part of a modern, well-funded and aggressively evangelical Flat Earth Society, and it's only appropriate to treat it as such.

He does not spend as much time on the bizarre offshoots of creationism that exist today (the arguments that species only ever "devolve", that evolution happens but can never lead to speciation, that an intelligent designer is constantly tweaking the process). That's because, after laying out the evidence, it becomes abundantly clear that these are simple "God of the gaps" arguments, attempts to shohoern theism into whatever parts of current scientific understanding can be assailed most seemingly plausibly.

Leaving aside the directness, the book is trademark Dawkins in other ways: full of details, anecdotes and diversions. Most of the time I enjoy these, but the book would have been better with more rigorous editing (which, I'm sure, Dawkins would or did push back against). Dawkins is a storyteller, and you have to be ready for an experience not unlike listening to a very knowledgeable, slightly eccentric professor in order to truly enjoy this book.

If you have your doubts about evolutionary biology, or are just not very well-versed in it, this is a good introduction, but it is not a gentle one. Look elsewhere for that. If you're ready to be shoved into a world that is truly filled with wonder, this book is a great start. You don't have to leave your delusions at the door, but be prepared to have them shattered.

Those nasty Ichneumon wasps! Their larvae, growing within a caterpillar's body, start "by taking out the fat bodies and digestive organs, leaving the vital heart and nervous system till last...." (page 395) Um, say what? Caterpillars, lacking any circulatory system, have no hearts. Surely, Dawkins is writing metaphorically about caterpillar hearts and using a bit of intentional hyperbole here; however, in so doing, he assumes that his readers have just enough knowledge of caterpillar anatomy not to take him literally. And that, I fear, is an unwarranted assumption.

Will GREATEST SHOW accomplish Dawkins' aim of successfully arguing the truth of evolutionary change as contrasted with the "creationist" beliefs of certain theists? No. It seems to be one of the weaknesses of the human mind that rational, orderly thought and objective analysis of evidence stand no chance of winning a bout when the opponent is an unquestioning belief in any sort of deity, including the supposed creations of that deity. Put another way, how can logic and reason ever hope to prevail over years of theistic indoctrination? Superstition has always been a powerful adversary. When the astronomer Galileo Galilei tried to enlighten his world to the fact that the earth revolved around the Sun rather than the other way around, the Inquisition in Rome found him "vehemently suspect of heresy," ordered him to "abjure, curse and detest" those opinions and placed him under house arrest for the term of his life. Somewhat more recently (in 2006), Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo, head of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for the Family, said that "scientists involved in research with human embryos, including embryonic stem-cell research, could be excommunicated. He also affirmed that excommunication is still applicable to persons who receive, perform or support abortions." It will take more than any book, no matter how well argued, to prevail in the face of such abysmal ignorance and superstition, resulting as they do from an unreasoning fear of the amoral universe in which all life finds itself.

In THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH, Dawkins may have somewhat overreached himself. By that I mean that I encountered no truly novel concepts that I had not previously run across in several of his other published works. That is not to say that GREATEST SHOW is in any way an inferior book, just that it seemed right on the verge of becoming repetitious of facts that the author has previously explained elsewhere. GREATEST SHOW does provide additional new examples of biological wonders and is certainly not a waste of time to read. Nonetheless, the excellence of Dawkins' earlier book THE ANCESTOR'S TALE has yet to be exceeded.

For the most part, GREATEST SHOW reads well, although inevitably, depending upon the reader's own interests, one finds some parts more intriguing than others. In fact, I found the discussion of protein structure pretty sluggish going, but the parts on plate tectonics galloped right along, not that either topic was heretofore unknown to me but that I found the writing more enjoyable in some sections than in others. One of the grand things about Dawkins' writing is that he is as much at home with literature as he is with the natural sciences, and his effective use of literary allusion here and there is nothing less than endearing to any bibliophile.

In brief, I found GREATEST SHOW satisfying in that, while it did not introduce me to any totally new concepts, it did offer quite a few new examples to illustrate and demonstrate the fascinating workings of the physical and biological world. It appears to me that any book can be evaluated in light of the fact that it requires a certain amount of time to read, time taken from the finite lifespan of every reader. The ultimate question is whether the knowledge and concepts that one gains from reading THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH are worth the hours from one's life that are consumed by the reading. To this question, I vote "yes," and I recommend the book to any mature reader.

This book is heartbreakingly brilliant.

It is clear and accessible and unlikely to be touched by those who were alienated by The God Delusion, a book I own and loved when I purchased it but now realize was toxic. Preaching to the choir at the expense of making every religious person now shun Dawkins and all his books.

I will not deny. I am an atheist who is out of patience with people who cannot explain science without concluding that there is no god. All this does is alienate people who are religious or are on the fence.

You shouldn't have to already be an atheist to read about math, the cosmos, or evolution. What is more important: winning a useless debate no one can win or getting people to understand that they need to vaccinate their children? People don't understand germ theory. They don't understand that the flu is different every year because the surviving blight keeps evolving They don't understand what the word "theory" means. The man who used to helpfully tell readers how to pronounce new or unfamiliar words is now the most public polarizing voice in scientific writing. I also cannot help but find it ironic that his most spectacular failures were on Twitter. Dawkins will never change but I can only hope science authors drop the god issue and focus on science. The world needs fewer people who make "science" seem like some aspect of a members-only club for atheists.

You cannot blame religious people for not understanding evolution when you slammed the door in their faces and called them idiots.

I can only hope that Neil DeGrasse Tyson and Bill Nye are successful at undoing the damage Richard Dawkins has cluelessly inflicted upon the scientific community.

Perhaps the best summary I can provide is this:
If you love Richard Dawkins and believe in evolution, you will enjoy and understand this book.
If you don't understand evolution or dislike Richard Dawkins, you would easily understand this book and really should to read it, but you won't.

Dawkins is definitely very knowledgeable in evolution. When I bought this book I did not expect it to be a book defending evolution.
This book presents a lot of useful ammo to debunk creationism. The sections about age of the earth n the missing link are particularly useful and easy to understand. Having said that there are sections about DNA that are too technical.
In sum it is still a very good book for evolutionist.

When a writer (or an artist) has written their finest work & experienced the adulation & recognition that are beyond their wildest dreams, it is difficult to write a follow-up. Often (as with Encore and Long Way Down), the follow-up proves weak and attention quickly goes elsewhere.

Fortunately this hasn't happened with this book to that degree (although it is a little tired in places - e.g. chapter 8 'You did it yourself in 9 months' and the ending). This book is, like all Dawkins books, an improvement on his last biology book in explaining evolution. Every book since The Extended Phenotype has been geared to popularise evolution & help the reader understand it. This book does so very persuasively with incredibly simple arguments in 'The Primrose path to Evolution', leading onto atomic clocks, experiments that have proven evolution and misconceptions about the fossil record.

Essentially, if you have a friend who hasn't read Dawkins (shame on them!), then this is a good place to start. Like Ancestor's tale, it makes little mention of religion and God (except Creationists) and is designed to persuade people like the Bishop of Oxford was, who are religious but also believe in evolution. Given the shocking statistic quoted in this book (that 40% of people don't believe in evolution), it is very much your duty to open the doors of perception for these people so that they may see (at least partially) how the World works.

That said, this book does have some weaknesses. The digressions Dawkins goes into can sometimes lead off the point & should have been footnoted at the back (as with The Selfish Gene). John Cornwell has also criticised Dawkins for quoting his own books and this, unfortunately, is quite common here (as it was with his latest documentary - The Genius of Charles Darwin).
One last criticism is that the book Why Evolution Is True by Jerry Coyne pops up a little too many times, which makes me wonder if its ideas were lifted for this book. The sources in this book are also not as diverse as some of his other books, and it suffers a little for it.

Still, if you can ignore these weaknesses (which are slight), then this is still a good book to persuade those with no scientific knowledge of the truth of evolution. I would suggest, however, that The Ancestor's Tale is a more peerless book in this field & I found it much more persuasive even if it is more technical. Knowing the unscholarly as I do, I would suggest getting the audio CD of The Ancestor's Tale for those who are unconvinced (since everyone can hear but not all like reading). I wait, with baited breath, to see what the audio CD for this is like...

Absolutely amazing even if you think you fully understand evolution I am willing to bet that you hardly grasp the concept if you have not read this book. It show how amazingly complex yet simple and elegant the theory is. Even if you don't believe the scientific theory is true you owe it to yourself to understand it. From what I can tell the only thing about the scientific theory that has changed is the element of chance is practically nonexistent. Just a note I have read very few books in my life did not even read the ones I was supposed to for school. This book was easily readable however and kept my attention to the point that I was thinking about it all the time even when not reading it. It turned out to be the best book by far I have ever read it starts out ok but gets tremendously better throughout and ends spectacularly! Just so you know I wrote a review so quickly because I read this book whenever it first came out.

An excellent book. Full of valuable information to understand how all living things interact and strive for survival. I understand your quest and interest on fighting people with antiscientific agendas as purposefully aim to keep manipulating a mass of people that enjoy being manipulated. Eventually they will get extint in an economy that is already relying on science. The structure and precise use of english makes it easier. Thanks

FASCINATING! Dawkins is absolutely brilliant! I was absolutely enthralled from beginning to end. Between the wit and humor, as well as the personal touches, I felt as though I was sitting in a lecture hall listening to one of his lessons.

I think EVERYONE, regardless of belief should read this book. No one, unless incredibly biased or just unable to grasp the concepts put forth, could walk away not believing in evolution (I was 100% sold after the first chapter). And if you want to walk away not believing in it, at least read it so you have the facts against that which you are arguing.

Dawkins does an amazing job explaining everything in lay terms so that anyone could understand the concepts. There are also illustrations and pictures to help explain the more detailed concepts. This is the perfect book for anyone, even if you know nothing about biology and evolution. Not only does he do a great job explaining all of these concepts, he provides examples. Not just one or two, but many!

I will definitely be buying the rest of his books and reading them :)

This is quite simply the finest and easiest to read book I have ever read on the subject. No opinions, no suppositions, just the scientific facts and evidence. It speaks for itself. To read this and still say you don't 'believe' in evolution would show such a lack of intelligence as to render one an imbecile. There is nothing to 'believe' in. Just evidence of the facts which combine to proivide an understanding that without Richard's astute mind and ability to explain may have escaped me forever. I am grateful for his intelligence and ability to explain things such that we can fully understand and appreciate evolution as a fact. Richard calls it 'the fact of evolution'; that is his message and he proves the case beyond scientific question. More than that, I admire Richard's courage to stand up and be counted regarding such things, as he did in his TV series on Darwin. With Richard, science is fun, and his latest book a fantastic journey. What a ride! Brilliant work by a brilliant man. I have continued to quote Richard in my own books as his words are so powerful.

This is a fantastic book. It's a clearly-written explanation for evolution. Richard Dawkins doesn't bore you with excessive information or terminology; everything is easy to absorb. In fact, I found this book enjoyable. I read it front to back, and I can't say that for half the books I read. "Greatest Show on Earth" provides a great education (or re-education) about evolution by natural selection, and because of the author's repeat plugs for "Origin of Species," I'll read that too. I think you'll like this book.

Given the plethora of evolution books published recently, I argue it's imperative to consider this book's worthiness against these other recent publications.

Richard Dawkins' objective with TGSOE is to present his ". . . personal summary of the evidence that the `theory' of evolution is actually a fact - as incontrovertible a fact as any in science." [1st pg. of the Preface]. This appears to make this book an argument for evolution, especially considering the subtitle, "The Evidence for Evolution". This framing also matches exactly to the explicit motivation expressed by evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne in his book, Why Evolution Is True.

Having read both I'd recommend Coyne's book if one is looking for an optimal argument on why Science considers evolution a fact and why there are no remaining hypotheses able to challenge evolution as an explanatory model for the evidence or discredit the findings supportive of evolution. It's much more concise, sticks more closely to peer-accepted findings, is more transparent about hedging on explanations where confidence is not yet overwhelming, and presents its findings in a manner easier to understand to someone not well educated in biology.

However, given that I think even the Coyne book falls short on its argument I also recommend molecular biologist Daniel Fairbanks' Relics of Eden: The Powerful Evidence of Evolution in Human DNA to provide additional evidence contained within all of life's DNA that evolution is both true and convincingly falsifies all prior arguments made by creationists and intelligent design creationists. Coyne makes an arguable assertion on why he didn't include a specific chapter on the evidence in our DNA though he weaves it into other chapters; I think that missing chapter is why Coyne's book is not a masterpiece. I'll post the link to his argument in the comments section of this review.

What I like about TGSOE and why I still recommend purchasing it is Dawkins' skill as a teacher. I quickly left by the wayside that this book was an argument and instead treated it as a tutorial. What I especially liked about Dawkins' book which makes for a poor argument but a great tutorial is his use of analogies and thinking exercises. Dawkins provides examples not merely because they provide devastating arguments for evolution, but instead because they are teachable moments. His reporting on the guppy and the Lenski experiments were as effective as any of Coyne's examples as arguments. However, Dawkins' distinguishes himself in providing examples that allow the stories and principles to resonate well after having read them. He asks questions, and guides us to how the evidence answers those questions. This makes for a lengthier book than Coyne's, but also helps reinforce the topical matter. The numerous photographs in the book also helped reinforce his examples and were an unexpected surprise.

An example of a powerful teaching moment was that Dawkins starts with how hominids acted as an agent to evolve wolves into an astonishingly broad collection of domestic dog breeds in the blink of evolutionary time. At first I thought this was too simplistic; I was wrong. Dawkins' builds on that reportage by then showing how plants and animals' dependent on those plants each act as agents causing the other to evolve. This eases the beginner (which I'm not though I'm also not an expert) into better appreciating how natural selection works. This initial primer on natural selection is not where it ends, instead Dawkins' excels at teaching natural selection from several aspects in a manner that optimizes retention of the principles discovered and the evidence falsifies other proposed mechanisms. Given the fact this makes for a bigger book than Coyne's, Dawkins' book is superior at taking on topics at a more advanced level. Dawkins begins at an even more elementary level than Coyne does, but then uses chapter after chapter to build upon what was learned in the previous chapter to flesh-out our understanding of evolutionary topics, particularly natural selection, how the variation in our DNA provides a map to our ancestral heritage, and how an intelligent designer is a ludicrous notion once we've understand all the evidence collected to date which not only validates evolution but frequently falsifies the idea of a designer - where the score is an uncountable number of observations for Science to zero for design advocates (which is a primary reason they don't publish in relevant peer-reviewed journals).

Where Dawkins' book suffers is related to his own personal musings. As a tutorial these musings are often but not always instructive. Science is significantly about what to research next given we certainly don't know everything. Dawkins' allows us a peek into where the research is heading. In fact, if you enjoy the chapter about evolutionary development, than I highly recommend adding to your knowledge in this area given it too provides overwhelming evidence for evolution while falsifying creationist/IDC notions, the classic is still biologist Sean B. Carroll's Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo. In addition, scientists as creative thinkers are often thought of as contradictory attributes when in fact it's a necessary element of framing your hypotheses or trying to create reasons to explain surprising data discoveries and then go off and attempt to validate these new notions. Science as a process actually yields more creativity than nearly all other thinking disciplines and Dawkins infers such in many of his musings.

One weakness I found is that Dawkins speculates in areas where the science is already being conducted, e.g., group selection, and the math regarding the number of planets where life could exist. So why waste pages speculating with zero data when he could have instead reported where the efforts were to date and extrapolated from there? In addition Mr. Dawkins can be a somewhat sloppy writer if this were treated like an argument rather than a teacher teaching; opening up opportunities for creationists to dishonestly quote-mine him where he is a preferred target of theirs, e.g., "the fact of our own existence is almost too surprising to bear" on pg. 425 and his other extraordinary reflections not shared by many of his peers.

Such rhetoric is sloppy because creationists often disingenuously attribute something one scientist states as personal opinion as that believed by all scientists. In a perfect world such intellectual dishonesty wouldn't occur and we wouldn't have to worry about how a great teacher's occasionally sloppy rhetoric is twisted to argue the opposite of what both the teacher and his discipline's adherents understand. So if you are a creationist looking to test your faith against what Science understands, the Coyne and Fairbanks' books are far sterner tests and provide less opportunities to avoid confronting the evidence that destroys that faith or at least requires modification if one is honest with oneself. If you want to actually learn and optimize the quality of the teaching where you forgive Dr. Dawkins occasionally lapsing into tangential topics, this book will resonate long after you've finished it and serve as a handy reference guide after your initial read.

I gave the book four rather than five stars primarily because I think he needs to use more research assistants to better footnote his book to more of the evidence he's reporting. While I've encountered nearly all his examples prior to my reading his book and know he's accurate in his reporting (with the exception of his possibly extending the findings in the Lenski experiment), books on controversial subjects should go over-board in citations. He also should have provided more examples from other scientists than his own musings, coupled to his musings not adding much, e.g., I found his zeal for computer programs extraneous to a book serving as a general review of the state of evolution. This adds up to the fact he needs a sterner editor. Given his success in selling prior books, it's not a surprise he was given so much latitude - to a fault I think.

If after the purchase of this book you remain excited about the topic and want to learn more, I recommend at least considering (I haven't read it yet but it's in my queue) getting Carl Zimmer's new book, The Tangled Bank: An Introduction to Evolution. Mr. Zimmer is one of our most trusted and respected science writers and is a brilliant communicator of evolution both in his prior books, periodical articles, and his blog. Tangled Bank is a text book focusing strictly on teaching evolution.

Eloquent and instructive, this book speaks to both the layman and the expert when it provides a long list of arguments proving to all with a mind to listen that evolution is beyond dispute in the scientific community.
I would give this book 4.5, as I feel that there are a number of other arguments Dawkins could use to make the book even more effective, but I am sure he has his reasons for keeping them out, and this book was simply too good to give a mere four stars to.
Unlike many scientifically minded books, this does not read like a lecture or a dry recitation of facts, but instead feels like Dawkins is right there in front of you, animately talking to you and taking you through the evidence with his unparalleled enthusiasm and passion for the natural world.

Dawkins accomplishes just what he set out to do with this book: to provide a clear, logical, and eloquent explanation of why scientists consider evolution to be a fact. He patiently deconstructs evolutionary theory piece by piece, explaining why each component is logical, sound, scientific, and supported by an enormous array of facts, with no dissenting facts. He gives a solid overview of every relevant area of science, covering how we know what we know about natural selection, genetics, mutation, the fossil record, the age of the earth, etc., and how each area of understanding reinforces the others (as in the rest of science). Along the way, he corrects common misconceptions about the theory of evolution, and demonstrates the gaping factual inaccuracies and logical flaws (which are many) in popular Creationist and "Intelligent Design" beliefs.

Given Dawkins' identity as an outspoken atheist, I doubt this book will reach too many people in the religiously-motivated evolution denial crowd, i.e. those whose viewpoint Dawkins puts in his gunsights, but for the part of the world that accepts Charles Darwin's ideas, The Greatest Show on Earth is an enjoyable tour of what we know, how we got there, and what it means. It covered a lot of concepts I was a bit fuzzy on, and gave me a new appreciation for the logic, simplicity, and elegance of evolutionary theory. When Dawkins claimed (early in the book) that the fossil record wasn't even necessary to demonstrate evolution's reality, my eyebrows rose, but he later went on to back that up with a convincing explanation as to why (short version: all the evidence we need is found in studying the diversity of modern life forms). The book goes into depth on a number of subjects, such as how evolution has been tested in a laboratory and how unrelated animals can converge on similar traits, which were interesting in their own right. As a software engineer, I also found the section on embryology particularly fascinating. I'd never been very certain of how we get from genes to actual physical traits in a developing organism, or how such a process might be subject to natural selection in a way whose feasibility of producing more complex life forms would seem logically and mathematically plausible. Now, I get it.

Is this a rigorous scientific textbook on evolution? No, Dawkins doesn't get into great depth on any one area of study -- anyone looking for more than a solid overview will have to go elsewhere. Rather, this is a book aimed at the reasonably well-educated layperson, whose last exposure to evolutionary science may have been high school biology class, and who would like a grown-up refresher on its framework of understanding. His arguments, I think will be sufficiently convincing for thoughtful readers who accept evolution intuitively, but feel ill-equipped to defend it, or those who aren't actively hostile towards the idea, but have a few doubts (perhaps instilled by the ID movement). Hard-core deniers, on the other hand, will probably still sniff out the inconsistencies in fragments of Dawkins' logic or his poor choice of words on a certain page, and take the minor flaws in the author's presentation as proof that his entire body of thought is a massive lie. So it goes.

As for me, my only real complaint about the book (speaking as an agnostic) is that Dawkins has a tough time restraining his contempt towards religion, and some of his counterattacks against Creationism stray a little too far into theological territory. For example, he assumes that an intelligent designer, if one existed, would make animals without useless vestigial parts, which is a sophomoric assertion. After all, many religious people believe in a God whose motivations for doing/allowing things are unknowable to us (as might be expected in an all-transcendent being). In fact, many such individuals probably aren't that close-minded towards evolution, though they might be struggling to reconcile scientific knowledge with their own beliefs. Thus, such smugness doesn't help win the hearts and minds of the uncertain.

Still, this is a very informative, well-argued, and substantial work, and I'd put it near the top of the list of good books on evolution for the curious and thoughtful layperson.

Famous evolutionary biologist and popular science writer Richard Dawkins FRS, FRSL has written this book as the crown upon his work. It finishes his work as Charles Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University, a position he is now retiring from. All of Dawkins' books are known for their accessible style and engaging tone while at the same time maintaining a remarkably high level of scientific detail and precision, which is a feat not to be underestimated.

This book, "The Greatest Show on Earth", is no exception to that rule. In it, Dawkins sets out to show the scientific evidence for evolution by means of natural selection, in as thorough and engaging a manner as possible. This might seem redundant based on his earlier works, but as he points out, this is not actually the case. In his prior publications, he had pointed to the effects of evolution on other modes of thought, the processes by which it works, and philosophized on its implications. He had however not yet made the case for evolution as such, and he does so now, convincingly and with vigor. Setting out the case, he goes into all the necessary detail about domestication, artificial selection, geological evidence, radiation clocks, DNA and RNA, the tree of life, isolation and speciation, nonadaptive evolution and so forth. Much of this is handled in perhaps more detail than the average person, even if of open mind and good will, can be expected to process in a short time. Nonetheless, the overall effect is clear and unmistakable: evolution by means of natural selection is one of the best proven and documented theories in natural science, and even the pedantic wrangling about the exact meaning of 'theory' and its analogy in gravity etc. is dealt with by Dawkins.

As usual with Dawkins' books, the content is unimpeachable - scientific, precise, sufficiently well written, intuitive and accessible. It must be noted that over time his publications show increasing traces of pedantry and Oxford donnishness: he occasionally adds footnotes when he uses 'unusual' words to pre-emptively alert the reader to their meaning, and he bloviates about uninteresting and unrelated topics such as his preference for 'Peking' over 'Beijing'. But this does not seriously obstruct the reading of the book, and on the other side of the coin, this book has been lavishly illustrated with beautiful color pictures enabling one to engage with the beauty of scientific biology even better. Equally as always with Dawkins, one does wonder what sort of person is likely to be wholly against evolution being true, yet at the same time open-minded, intellectually honest and intelligent enough buy the book and follow to the end the often fairly complicated scientific results and statistical reasonings.

Notwithstanding that problem, something Dawkins can't do anything about anyway, it is excellent that there be some clear and readable books for the intelligent layman that show once and for all how and why evolution by means of natural selection is simply as true as the fact of the earth revolving around the sun. "The Greatest Show on Earth" was written to do this, and it fulfills that purpose admirably.

Richard Dawkins asks creationists, why are there no flatworm fossils? None at all if creationism is true. He asks, would they state that flatworms just popped up into existence today? No, of course they know that flatworms have existed (at least to them) for at least thousands of years. His point of this question, is that some species we know have existed for more then a day or a week don't make good fossils (such as flatworms) and so we don't have any or few fossils of them. That is why before the Cambrian era we see less fossils because the species that were alive then, because they were harder to fossilize then more modern animals. At most there are a few traces in the earth that suggest a flatworm.

Dr. Dawkins mentions also that between any species such as homo erectus and homo sapien there is a flow of evolutionary rate. An anaology is that when is a man old and not middle age? Does he wake up one day old and last night was middle age? No, of course not, it is a contimum where you get older and older until the point is that you can't identify as middle age anymore. One day is too arbitary to make such a designation and there is virtually no change physically in age from one day to another. The same thing with species, there is evolution even within a species. Homo erectus evolved to a different gene pool over tens of thousands of years even while still homo erectus. We are evolving right now, in terms that the collective human genome pool is changing. It is just at a rate that isn't much noticeable to our eyes. So in reality, every species is a transitional form because no species is static in its' collective DNA.

Dr. Dawkins explains radioactive dating and how radioactive dates are set such as when a crystal forms, by measuring its' half life. For example one can measure the ratio of potassium-40 vs. argon-40 and find the age of granite or basalt by the fact that it takes 1.26 billion years for 1/2 of potassium-40 to change into argon-40. Then another 1.26 billion years to change the remaining half of potassium-40 into argon-40. So on and so on onto no remaining potassium-40 is left. When the crystal formed there was no argon-40 so it is a very accurate clock.

Dr. Dawkins also explains how the continents have moved and how the fact that this has dramatically effected the species that exist and where they exist, around the world today. For example, only in Madagascar are lemur primates native. Now, if evolution isn't true why would they only be found there? If they got off a big boat 5000 years ago, called Noah's Ark, wouldn't they be random througout the world? Did he tell them to all go to this island off the coast of Africa? How did they get to that island anyway? Africa would still be seperate from Madagascar even after the supposed flood. Did they build a raft? Did the kangaroos of Australia build a raft to Australia and go nowhere else? The fact that continents and big islands like Madagascar have moved show that species become seperate when these movements occur and that they lead to a group isolated from closely related species evolving. An analogy would be English settlers coming to America and the evolution of the American type accents from the British over the course of a few centuries. After isolation or relative isolation then accents and so species evolve or change to some degree from they come from.

Dr. Dawkins writes about how if you take a rubber sheet and draw a chimpanzee skull or a baboon skull on it that it can be stretched or retracted to show a modern human skull. Or, take a human skull and make a chimpanzee skull. Or take a lobster and make a much different species of lobster. The point is, that the physical features of different species are only a matter of degree. One species might have a bigger forehead, or wider nose and that those differences built up over time and change in DNA between the species lead to our physical differences. Dr. Dawkins also asks why are there no feather on any non-birds? Why would a deity or designer limit himself in that way? Or, why don't any reptiles produce milk like mammals? Why would a deity limit himself in such a way? The answer of course is that only mammals produce milk is because mammals have a common mammalian ancestor that developed the ability to give milk to its' young. The reason only birds have feathers is that there was a common bird ancestor that had feathers. Both these features increased the odds of survival for individuals that had these traits, or natural selection in action.

Dawkins asks why does the laryngeal nerve in a giraffe does not go straight to the larynx but make a weird circular route around the heart of the giraffe. In fact, it is not just giraffes that this happens but in all mammals. Why would a deity create such an inefficent design? The reason of course, is that just like many of the "unintelligently designed" physical features of not only humans but other animals, they were a product of non-planned traits that have evolved.

Dr. Dawkins covers the 2nd law of thermodynamics (he is a jack of all sciences and just not biology) which to sum it up in layman's terms states that an external energy source is needed or organization breaks down. For example without an energy source life couldn't develop. Creationists say this creates the need of a deity. The problem with this, is that it seems they have never noticed that big round yellow ball in the sky that we call the sun. The earth isn't a closed system because we have the external energy source of the sun which supplies energy for plants to grow which animals then eat.

Lastly, if evolution isn't true then why are there no homo erectus found with dinosaur bones? Why no 500 million year old amphibilians found with mammoths? The reason is because the fossil record is laid down when those species existed so it is expected they won't be random.

I don't expect this book to convince hard core creationists. A deity himself coming down and telling them evolution isn't true wouldn't convince them, but I believe for those on the fence or not sure of evolution it will convince them that yes, evolution is true and it isn't the work of "evil atheist" scientists.

Why is the Biblical myth of creation (or its Qur'anic counterpart) so flawed? You can easily see that it's incomplete, and it doesn't make sense at all. As atheists, some of us may attribute that to human errors, since they were written by humans. Yet, that's not an adequate explanation. Other myths were created by humans, but they had a narrative consistency within the storyline. It's inconceivable that these societies, which were highly cultured and intelligent by every measure, couldn't have come up with a better narrative. So, what went wrong?

There is ample historical and linguistic evidence to answer these questions. When I say, "answer," I do not mean to justify or validate these religions. To the contrary, I think we can make the case for atheism. But that's not the point. The point is to explain why Satan is virtually just another deity. Even his name, Satan, is fashioned in the typical Semitic manner used to describe deities. Much more is discussed in the book God's Untold Story, which covers not just how monotheism remains largely polytheistic, but also sheds light on the many great gaps in the Biblical and Qur'anic narrative. It is a must-read for every Atheist and Theist alike.

Cheers.

As someone who delights in Richard Dawkins' explorations of biology, I'm often also frustrated by his virulent attacks on creationists (and the religious in general). Of course, I can understand how his antipathy developed after years of battling intolerance, but bitter sarcasm does not make for good PR. Due to his often aggressive attitude, Dawkins ends up souring the image of atheists and scientists in the view of the general public, instead of getting them to understand, and get excited about, the science that so captivates him.

"The Greatest Show On Earth" is probably the closest thing the world is going to get to a Dawkins book that simply basks in the wonders of the natural world, without too much interference from his characteristic vitriol. TOO MUCH being an important qualifier here, for the book is still peppered with some digs at individuals ignorant of the science that supports evolutionary theory. And this is the main reason for which I left off a star. This could have been THE book for honestly undereducated individuals (those willfully counter-educated are another matter) to learn about the way our world works, and have a lot of fun doing it. That is, if it weren't for Dawkins' recurrent referral to this same demographic as "history deniers."

Again, I understand his frustration with well-funded, politically muscular groups that actively combat biological science, but his crude generalization of even innocently ignorant individuals as "history deniers" is a constant insult to a crowd that surely could benefit from the book. Talk about a wasted opportunity.

That said, the book is endlessly informative and entertaining, and shows off Dawkins' characteristically geeky sense of humor more often than his more infamous acerbic side. I also recommend the audiobook version for the author's (and his wife, Lalla Ward's) charming delivery of the text.

Highly recommended; just try to ignore those pesky bits of sarcasm he just can't seem to get rid of!

I got interested in evolution because of my study of 19th century British intellectual history, which led me to Charles Darwin and the ramifications of his "Origin." Although my focus is the 19th century, I am always on the lookout for good books on evolutionary theory (and have reviewed several on the store), written for the non-scientist, and this is a very good and useful one. The author has engaged extensively in the "intelligent design" wars, but one thing I liked about this book is its more positive tone: what is the evidence for evolution? Not to say that Dawkins does not, from time to time, point out a fallacy in ID arguments, but that is not the primary goal of the book. In one 450 page treatment, the author covers about every conceivable point relating to evolution. Another bonus of the book is that Dawkins writes very well for the layman when discussing scientific terms, approaches, and studies. There was only one chapter (that dealing with how the human body develops from single cells) where I got a bit lost in his discussion.

Darwins develops his evidence for evolution in an interesting fashion. First he talks about what a scientific "theory" is, since this is a frequent point of contention with those who dispute evolution. Next, he focuses on dogs and cows, and other domestic animals, to argue that the multiplicity of canine breeds (all derived from the wolf) demonstrates how man has employed evolution--the so-called "artificial evolution." Natural evolution takes place without human intervention, in nature, and is not controlled by anyone or anything. An interesting chapter is devoted to methods of dating rocks and embedded fossils. Moreover, the author contends there are such things as "living fossils (e.g., guppies).

Dawkins rejects any suggestions that the fossil record is incomplete. In fact, he says we don't even need fossils to verify evolution; in any regard, more are being discoved all the time. Nor is there a human "missing" link, as he discusses the extensive human fossil record--quite a thorough but compact discussion with superb illustrations. The importance of tectonic plates and isolation is the subject of another chapter. Two later chapters I found particularly interesting: one on the vestiges of prior evolutionary stages left in animal and human bodies; the second on what Dawkins refers to as the "arms race"--how animals are in competition to survive and develop biologic weapons as part of the "survival of the fittest." The book includes extensive illustrations, including 32 pages of helpful full color illustrations: 6 pages of notes; and a 7-page bibliography (some of which sources are discussed in the text). An extremely helpful discussion of the topic by one of the best informed scientific students of evolution.

This is the first book I have read by Richard Dawkins, and I found it to be very interesting. I certainly plan on reading more of his books in the future. In this book Dawkins attempts to present the reader with evidence that supports evolution. I think he did an admirable job at this. There are many things to recommend this book.

In chapter four, Dawkins discusses the various dating methods such as Carbon-14, Potassium-40, and Dendrochronology. He continues with a discussion of how the sedimentary record and isotopes support the reputed age of the earth.

In chapter five, he delves into how evolution has actually taken place before our very eyes. Here he discusses such topics as the Lizards of Pod Mrcaru, elephants in Uganda, an interesting E-coli experiment and a guppy experiment.

In a subsequent chapter, Dawkins explains the development of life from embryo to adult elaborating on such things such as Epigenesis, chemo-affinity, enzyme and protein formation, asymmetric cell division, and local rules.

I found the chapter on how DNA and the molecular clock can be used to ascertain the closeness of species to be quite interesting.

Overall, I believe that one can learn much about the evolutionary processes that are described in this book. Of course, if you want a better view of the whole picture, you need to read many books on the subject. No one book will give you everything you need to know on the subject.

"The Greatest Show on Earth" (the only game in town) is in my opinion Dawkins' weakest, or should I say least fascinating, book. That should not really be considered a slur, because his other books are so exquisitely outstanding. This one still is outstanding, but suffers a bit from being clearly written for a larger public.

He undertook the writing of this book -according to his own words-, because he's been talking a lot about evolution, but never presented the evidence. I'd like to disagree there, I think he's done a splendid job giving evidence in his earlier books (from"The Selfish Gene' and "The Extended Phenotype" to "Climbing Mount Improbable", "River Out of Eden" or "The Ancestor's Tale"). It comes shortly after Jerry Coyne's "Why Evolution is True", but it does offer some different angles, although there is -inescapably- some overlap (Dawkins does acknowledge Coyne's book).

He starts with a justified diatribe against the "only a theory' as opposed to 'fact' argument and proposes the awkward term 'Theorum'. Really not necessary, as Ken Miller (a prominent destroyer of Intelligent Design) pointed out beautifully in the Dover trial. A scientific theory is much stronger than a fact: the latter can easily be replaced by a better observation, a scientific theory is based on a more solid basis. To be fair, Dawkins does allude to the frailty of 'facts'. He was always good at coining terms and memes (the word 'meme' itself, for example, so much better than 'culturgen'), but 'theorum' really is off the mark IMMO.

In presenting evidence Dawkins follows Darwin: starts with Artificial (human) Selection and segues quite masterly to Natural Selection, very convincing.
It is followed by a chapters on the evidence for Deep Time, evolution in action ("before our very eyes"), not missing 'missing links' in the fossil record, and an extra chapter about no longer missing links in our own human lineage.
A chapter about embryology, one a out plate tectonics and biogeography, one comparative anatomy which includes messy, unintelligent design, and one genetics and its implications. He ends with a chapter on arms races and a finale on Darwin's last chapter of the "Origin ...",
He also makes clear, time and again, that each of these independent lines of evidence on their own would suffice to prove evolution.
Comprehensive and systematic, covers the subject in quite some detail. Criticisms of a hodge-podge are really neither here nor there.

It is, moreover, beautifully illustrated.

Some negatives:

For those not very conversant with evolutionary theory, the public it is apparently aimed at, this book is an absolute must read. For those well versed in evolutionary theory there is not very much new, although I'm certain he describes some details and experiments we were not aware of, and does it, as usual, in style.

Dawkins, a Master of explaining complex things simply in a page or two, resorts to uncharacteristic cop-outs in this book. " a 'viscous damping coefficient' and an 'elastic spring constant'. Never mind exactly what they mean: they are the kinds of things physicists like to measure in a spring." Uncharacteristic and condescending, methinks. And there are a few (luckily only a few) passages like that. Why not an endnote?

In the chapter on plate tectonics he mentions Alfred Wegener, but fails to mention the one who did more than anybody to prove the theory (from the 30's until the 60's -when the Atlantic Ocean floor was dated-, that is), by recording the stratigraphy of South America and Africa in great detail: Alexander Logie du Toit. As a South African resident I feel this omission possibly as worse than it possibly is, but still.

Another small detail, he names the Galapagos Islands by their former English names (because they sound so nicely 'Naval'), but misses the occasion to link them to their modern names, confusing the 'general reader' at whom, after all, this book is aimed. Admittedly a small detail, buy it gives the kind of 'chauvinistic' impression that should be absent.

All in all an excellent account of the evidence for evolution, but don't expect the complex intricacies of an 'Extended Phenotype' (possibly Dawk's finest work).
I thought of giving only four stars, but keeping the larger audience aimed at in mind -it would be unfair to use other criteria-, five.

Unfortunately Richard Dawkins preceded this book with the book, The God Delusion. He realized that the earlier book angered even some of his supporters and hardened hearts against him more than it helped to bridge the gap between the religious and adherents to science.

This book comes from his passion for evolution and his determination to answer those with questions about the "theory" of Evolution, and more particularly the fake theory of Intelligent Design. The failure of Intelligent Design is a matter of proven fact. Decided in a Dover Delaware case, before a conservative judge who saw, first hand how creationist texts were re written by cut and paste to be born again as the theory of Intelligent Design. Sic Transit Intelligent Design.

It is unlikely that the true believers will read this book. At that level it is a failure in concept for Dawkins. For those who do read it, it is a valuable resource against those who think they have the facts to defeat evolution. The facts as Dawkins consistently documents, support the fact of evolution.

To be technically correct; there is The Fact of Evolution and the Theory of Evolution.

The fact of evolution can be established following the simple logic of Darwin's original arguments:
1. All life forms reproduce at a rate greater than needed to duplicate the parent/s (cell division as well as sexual reproduction).
2. Absent some limits on the number of off spring who survive, that life form will exceed the space and resources on the planet.
3. Competition for limited resources means that those individuals who are less able to compete will die either without offspring or with relatively few.
4 Those individuals who survive will have or have more offspring and therefore their individual qualities will be more likely to carry forward into future generations.

As we extend this logic sequence forward, we can expect to see variations in any given life form and that life forms will over time vary from the original. All of this takes huge amounts of time.

At this level Evolution has been tested more than any known theory and passes these tests. Evolution is predictive and in fact all of us have come into contact with it in any of several forms. Example animal breeds, the need for this year's flu vaccine to fight this year's flue and DNA evidence.

Change in life forms over time is a fact. That the Earth has been around for millions of years is a separately established fact and is not herein discussed any further.

Some of the more negative reviews of this book have been based on specific questions in the Theory of Evolution. That is what exactly are the mechanics of, the speed of and the sizes of changes allowed given the amount of information we know about topics like genetics. This debate is not possible unless you accept that life forms change over time.

By analogy there is the Fact of gravity and the theory of gravity. There is the fact of light and the theory of light. Across the world of physics there are major disagreements over what is a wave and what is a particle?

We all demand that our cars and aircraft be build to the highest standards of science. Airplanes fly because of the facts of physics, not the debates within the field of physics.

Enough about evolution. What about the book?

In 12 chapters Dawkins lays out virtually every question and argument that is supposed to disprove the fact of evolution. In clear, lucid and frequently passionate prose he lays out concrete examples and the attendant logic to support the case for the fact of evolution.
This is not a book seeking to balance arguments. Dawkins holds to his evidence and gives no standing to those who fail to understand.

Dawkins is clearly passionate about the beauty of a science driven world. His wonderment at the eloquence of creation is forefront. That the world should have laws and that these laws are decipherable is motivational to Dawkins. He wants you to see that science does not reduce the wonder of existence; it proves the wonder of existence.

For myself I suggest the following.
The word/concept/definition/ of God is a matter of belief. Belief is what you have that that requires no proof.
Whatever our role as humans may be, we are confronted by challenges and questions.
Our efforts in the form of work, learning and thinking, can bring us to whatever limits there may be on human ability to answer all these challenges/questions. Whatever we cannot know, and by this I mean beyond human abilities now and in the future is the boundary between human existence and Devine existence. Failure to strive towards that boundary is a failure to meet divinely proposed challenges.

There is no reason to assume that science is a refutation of religion. Science is a human tool for understanding life in this world and to answer the challenges of living in it.

I would like to think that everyone who would question the fact of evolution will read this book. Likely most will not. It is therefore an easy to read enlightening casebook resource for those who are either unsure or who need facts to face down those who would limit human achievement

Who was Richard Dawkins' target audience for this book? Who did he imagine would be reading it? I was already an atheist, so I didn't need convincing. I read the book hoping to learn all kinds of amazing new discoveries about evolution and the natural world. I did learn some things about genetics; there have been a lot of discoveries since I went to school. Still, I would have imagined that there was a lot more fascinating DNA-news than I got from this book.

Then there's another kind of person, the one who doesn't know anything about biology but is not a creationist, either. The biology in this book was too deep and too intense for that kind of reader.

There's yet another kind of person, the one who believes in God and wonders about evolution--but this book of Dawkins' will definitely alienate that person, because Dawkins liberally sprinkles nasty sarcasm and name-calling throughout the book, as if every person "of faith" is a representative of his mortal enemies, the dyed-in-the-wool, Taliban-like "Creationist." I was actually left with the impression that Dawkins wrote the book while imagining lobbing spears and grenades at those extremist Creationists--which I suppose means they were his target audience.

Didn't Dawkins ever hear the saying, "You can catch more flies with honey"? I read the whole thing but I sure could have done without the bitterness it spewed. It's a real shame. We need a biologist/writer who can explain evolution in an amazing way without alienating the very people who might buy this book, looking for answers.

Another fascinating and thoroughly convincing book from the pen of one of our generation's most eloquent, inspiring, rigorous, dedicated, and prolific defenders of rational thought. Might one take issue with specific points Dawkins makes, or conjectures he sets forth? Sure, that's what scientists -- and any committed rationalists -- should do, when issue taking is warranted and alternative, more convincing, hypotheses suggest themselves. Dawkins would undoubtedly be the first to welcome serious scrutiny of his thinking. Might one take issue with the whole, i.e., with all of Darwinian theory? It goes without saying that one might, and (sadly, pathetically) many do. But the challenge to creationists, anti-evolutionists, and design theorists is to provide a convincing alternative to that theory, and to explain how the overwhelming evidence for it -- yet to be contradicted by a single piece of counter-evidence -- could point to a different conclusion than the one modern science has reached. Of course, they can't. That is not to say that Darwinian theory is insuperable, only that no theory yet devised has superseded it. Why? Because the evidence overwhelmingly supports it. Why do anti-Darwinians insist otherwise? Because anti-Darwinians -- for the most part -- are not scientists in honest (and rigorous) pursuit of truths about nature. If evolutionists are ideologues (and I'm not saying they are), they are ideologues with a toolkit (scientific inquiry) that anyone can -- and is encouraged to -- employ, and with an ever-mounting wealth of data to support their claims. If anti-evolutionists are ideologues (and I'm saying that for the the most part that's all they are), they are ideologues with a bullhorn only, whose shrill discourse masks their total impoverishment of ideas and what any thinking person should clearly see is their lack of evidence to support them. Once again, Dawkins does a masterful job of throwing down the gauntlet, not as ideologue (though he can be acerbic at times; who can blame him?) but rather as scientist. Let's see his detractors match him idea for idea, evidence for evidence. Anyone? Not likely...

With laser precision Dawkins examines evidential fact after fact and steadily destroys any counter theories to evolution whilst also deftly presenting the reasons evolution is rationally indesputable.

What is nice about this book is that it is still readable despite being quite rich in detail.

Dawkins approaches his subject like a lawyer, tackling each argument one at a time, shirking none, presenting multiple sides of the arguments and lays out the evidence in a way that simply is breathtaking.

If you are a creationist simply do not bother to read it. It will either destroy your faith, or you won't have understood it.

This is such a thorough analysis, with both depth and breadth, even people with strong scientific backgrounds will find new stuff in it.

One word of warning - it does require thinking about an so isn't a light book, although it is quite readable, so you probably should read it in chunks without distractions.

Evolution is a fact, is what Richard Dawkins tells us again and again in the first chapter of the book. At times it could feel like brainwashing if it wasn't for the arguments and the facts that go along with it. "The Greatest Show on Earth" presents evolution from different perspectives following a similar approach to Stephen J. Gould's collections of essays, but (naturally) puts the pieces together more coherently in the end. It is almost a shame that there are endless excursions into quasi-arguments from creationists when evidence upon evidence for evolution is presented. (Sadly it seems necessary to reply to all sorts of allegations and attacks on scientific results again and again - we can call it a learning process.)

The book starts with an excellent summary of the definition of a scientific theory versus the use of that same word in common speech - a delicate difference which creationists seem to ignore and mix on purpose. A scientific theory is the most fundamental formulation with which we can describe our world. It is either true or it is wrong and contrary to a model it should be generally applicable. The rest of the book is devoted to the general applicability of evolution to the heap of evidence we have collected. Regardless of any missing links (which we obviously can never completely fill) evolution is consistent with every single fossil that has been collected and any living species that we know about, quite opposite to internal contradictions of other "hypotheses." This is maybe most impressive when it comes to independent evidence for plate tectonics and geologic timescales.

Richard Dawkins reads the audiobook himself (together with Lalla Ward) and his professorial voice makes it all the more believable. There are several references to illustrations, photos, and figures in the text which are attached as a pdf-file to the audiobook. It is usually good enough to look at a handful of pictures beforehand if you can't look them up at the time they are discussed - they are described in detail in the text, too, where necessary.

People who are interested in the topic will enjoy this book without a doubt. It should be recommended to everyone else even more - not so much for the purpose of convincing them but to spark a certain amount of curiosity and thinking about the world around them.

While I think that Dawkins has done a good job in this book of laying out the case for evolution, I was not completely satisfied when I reached the end. A lot of the information is really just introductory. He seems to selectively decide when he should get into more or less detail based purely on his own intuition, which sometimes makes for a frustrating circumstance where he spends too much time explaining something already familiar, and not enough explaining something really complex. Also, the frequent tosses to his other books were quite annoying. He could have spent some time explaining those concepts on their own. I'm a college student, and I don't have much time to go reading through Ancestor's Tale or Blind Watchmaker looking for information that should have been included in the Greatest Show on Earth.

At the end of the day, though, in spite of its minor flaws, it is a great book. It is a must read for anyone who doubts evolution. There is so much evidence, from the fossil record to biogeography to genetics, that evolution really is, as Dawkins likes to say, "the only game in town." It is pathetic that in 2009, there exists a need for such a book.

Richard Dawkins has written a number of books, and most of those have been on the subject of evolution and its irrefutable reality. So with the release of The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution, readers - whether they are fans of Dawkins or not - may think: "What? Another book on evolution? Haven't you said everything you've needed to say?" But The Greatest Show on Earth is different; unlike most of Dawkins books that seek to teach and educate. In this book, there is less of Dawkins revealing the absurdity of creationists and other fundamental religious groups seeking to cry out again the "theory" of evolution with the "truth" that the Earth is only four thousand years old (though there is certainly some, just less), Dawkins lets the facts and reality of nature, life, and the evidence speak for itself.

The book doesn't employ a chronological, evolutionary history of life on the planet, but seeks more to reveal the linkages and combinations and symbiotic relationships in nature that are just there for us to see if we take the time to look and study them in detail. Bursting with charts, illustrations, and photos, Dawkins just shows us the facts and lets the reader understand and accept, providing illustration and discussion where necessary to thoroughly convince. Dawkins even makes the effort to link many of the chapters to personal stories and experiences in his life.

The Greatest Show on Earth is a book in which Dawkins puts less of himself into, as compared to his other books, but at the same time feels more of a personal work for him. It is the triumph of nature and life in revealing its incredible complexity, development, and evolution over the billions of years that can only astound and awe readers; which is why having Dawkins along for the ride helps make the journey that much easier and more meaningful.

Originally written on February 9th 2010 ©Alex C. Telander.

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In this Year of Darwin, it's not surprising to see a new book from one of the leading proponents of Evolution. Dawkins has covered the topic from many angles in the past, this time, however, he's poking his fingers in the eyes of Creationists/"Intelligent Designers" (or, as he prefers to call them, "History deniers"). Dawkins begins by stating the dictionary definitions of the word "theory", a common entry point on Creationist dogma. The first definition of the term is, to paraphrase, "an explanation that describes a set of facts." This, he maintains, is what the Theory of Evolution is; a model which describes a set of facts. The "History deniers," however, insist on pointing to another definition of the term -- again to paraphrase, "a conjecture that describes a set of observations that have not been tested." By the end of the book, there is no doubt whatsoever that the first definition is the correct one when describing evolution.

Dawkins also purports to give readers ammunition they can use when going up against Creationist/Intelligent Designer pinheads. His examples superbly describe the evidence for evolution beyond any shadow of a doubt -- however, the examples are not of the sort that simpletons will readily understand or concede. He does debase another tiresome argument that the "fossil record is incomplete" and "riddled with missing links;" Dawkins goes on to explain how we can prove evolution without using a single fossil, and besides, we have plenty of "missing links," the deniers just keep saying that as if constant repetition will make the evidence go away. Some of the hard, indisputable evidence comes from experiments in microbiology -- which is where the ammunition gets a little sophisticated for use in your average bar fight.

The conclusion of the book in inescapable -- the Theory of Evolution is not dogma, to be taught alongside alternate opinions -- it is fact and needs to be taught as such. One of the staggering statistics he repeated often is that 44% of Americans actually believe the earth is less than 10,000 years old and that humans coexisted with dinosaurs. While there is some good stuff here to throw at them, most will just yell "la la la" when you try to make them less ignorant.

Review of The Greatest Show on Earth by Richard Dawkins
(Free Press, New York, 2009, 470 pp)
I am not a scientist, though I did my Masters on “Physics and Theology.” Nonetheless, I venture a review of this scientific book, primarily because Mr. Dawkins wrote the book to provide a resource for people “who are not history-deniers but who know some – perhaps of their own family or church – and find themselves inadequately prepared to argue the case.” (p. 8) In the words of Jerry Coyne in his back-cover review, the book provides “the multifarious and massive evidence for evolution – evidence that gives the lie to the notion that evolution is ‘only a theory.’”
Early in the book, Dawkins addresses the common critique that evolution is “only a theory.” He points out the confusion between common use of the term “theory” and the scientific use. The common use is for “a mere hypothesis, speculation, conjecture.” The scientific use is of “an explanation… of a group of facts… a hypothesis that has been confirmed.” (p. 9) The rest of the book is to document how evolution is not a mere hypothesis but a hypothesis that has been confirmed by facts.
Also in the first chapter, Mr. Dawkins celebrates that many of the highest leaders of the church, including the Bishop of Canterbury and the Pope, have “no problem with evolution.” (p. 6) Rather, his major concern and astonishment is about the “more than 40 per cent of Americans (who) deny that humans evolved from other animals …. and were created by God within the last 10,000 years.” (p. 7) He also rues that almost the same level of opposition exists in England (p. 106), though at the end of the book he provides a 2005 survey by Eurobarometer. It records that the denial that humans “developed from earlier species” was only in the 20th percentile in the vast majority of Western nations. Only the Muslim country of Turkey was closer to the USA, at 51%. (p. 433) In the case of both Turkey and the USA, he attributes this view to the strong hold of fundamentalist religious beliefs.
Throughout the book, there is a tone of sadness and incredulity that people could hold these positions. He finds it “depressing” (p. 202) that people will so desperately hold onto positions that have no evidence to back them and so much evidence that is contrary. In a television interview with a lawyer Wendy Wright in 2008, he urges time and again “if only you would open your eyes and look at the evidence…. Go to any museum.” (pp. 198-99) However, his anger arises when such people “lamentably” try to mandate those fundamentalist religious views in the public forum, especially in public schools. (p. 106, pp. 269-70)
Dawkins provides an interesting combination of homely metaphors for the scientific neophytes (like myself) to explain scientific theories and evidence along with extensive detail for those of scientific backgrounds. Some of the Creationist critiques that he addresses are:
• The Flood creating the fossil record - by using radioactive dating (pp. 100-01)
• The Intelligent Design assertion of “irreducible complexity” - by experiments with bacteria that produced metabolic adaptations of seemingly irreducible complexity via random mutations and artificial (i.e. experimenter-imposed) selection (pp. 130-01, cf. pp. 356-71 (pp. 130-01, cf. pp. 356-71)
• The gaps in the fossil record – by demonstrating how across the sciences evolution would be the accepted theory across even if there were no fossil record because of overwhelming other evidence (p. 283) and that no fossil has ever been found in a stratum (before it could have evolved.” (p. 147)
• The lack of missing links in the fossil record - by documenting fossil records of transitionary animals from sea to land and even back again. (pp. 153-61, 342)
• Evolution as violation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics (a thought I had held till now) – by including the energy from the sun that would overcome the law of entropy. (p. 415)
• Inability to explain how whole process started – by acknowledging this mystery while providing the new theory of RNA as the “self-assembling” dynamic until proteins evolved to propel the process forward through natural selection. (p. 421)
Mr. Dawkins also addresses the Christian angst over a good, reliable God involved in the chaos and violence of the natural selection process. He asserts that evolution really has no issue of theodicy. It is simply a process of “self-advancement,” not at all concerned about others’ suffering (pp. 288-92), no “waste… only survival” (p. 384)
However, for Christian theology theodicy is a major issue, seriously affecting the credibility of our message. Strikingly, it is not an issue for any other religion, as Hindus will simply attribute suffering to karma, Muslims to the will of God, animists to bad spirits, and Buddhists to a practical path to overcome it. Dawkins actually suggests a way for Christians to address the conundrum. He suggests that we avoid asserting that God made everything, and instead propose that God provided “an embryological recipe, or something like a computer program,” which would be just as “breathtaking” as direct creation. (p. 213)
I recall having lunch with a faculty colleague who was advocating for us to accept evolution as the process of creation. I responded that such a change would be very complicated and intense, as so many underpinnings of our message have assumed an ordered creation by divine fiat. When that assumption is rejected (as it is by half of Americans and increasingly by young people), much has to be reworked.
Most churches have a commission of theologians and scientists (paleontologists, biologists, geologists, geneticists) working together on pressing issues of science and technology. Our views will have no weight among the general public if reputable scientists are not participants. There are many reputable scientists who hold that God is the almighty Creator of all. We should invite them to participate in this conversation. Theologian scientists like Polkinghorn, Pannenberg, Rahner, and Lamoureaux are ideal for the task. We need to reflect on their proposals. It is certainly true that we cannot afford to be viewed as “history deniers” who advocate beliefs that have no grounding in facts.

Herb Hoefer
January 2014

Dawkins makes no mistakes regarding his excellent description for the clear evidence of evolutionary processes. His 'flaw' is in treating 'History Deniers' like the ENEMY, as opposed to misguided people who need our help. Anyone starting this book as a creationist will leave feeling that Richard thinks they are total idiots. Creating this sort of antipathy makes people unwilling to listen to you, even if you're right. There is no point in being 'right' if the people you are trying to convince hate you, and won't listen to you. Being a person that already knows evolution is true, I enjoyed the various descriptions of evolutionary processes a great deal; in that department...WELL DONE. I will use some of the material to try and convince my Jehovah's Witness friend of the error of his ways. Sadly, I won't be able to lend him the book on CD, because Richard's caustic attitude will surely turn off the logic centre in his brain:-)

I felt as though this was an informative read, but not necessarily what it was advertised to be. I was hoping that Dawkins had simply laid out laymen’s explanations of the various forms of the strong evidence for evolution clean and crisp, but this was unfortunately a bit too filled with digressions. Throughout the book he’d go into long-winded explanations of various things you can study in zoology, chemistry, even physics, which are yes all well explained and good things to go learn, but not so much on point in a book that was supposed to be his one where he laid out the simplistic version of evolution evidence in boom-boom-boom fashion. Additionally, I felt he wasted time putting in whole chapters that didn’t need to be included, like his opening chapter dealing with the semantics of words like fact, theory, and hypothesis, or his closing chapter that served as more or less an apology for the implications of evolution being true (which, as he ironically earlier points out, is pointless because it’s about what the evidence shows not argumentum ad consequentiam). Furthermore, I felt like it was a mistake to dedicate whole chapters to things like the evidence for the age of the earth, or basics of how gene pools work. In my view the book ought to have had a brief intro, then the evidence from chapter 5 through chapter 12, as it went through watching real-time evolution in the lab (ch 5), to fossils (chs 6 and 7, and really there was no need to avoid conflating human evolution fossil evidence with the more general topic), embryology (ch 8), the geographical spread of species (ch 9), the molecular evidence (ch 10), the history of evolution written into current creatures bodies (ch 11), and the structure of ecosystems being non-centrally planned (ch 12). I would have reorganized each chapter into two sub-sections; evidence for evolution, and evidence against the existence of a purposeful central planner, talking about what we find in each of those areas of evidence that demonstrates that evolution happened and then a section in the chapter explaining what we’d find in the lab, the fossil record, embryology, geographical spread, molecular evidence, and the structure of creatures and ecosystems if there were a central planner, talking about how we don’t see each of those things.

This doesn’t mean that the evidence he presented in the book was anything less than throughoughly spectacular. Rather, it’s just that his detours, unnecessary chapters, long-winded way of explaining things, and poor overall structure of the various needed chapters probably left people who weren’t already well-educated a bit confused and too tired to finish or understand all they’d taken in. If you already understand the basics of evolution, his detours are actually pretty interesting and you’d probably enjoy reading this, but if you are trying to say educate a young child or convince an evolution-denying friend to be exposed to some basic evidence this isn’t a great choice in my opinion. Finally, as much as it doesn’t bother me as an atheist, I really wish that he would have kept religion completely out of this book, because any mention, however small, and no matter how much he would say it wasn’t a book intending to slam religion, it hurts the cause of educating people in science to present their superstitious beliefs as a barrier to their enlightenment that you personally resent. Just show them the science and hopefully their worldviews will be molded around the evidence rather than the other way around

Bookmarks begins its review of this book by saying: "'Like a detective reconstructing a crime' (San Francisco Chronicle), Dawkins amasses a mountain of evidence in this richly illustrated, enormously readable explanation of the theory of evolution." This book is Dawkins' effort to lay out the evidence for evolution. His target is the "intelligent design" approach to explaining why species end up as they are--explicitly rejecting Darwinian evolutionary theory.

The book features many fascinating examples of evolution in action--including demonstrating that many species do NOT exhibit anything like intelligent design. His description of the wacky nerve structure of giraffes shows the willy nilly nature of evolution--and is certainly not consistent with the concept of intelligent design.

Anyone familiar with other of Dawkins' works will not be surprised at what a nice read this book is. The author does write well and is persuasive throughout the book. However, those who believe in intelligent design are not apt to accept his arguments.

For those who wish to get a sense of the logic of and evidence for evolution, this is a good starting point.

Richard Dawkins’ The Greatest Show on earth: the evidence for evolution is a superbly written convincing exposition of the explanatory power of evolution. Be aware this is no neutrally phrased popular science book. This is Dawkins at his pugnacious best. This book positions Dawkins as a worthy successor to T. H. Huxley - Darwin’s Bulldog. This is a gloves-off counter-attack on creationists, followers of ‘intelligent design’ and those who still question evolution as a scientific fact

To be fair, many reasonable people may find Dawkins’ approach to be smug or even intellectually confrontational. Dawkins begs no forgiveness. Dawkins comes from what I would call the ‘pugilistic’ school of academia - one I was quenched in myself as a young researcher. As Edward Dolnick pointed out in The Clockwork Universe, “Even today, with such structures long established, science is a contact sport.” He does not reach the greatness of Galileo, who wrote his most important works in the form of pugnacious dialogues, putting his rivals’ arguments into the mouth of Simplicio, a character who embodied intellectual mediocrity.

Dawkins though, is a great teacher. This book a superb example of his explanatory skills. He starts by assuming nothing other than the reader is interested to learn. Within the first three chapters we are introduced to what a scientific theory is, compared to a mathematical theorem, what inference, axioms and facts are, and how biology has developed through Mendel, Darwin and Wallace and the power of artificial selection (what is known as breeding). Here we see how humans have sculpted cabbages to make cauliflowers, cows to make the modern milk machine - the dairy cow, and the current multitude of dog shapes, sizes, forms and colors from a human-refuse scavenging wolf.

It is interesting, as Dolnick has noted, two centuries passed between Newton’s theory of gravity and Darwin’s theory of evolution. Newton’s work was arcane mathematics ‘focused on remote, unfamiliar objects like planets and comets.’ As Dawkins demonstrates Darwin’s evolution deals in ordinary words with ordinary things; aphids and ants, barnacles and birds. So ordinary that Thomas Huxley is quoted as saying “How extremely stupid not to have thought of that!” after his first read of Darwin’s Origin of Species. Dolnick again comments ‘No one ever scolded himself for not beating Newton to the Principia. It is possibly this seeming simplicity, compared with modern physics, that leads to its misinterpretation.

One of the necessary keys to establishing evolution as such a powerful theory is knowing the age of the Earth and the various landmark points in the fossil record. Dawkins explains the overlapping techniques of tree rings, carbon 14 dating, and other radioactive dating that allow us to date objects from recent to many billions of years old with great accuracy.

With this established Dawkins takes on the myth of the missing link. Dawkins demonstrates that every fossil is an intermediate, a link, between something and something else. Debunking the misunderstandings about ‘higher’ and ‘lower’ animals, Dawkins takes the reader on an educational journey of ‘intermediates’ as animals left the water to evolve into land dwelling creatures. This discussion leads to a fascinating look at the common ancestry of the modern whale and hippopotamus; where the whale evolved from a land dwelling animal antecedent to both. Dovetailing into to this is a beautiful description of the origin, and fossil record, of modern humans.

To see that there was no intelligent design in all the current multitude of living animals Dawkins takes a look at the anatomy of many. You are left in no doubt that evolution has resulted, as the American biologist Colin Pittendrigh said, ‘in a patchwork of makeshifts pieced together, as it were, from what was available when opportunity knocked, and accepted in the hindsight, not the foresight, of natural selection.’

All said and done this is a very important book to read and digest, recommended to all who can read; skeptic,creationist, science-denier, quaint gent on the Clapham omnibus, included.

Richard Dawkins | The Greatest Show on Earth: The evidence for evolution | Black Swan | 2009 | AUS$19.99 | ISBN: 9781486300754 | 470 pp. | Paperback | 32 color figures.

Edward Dolnick | The Clockwork Universe: Isaac Newton, the Royal Society & the birth of the modern world | HarperCollins | 2011 | AUS$24.95 | ISBN: 978-0-06-171951-6 | 378 pp. | Paperback | 29 color/black & white figures.

Charles Darwin | The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life | 1859 | in From So Simple a Beginning: The four great books of Charles Darwin | Edward O. Wilson ed. | Norton | 2006 | ISBN: 0-393-06134-5 | 1704 pp. | Hardback

This review first appeared on dragonlaughing

Richard Dawkins possesses the unique ability to explain complex subjects with utter simplicity while maintaining the necessary nuance. Like Einstein says "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler." Richard Dawkins epitomizes this notion, explaining the evidence for evolution with simplicity that is palatable to the layman but with nuance that makes the evolutionary biologist proud. Must read!!

In this Year of Darwin, it's not surprising to see a new book from one of the leading proponents of Evolution. Dawkins has covered the topic from many angles in the past, this time, however, he's poking his fingers in the eyes of Creationists/"Intelligent Designers" (or, as he prefers to call them, "History deniers"). Dawkins begins by stating the dictionary definitions of the word "theory", a common entry point on Creationist dogma. The first definition of the term is, to paraphrase, "an explanation that describes a set of facts." This, he maintains, is what the Theory of Evolution is; a model which describes a set of facts. The "History deniers," however, insist on pointing to another definition of the term -- again to paraphrase, "a conjecture that describes a set of observations that have not been tested." By the end of the book, there is no doubt whatsoever that the first definition is the correct one when describing evolution.

Dawkins also purports to give readers ammunition they can use when going up against Creationist/Intelligent Designer pinheads. His examples superbly describe the evidence for evolution beyond any shadow of a doubt -- however, the examples are not of the sort that simpletons will readily understand or concede. He does debase another tiresome argument that the "fossil record is incomplete" and "riddled with missing links;" Dawkins goes on to explain how we can prove evolution without using a single fossil, and besides, we have plenty of "missing links," the deniers just keep saying that as if constant repetition will make the evidence go away. Some of the hard, indisputable evidence comes from experiments in microbiology -- which is where the ammunition gets a little sophisticated for use in your average bar fight.

The conclusion of the book in inescapable -- the Theory of Evolution is not dogma, to be taught alongside alternate opinions -- it is fact and needs to be taught as such. One of the staggering statistics he repeated often is that 44% of Americans actually believe the earth is less than 10,000 years old and that humans coexisted with dinosaurs. While there is some good stuff here to throw at them, most will just yell "la la la" when you try to make them less ignorant.

Review of The Greatest Show on Earth by Richard Dawkins
(Free Press, New York, 2009, 470 pp)
I am not a scientist, though I did my Masters on “Physics and Theology.” Nonetheless, I venture a review of this scientific book, primarily because Mr. Dawkins wrote the book to provide a resource for people “who are not history-deniers but who know some – perhaps of their own family or church – and find themselves inadequately prepared to argue the case.” (p. 8) In the words of Jerry Coyne in his back-cover review, the book provides “the multifarious and massive evidence for evolution – evidence that gives the lie to the notion that evolution is ‘only a theory.’”
Early in the book, Dawkins addresses the common critique that evolution is “only a theory.” He points out the confusion between common use of the term “theory” and the scientific use. The common use is for “a mere hypothesis, speculation, conjecture.” The scientific use is of “an explanation… of a group of facts… a hypothesis that has been confirmed.” (p. 9) The rest of the book is to document how evolution is not a mere hypothesis but a hypothesis that has been confirmed by facts.
Also in the first chapter, Mr. Dawkins celebrates that many of the highest leaders of the church, including the Bishop of Canterbury and the Pope, have “no problem with evolution.” (p. 6) Rather, his major concern and astonishment is about the “more than 40 per cent of Americans (who) deny that humans evolved from other animals …. and were created by God within the last 10,000 years.” (p. 7) He also rues that almost the same level of opposition exists in England (p. 106), though at the end of the book he provides a 2005 survey by Eurobarometer. It records that the denial that humans “developed from earlier species” was only in the 20th percentile in the vast majority of Western nations. Only the Muslim country of Turkey was closer to the USA, at 51%. (p. 433) In the case of both Turkey and the USA, he attributes this view to the strong hold of fundamentalist religious beliefs.
Throughout the book, there is a tone of sadness and incredulity that people could hold these positions. He finds it “depressing” (p. 202) that people will so desperately hold onto positions that have no evidence to back them and so much evidence that is contrary. In a television interview with a lawyer Wendy Wright in 2008, he urges time and again “if only you would open your eyes and look at the evidence…. Go to any museum.” (pp. 198-99) However, his anger arises when such people “lamentably” try to mandate those fundamentalist religious views in the public forum, especially in public schools. (p. 106, pp. 269-70)
Dawkins provides an interesting combination of homely metaphors for the scientific neophytes (like myself) to explain scientific theories and evidence along with extensive detail for those of scientific backgrounds. Some of the Creationist critiques that he addresses are:
• The Flood creating the fossil record - by using radioactive dating (pp. 100-01)
• The Intelligent Design assertion of “irreducible complexity” - by experiments with bacteria that produced metabolic adaptations of seemingly irreducible complexity via random mutations and artificial (i.e. experimenter-imposed) selection (pp. 130-01, cf. pp. 356-71 (pp. 130-01, cf. pp. 356-71)
• The gaps in the fossil record – by demonstrating how across the sciences evolution would be the accepted theory across even if there were no fossil record because of overwhelming other evidence (p. 283) and that no fossil has ever been found in a stratum (before it could have evolved.” (p. 147)
• The lack of missing links in the fossil record - by documenting fossil records of transitionary animals from sea to land and even back again. (pp. 153-61, 342)
• Evolution as violation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics (a thought I had held till now) – by including the energy from the sun that would overcome the law of entropy. (p. 415)
• Inability to explain how whole process started – by acknowledging this mystery while providing the new theory of RNA as the “self-assembling” dynamic until proteins evolved to propel the process forward through natural selection. (p. 421)
Mr. Dawkins also addresses the Christian angst over a good, reliable God involved in the chaos and violence of the natural selection process. He asserts that evolution really has no issue of theodicy. It is simply a process of “self-advancement,” not at all concerned about others’ suffering (pp. 288-92), no “waste… only survival” (p. 384)
However, for Christian theology theodicy is a major issue, seriously affecting the credibility of our message. Strikingly, it is not an issue for any other religion, as Hindus will simply attribute suffering to karma, Muslims to the will of God, animists to bad spirits, and Buddhists to a practical path to overcome it. Dawkins actually suggests a way for Christians to address the conundrum. He suggests that we avoid asserting that God made everything, and instead propose that God provided “an embryological recipe, or something like a computer program,” which would be just as “breathtaking” as direct creation. (p. 213)
I recall having lunch with a faculty colleague who was advocating for us to accept evolution as the process of creation. I responded that such a change would be very complicated and intense, as so many underpinnings of our message have assumed an ordered creation by divine fiat. When that assumption is rejected (as it is by half of Americans and increasingly by young people), much has to be reworked.
Most churches have a commission of theologians and scientists (paleontologists, biologists, geologists, geneticists) working together on pressing issues of science and technology. Our views will have no weight among the general public if reputable scientists are not participants. There are many reputable scientists who hold that God is the almighty Creator of all. We should invite them to participate in this conversation. Theologian scientists like Polkinghorn, Pannenberg, Rahner, and Lamoureaux are ideal for the task. We need to reflect on their proposals. It is certainly true that we cannot afford to be viewed as “history deniers” who advocate beliefs that have no grounding in facts.

Herb Hoefer
January 2014

Dawkins makes no mistakes regarding his excellent description for the clear evidence of evolutionary processes. His 'flaw' is in treating 'History Deniers' like the ENEMY, as opposed to misguided people who need our help. Anyone starting this book as a creationist will leave feeling that Richard thinks they are total idiots. Creating this sort of antipathy makes people unwilling to listen to you, even if you're right. There is no point in being 'right' if the people you are trying to convince hate you, and won't listen to you. Being a person that already knows evolution is true, I enjoyed the various descriptions of evolutionary processes a great deal; in that department...WELL DONE. I will use some of the material to try and convince my Jehovah's Witness friend of the error of his ways. Sadly, I won't be able to lend him the book on CD, because Richard's caustic attitude will surely turn off the logic centre in his brain:-)

I felt as though this was an informative read, but not necessarily what it was advertised to be. I was hoping that Dawkins had simply laid out laymen’s explanations of the various forms of the strong evidence for evolution clean and crisp, but this was unfortunately a bit too filled with digressions. Throughout the book he’d go into long-winded explanations of various things you can study in zoology, chemistry, even physics, which are yes all well explained and good things to go learn, but not so much on point in a book that was supposed to be his one where he laid out the simplistic version of evolution evidence in boom-boom-boom fashion. Additionally, I felt he wasted time putting in whole chapters that didn’t need to be included, like his opening chapter dealing with the semantics of words like fact, theory, and hypothesis, or his closing chapter that served as more or less an apology for the implications of evolution being true (which, as he ironically earlier points out, is pointless because it’s about what the evidence shows not argumentum ad consequentiam). Furthermore, I felt like it was a mistake to dedicate whole chapters to things like the evidence for the age of the earth, or basics of how gene pools work. In my view the book ought to have had a brief intro, then the evidence from chapter 5 through chapter 12, as it went through watching real-time evolution in the lab (ch 5), to fossils (chs 6 and 7, and really there was no need to avoid conflating human evolution fossil evidence with the more general topic), embryology (ch 8), the geographical spread of species (ch 9), the molecular evidence (ch 10), the history of evolution written into current creatures bodies (ch 11), and the structure of ecosystems being non-centrally planned (ch 12). I would have reorganized each chapter into two sub-sections; evidence for evolution, and evidence against the existence of a purposeful central planner, talking about what we find in each of those areas of evidence that demonstrates that evolution happened and then a section in the chapter explaining what we’d find in the lab, the fossil record, embryology, geographical spread, molecular evidence, and the structure of creatures and ecosystems if there were a central planner, talking about how we don’t see each of those things.

This doesn’t mean that the evidence he presented in the book was anything less than throughoughly spectacular. Rather, it’s just that his detours, unnecessary chapters, long-winded way of explaining things, and poor overall structure of the various needed chapters probably left people who weren’t already well-educated a bit confused and too tired to finish or understand all they’d taken in. If you already understand the basics of evolution, his detours are actually pretty interesting and you’d probably enjoy reading this, but if you are trying to say educate a young child or convince an evolution-denying friend to be exposed to some basic evidence this isn’t a great choice in my opinion. Finally, as much as it doesn’t bother me as an atheist, I really wish that he would have kept religion completely out of this book, because any mention, however small, and no matter how much he would say it wasn’t a book intending to slam religion, it hurts the cause of educating people in science to present their superstitious beliefs as a barrier to their enlightenment that you personally resent. Just show them the science and hopefully their worldviews will be molded around the evidence rather than the other way around

Bookmarks begins its review of this book by saying: "'Like a detective reconstructing a crime' (San Francisco Chronicle), Dawkins amasses a mountain of evidence in this richly illustrated, enormously readable explanation of the theory of evolution." This book is Dawkins' effort to lay out the evidence for evolution. His target is the "intelligent design" approach to explaining why species end up as they are--explicitly rejecting Darwinian evolutionary theory.

The book features many fascinating examples of evolution in action--including demonstrating that many species do NOT exhibit anything like intelligent design. His description of the wacky nerve structure of giraffes shows the willy nilly nature of evolution--and is certainly not consistent with the concept of intelligent design.

Anyone familiar with other of Dawkins' works will not be surprised at what a nice read this book is. The author does write well and is persuasive throughout the book. However, those who believe in intelligent design are not apt to accept his arguments.

For those who wish to get a sense of the logic of and evidence for evolution, this is a good starting point.

Richard Dawkins’ The Greatest Show on earth: the evidence for evolution is a superbly written convincing exposition of the explanatory power of evolution. Be aware this is no neutrally phrased popular science book. This is Dawkins at his pugnacious best. This book positions Dawkins as a worthy successor to T. H. Huxley - Darwin’s Bulldog. This is a gloves-off counter-attack on creationists, followers of ‘intelligent design’ and those who still question evolution as a scientific fact

To be fair, many reasonable people may find Dawkins’ approach to be smug or even intellectually confrontational. Dawkins begs no forgiveness. Dawkins comes from what I would call the ‘pugilistic’ school of academia - one I was quenched in myself as a young researcher. As Edward Dolnick pointed out in The Clockwork Universe, “Even today, with such structures long established, science is a contact sport.” He does not reach the greatness of Galileo, who wrote his most important works in the form of pugnacious dialogues, putting his rivals’ arguments into the mouth of Simplicio, a character who embodied intellectual mediocrity.

Dawkins though, is a great teacher. This book a superb example of his explanatory skills. He starts by assuming nothing other than the reader is interested to learn. Within the first three chapters we are introduced to what a scientific theory is, compared to a mathematical theorem, what inference, axioms and facts are, and how biology has developed through Mendel, Darwin and Wallace and the power of artificial selection (what is known as breeding). Here we see how humans have sculpted cabbages to make cauliflowers, cows to make the modern milk machine - the dairy cow, and the current multitude of dog shapes, sizes, forms and colors from a human-refuse scavenging wolf.

It is interesting, as Dolnick has noted, two centuries passed between Newton’s theory of gravity and Darwin’s theory of evolution. Newton’s work was arcane mathematics ‘focused on remote, unfamiliar objects like planets and comets.’ As Dawkins demonstrates Darwin’s evolution deals in ordinary words with ordinary things; aphids and ants, barnacles and birds. So ordinary that Thomas Huxley is quoted as saying “How extremely stupid not to have thought of that!” after his first read of Darwin’s Origin of Species. Dolnick again comments ‘No one ever scolded himself for not beating Newton to the Principia. It is possibly this seeming simplicity, compared with modern physics, that leads to its misinterpretation.

One of the necessary keys to establishing evolution as such a powerful theory is knowing the age of the Earth and the various landmark points in the fossil record. Dawkins explains the overlapping techniques of tree rings, carbon 14 dating, and other radioactive dating that allow us to date objects from recent to many billions of years old with great accuracy.

With this established Dawkins takes on the myth of the missing link. Dawkins demonstrates that every fossil is an intermediate, a link, between something and something else. Debunking the misunderstandings about ‘higher’ and ‘lower’ animals, Dawkins takes the reader on an educational journey of ‘intermediates’ as animals left the water to evolve into land dwelling creatures. This discussion leads to a fascinating look at the common ancestry of the modern whale and hippopotamus; where the whale evolved from a land dwelling animal antecedent to both. Dovetailing into to this is a beautiful description of the origin, and fossil record, of modern humans.

To see that there was no intelligent design in all the current multitude of living animals Dawkins takes a look at the anatomy of many. You are left in no doubt that evolution has resulted, as the American biologist Colin Pittendrigh said, ‘in a patchwork of makeshifts pieced together, as it were, from what was available when opportunity knocked, and accepted in the hindsight, not the foresight, of natural selection.’

All said and done this is a very important book to read and digest, recommended to all who can read; skeptic,creationist, science-denier, quaint gent on the Clapham omnibus, included.

Richard Dawkins | The Greatest Show on Earth: The evidence for evolution | Black Swan | 2009 | AUS$19.99 | ISBN: 9781486300754 | 470 pp. | Paperback | 32 color figures.

Edward Dolnick | The Clockwork Universe: Isaac Newton, the Royal Society & the birth of the modern world | HarperCollins | 2011 | AUS$24.95 | ISBN: 978-0-06-171951-6 | 378 pp. | Paperback | 29 color/black & white figures.

Charles Darwin | The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life | 1859 | in From So Simple a Beginning: The four great books of Charles Darwin | Edward O. Wilson ed. | Norton | 2006 | ISBN: 0-393-06134-5 | 1704 pp. | Hardback

This review first appeared on dragonlaughing

I was surprised at how much evidence there is for evolution. I knew there was a lot, but chapter after chapter of well explained evidence. I've not read his other books, so I can't comment on the duplicate content, but if you have not read his other books then this will surely satiate your appetite for evolution science.

Greatest show on earth is a good book. It gives you a lot of information about evolution. Mr. Dawkins is very persuasive in his arguments.

At places I found the book too detailed and hard to follow. Also, at every now and then, Mr. Dawkins criticizes creationists or IDers. I think once he made his point, it is no longer necessary to keep doing it in every page. People who believe in ID are continuing to believe in it, no matter the evidence.

I agree that this whole process of Natural Selection and Evolution is indeed the greatest show on earth

In the circus show that science has become we have two groups fighting for your attention-- creationists (who often accept many concepts of science as fact) and those that believe in evolution. There's no denying the evidence of evolution the argument according to Dawkins often stems from an interpretation of what is "fact" and what is "theory" as he makes clear early on in his The Greatest Show on Earth. According to Dawkins that doesn't mean that you can't believe in God nor does it mean you have to believe in God (Dawkins makes no apologies for the fact that he doesn't believe God is necessary and he's not a big fan of religion either which is pretty evident in his previous book). Dawkins is pretty up front about which ring he's watching.

Evolution as Dawkins points out exists independent of what your religious beliefs are but that hasn't satisfied fundamentalists who believe the world is only 10,000 years old, that humans co-existed with dinosaurs and that all of the compelling proof (and if you read the book you'll see that Dawkins provides proof in spades from a variety of different sources)that exists is wrong. Evolution may be the greatest show on Earth but as Dawkins demonstrates it has no short supply of critics. The Greatest Show on Earth presents the scientific facts of evolution with Dawkins pitting them against the theory of creationism.

Dawkins points out that there are two definitions of "theory" and Dawkins distinguishes between them. Definition one used by scientists--"A hypothesis that has been confirmed or established by observation or experiment, and is propounded or accepted as accounting for the known facts; a statement of what are held to be the general laws, principles, or causes of something known or observed."

Number two used by creationists- "a hypothesis proposed an an explanation, hence, mere hypothesis, speculation, conjecture; an idea or set of ideas about something; an individual view or notion".

There in lies part of the intentional disconnect between those who believe in evolution and those that don't and both use their definition as the basis for their point-of-view.

Dawkins does a very good job "proving" that the "theory" of evolution isn't mere speculation. He provides evidence of natural selection that exists all around us every day and even uses dog breeding as an example of "forced" selection basically mimicing what natural selection does but focusing on a very specific goal (although I should point out that breeding isn't the same as natural selection). He points out that the natural time clocks reflected in radioactive decay, etc. provide a realistic idea about the passage of time. He cites examples of genetic changes (a good example of forced selection would be the over use of antibotics causing bacteria to develop tools to fight survive in a hostile environment)that are happening in our world today as an example.

He also shoots an arrow through the simplistic falicy that we're descendants of modern apes but does point out that we have a common ancestor with chimps. Dawkins points out that having a common ancestor says so much about why so many creatures in our world are similar as well as why they are different. Humans branched off a common tree nothing more nothing less but that doesn't make us chimps nor does it make chimps human.

Dawkins book isn't perfect--sometimes his explanations can be unnecessarily complex but, for the most part, Dawkins does an exceptional job tackling a difficult subject that inflames a lot of people.

Look, you either believe in evolution or you don't. Evidently 40% of the U.S. population doesn't which to me is frightening. Science and religion don't have to be mortal enemies but extremist thinking and literal interpretation (as Dawkins points out) of the Bible creates an environment where pseudoscience thrives misleading generations of children about the how we came to be.

The Greatest Show on Earth probably won't change your mind if you believe in creationism but if you give it a chance it will make those who follow this belief question how rational it is to deny all of the physical evidence that exists demonstrating that evolution happened, continues to happen and will always happen. I doubt that Dawkins book will cause those paying attention to the ring filled with creationist activity to pay attention to the one in the center with all the proof.

Highly recommended.

This is Richard Dawkins at his best, not simply as a great scientist, but as a teacher of science - the worthy former Charles Simonyi professor for the public understanding of science at Oxford University! He engages the non-science trained reader quickly and convincingly, but about midway through the book he lets himself sometimes be carried away a bit to fall back into the role of pure scientist with the concomitant risk of maybe loosing some of his readership. A minor flaw, of any.
The book reads like an apologia for evolution by natural selection and therefore appears to be targeted chiefly at a North American audience. Is it because of this target market that the author feels he has to lash out constantly against 'creationists' and their views? It becomes tiring after a while and in my opinion detracts from the work by unnecessarily introducing Dawkin's own strong atheistic and deterministic bias here. That is my reason for giving the book only 4 stars and ending with a 'but' in my review heading.

Richard Dawkins certainly won few friends among the zealous with his fiery attacks on religion of the past several years, and though he holds back from too much excoriation of those particular wounds, his masterfully argued case for the truth of evolution is little more likely to win any of them over. Dawkins says he IS trying to reach the 'history-deniers' (shortly after a just but none-too-diplomatic comparison to holocaust denial): "But, perhaps more importantly, I aspire to arm those who are not history-deniers but know some...and find themselves inadequately prepared to argue the case." As a student of the physical sciences with a deep passion for truth and concern for the integrity of science education in our public schools, I find myself squarely in this category. I have absorbed the science of evolution piecemeal over my life, but I had yet to make an effort to go over the evidence methodically. This is just the book I had been waiting for a science writer as gifted as Dawkins to write.

Dawkins' literary talent shines through with excellent analogies and eccentric wit. He puts to rest misconceptions as to the nature of scientific truth, the meaning of 'transitional forms', patterns of genetic inheritance, and the relation of 'micro' to 'macro' evolution. I have encountered most of the major pieces before, but it was edifying to see them all lined up in logical succession and joined into a coherent whole. Of particular value to me were detailed descriptions of the Lenski E.coli experiments as an example contrary to the notion of 'irreducible complexity' and a clarification of the genomic evidence on the relations between species.

I needed no convincing when I started reading, but I tried to be as skeptical as possible and try to think of alternate explanations as I went along. By the end I had put to rest the nagging feeling that I hadn't really deliberated the evidence. Admittedly, the exercise reminded me a bit of when I had to write a detailed proof that a + b = b + a. I was also sobered by the sad reality that few, if any convinced creationists, would be persuaded. For theirs is a theory that not only can explain the evidence as it actually exists, but also the evidence that doesn't exist, or anything at all, by rendering it unto the work of a God beyond all understanding.

As a comprehensive introduction to the evidence of evolution, I suggest reading this book along with Jerry Coyne's "Why Evolution is True". If you only have time for one, then Dawkins' book is better for the depth of explanation and clarification of common confusions, while Coyne's is more concise and is particularly illuminating on the crucial point of speciation.

Dawkins, in The Greatest Show on Earth, assembles information from the fields of physics, chemistry, geology, anatomy, genetics, and cell biology to make an airtight case for evolution. This is not Dawkins' first attempt to drive the last nail into the coffin of doubters, nor is it necessarily his best, but it is probably his most thorough. With bone-crunching force, Dawkins walks the reader through a summation of what we know from geology (the evidence that Earth is 4.5 billion years old), genetics, contemporary biology (multiple examples of evolution that have been observed to have happened over the course of one or two generations), the fossil record (always fun reading!), physics (the accuracy of the techniques used for dating the age of events and fossils), and much, much more.

The strength of The Greatest Show on Earth is its demonstration that the theory of evolution is no more "theoretical" than atomic theory, or the theory that our solar system is (thanks, Copernicus!) heliocentric. It would be safer to bet that the sun won't come up tomorrow, argues Dawkins, than to doubt that the myriad forms of life on earth are the result of the tri-part action of heritability, genetic variability, and natural selection. To knock down evolution, one of those pillars would have to crumble. If you believe that traits are passed on from parent organism to offspring, and if you believe that mutations occur regularly in genetic material, and if you believe that nature will select out the mutations that favor survival, then you believe in evolution, Dawkins would say. Tough to argue with that stance, unless you resort to what Hawkins calls "argumentum consequentiam", i.e. you reject the argument because you don't like the consequences of it being true, rather than because it has lack of merit.

The weakness of the book is that Dawkins often behaves like an NBA or hockey player that has just been in a brawl on court/rink: with his teammates dragging him away so that the game can resume, he keeps trying to break loose to take one more punch, just ONE MORE PUNCH, at his opponents (the creationists/intelligent design advocates). It's not that I don't share Dawkins frustrations with the intelligent design folk. I'm a family physician, and the notion that the human body was designed by something or someone with even mediocre intelligence is way, WAY into LOL territory. From the top of our heads (hair) to the tip of our toes (toenails), our bodies are loaded with features (try goosebumps!) that make no sense whatsoever for human function, but make perfect sense as the detritus of an evolutionary process. That said, Godawmighty, Dawkins, let the science speak for itself. If a person has ears to hear, the science will speak to him/her. If a reader does not have ears to hear, and has adopted religious/supernatural beliefs that lead to loud cognitive dissonance with the concept of a singularity (the Big Bang) leading without unnatural assistance into the world that we see around us, little in The Greatest Show on Earth is likely to cause a conversion to a belief system based on verifiable and reproducible knowledge.

At its best, The Greatest Show on Earth is an excellent, in depth, remarkably thorough recounting of the prolific evidence that has built upon and corroborated the revolution started with Darwin's On the Origin of Species. In its lesser moments, the book is a brawl with those who cannot conceive of a world in which the hand of God did not wave a wand over nature's orchestra, and consequently must renounce all findings that threaten this view.

There is a sadness in this ongoing conflict between scientists and creationist/intelligent design advocates, and there are people of good will on both sides. I have a patient that is a retired high school science teacher. His hobby and his passion was geology. The last time that I saw him, he let me know that he no longer pursues his fascination with geology, because the scientific evidence that the Earth is billions of years old was beginning to overwhelm his belief that the Bible is literally true. "I had to make a choice" my patient said, "and I chose the Bible". I dream of a world in which we inquire vigorously after the truths of the natural world, have the courage to go where that inquiry takes us, and in the end, revel in the sense of awe and wonder that results.

Many flowers guide bees in to land by little runways
markings, painted on the flower in ultraviolet pigments,
which the human eye can't see.
Why - Because for the flower, insect pollination
represents a huge advance in economy over the the wasteful
scattergun of wind pollination.
Insects on the other hand, by choosing the most
attractive flowers to visit, breed for floral beauty,
while the flowers breed the insects for pollination ability.

According to evolution, the wonderful spectacle
of the flowers and the bees came about as an evolutionary process.
Evolution is a falsifiable theory, and therefore
a scientific theory. Mammals haven't be around for all
the Earths history - so you wouldn't expect to find
mammal remains in old Earth layers like e.g. Devonian rock.
And indeed noone have. If someone were to find
a mammal in say Cambrian rocks, evolution would be
blown apart.
In the words of J.B.S. Haldane: "Fossil rabbits in the
Precambrian" is no good (for the theory of evolution).

Instead, the world is just stuffed with evidence for
evolution - and this book goes through a lot
of this evidence. And quite a treat it is.

Obviously, we can debate for ever what ''fact'' and
''evidence'' really means. In the book a ''fact'' is something
that really occurred, or is known to be true by observation
or authentic testimony.
Biologists, and Richard Dawkins in particular, seems
awful sure about what is fact and what is not.
Whereas physicists, through quantum physics and more,
live in a world where ''fact'' is a somewhat slippery concept.
Trained in mathematics myself - mathematicians tend to
believe in abstract beauty, which is ''fact'', whereas
the world around us is a fata morgana you can believe in or
not. Depending on the time of day.... or if you have some mathematics
at hand that can explain what you see.
My only grievance about this book (and
other books by Richard Dawkins), is his religious belief
in ''facts'' and his vendetta against people who doesn't
believe in the true ''facts''.
In the world of evolution, surely you should be able to believe
the Moon is a green cheese, if that helps you survive.
No reason to be so upset?

But with so much at stake, our entire existence actually,
passions run high.
Take eugenic breeding of humans. The book doesn't say
it is impossible (everyone agrees that it is immoral).
On the contrary - you could breed a race of superior body builders,
pearl fishers .... and much worse ... superior musicians,
poets and high IQ people.
If evolution say you could probably do that - would you then rather
believe something else? In Richard Dawkins words "upholding
the origin myth of a particular set of Bronze age desert tribesmen" ?

The secret of evolution is the mind numbing big numbers.
Take bacteria. The E.Coli is a common bacterium.
Very common. About a billion of them are in your large intestine
at this moment. Harmless or even beneficial - they are
a part of ''you''. How this weird ''you'' came about
is explained by evolution though the mind numbing eons of time.

What is a million years? In human terms it is app. 45.000
generations. Which takes us back to the days of the Homo Erectus ...
a time where we were not even Homo Sapiens...
Some 100.000 years ago a roving band of Homo Sapiens -
looking pretty much like us - left Africa and diversified
to all the races we see today.
The Turkana Boy of some 1.6 million years ago would
have been 1.8 meters tall and have a brain of about 900 cubic
centimetres (cc). Typical for Homo erectus. Larger than the earlier Homo
habilis (600 cc), which in turn is larger than the earlier
Lucy - Australopithecus (400 cc).
The human story, from 3 million years ago to recent times,
is a tale of increasing brain size.

But according to evolution, there is no overall
plan of development, no blueprint, no architects plan.
All is achived by local rules implemented by cells.
Cells interacting with other cells on a local basis.
Inside cells, local rules apply to molecules, proteins,
interacting with other molecules.
The nervous system wires itself up, not
by following an overall blueprint - but by each neurons
axon seeking out end organs with which they have a chemical affinity.
Local units following local rules. Cells
that bristle with ''labels'' that enable them
to find their ''partners'' (Sperry).
The genes that survive are those that are good at building bodies.
Sexual selection, social environments, ecology and what have
you,determines what is good and what is not so good.

Lemurs live in Madagascar. Nowhere else. The story is
not that when Noahs Ark landed at Araret mountain in Turkey -
the lemurs all decided to walk down to Madagascar
(swimming the last stretch to the island).
No, it is of course a long story of small changes according
to evolutionary rules from some predecessor animal.
The evolution of the human skull is series of changes
in the rates of growth of some parts relative to other parts,
controlled by genes in the developing embryo (D'Arcy Thompsons
transformations).

Not necessarily leading to the best design - just ''good enough''.
Take the eye. Apparently designed by a complete idiot.
Where the photocells point in the wrong direction,
making it necessary for the wires that carry their data
to pass through the retina and back into the brain.
Leaving a hole - the blind spot - which takes a lot
of ''photo shop'' brain software to get rid of again.

No designer would plan a design like this. Only history
and evolution could end up here.
And so it is with all what we see. If forests were designed -
they could be much smaller. I.e. a forest ''of friendship'' could
agree to be only 10 feet tall. Much more efficient than the uncontrolled
(not designed) competition for sunlight that makes forests trees a 100 feet
tall.
Again - evolution.

The greatest show on Earth.

-Simon

In The Greatest Show, Dawkins the famous atheist provides experiemental evidence for evolution.

For those expecting a diatribe against religion or a lampooning of creationists don't read this book. Dawkins sticks strictly to a diet of explaining the facts. Sure occasionally he pokes fun at creationist theory, but the basis of the book is biology lessons.

While I imagine some people who won't have read the book will tirade and condemn this book, the book isn't particularly controversial (unless of course you vehemently deny evolution, or read the appendix on history-deniers). Dawkins even restrains himself from criticising those who believe God made evolution.

Recommended for those who want to learn more about evolution from a plain-speaking perspective.

Other reviews have more than properly given this book credit and honest commentary. I can only add that I believe this might be his most important work. Yes, some of the material has been said and done in his other works, and that is why it is important to continue on course.

There are still people hiding in fear, believing in superstition and ignoring proven scientific facts and well developed theory (unproven) but based on solid information. I do not care if you are religious or not. What is most frightening are the people that are religious trying to force their confused, disorganized and unprovable beliefs onto everyone else. Schools should teach facts as Dawkins says. Outside of school, you are free to pursue religious beliefs. Now, we have 'nut jobs' on TV preaching hate but hiding behind religion. That is dangerous, it is wrong and people get killed because of that behavior. I cannot think of anything that goes more against the teachings of Christ than preaching hate and violence!

This is the ground that Dawkins covers in this book. Going over the proof of evolution and the myths and unproven beliefs of religion. This is new for Dawkins. Going over the evidence and providing the proof and not assuming it to be truth or the reader to assume the truth.

Believe what you will after reviewing the evidence. I know I believe in scientific fact but have no desire to strip anyone of their religion and neither does Dawkins.

This was an excellent read - I borrowed it from the library and enjoyed it so thoroughly that I bought my own copy before I had even finished. Dawkins does hack on those people who don't believe in evolution a little, but to give him credit he has to put up with so much nonsense from those people I think he's beyond justified in doing so. And it doesn't detract from what he is explaining.

The Greatest Show on Earth is very well written; extremely clear and a seamless flow. He also uses excellent examples to get his point across, many of them so interesting I have to repeat them to anyone who will listen. That breeding silver foxes for tameness would be accompanied by changing coat color and ear morphology, in just a few generations? I couldn't get enough. I find he does a great job of presenting the facts and describing how they support the theorum (a word he uses to get away from the hang-ups of using theory but avoid the mathematicians' stringency of theorem) of evolution. Dawkins even goes one step further, explaining the science behind the facts and explaining how the knowledge is collected, but in a clear, succinct and direct way that will be understood even by non-science lovers - more science writers should strive to achieve what Dawkins has done with this book.

When evolutionists say evolution has a massive amount of evidence, they aren't kidding! Dawkins's book gives you a great variety of evidence for evolution. There are hundreds of examples presented in this jam-packed book! As always, Dawkins shows you the evidence with great detail and elegance. I must, however, tell you, as a future reader of this book, you must be at least somewhat interested in biology, otherwise you will not have a fun time trying to understand his evidence. In conclusion, I completely recommend this book.

Dawkins has described in great detail the discoveries made after Darwin's time, which provide evidence to the theory of evolution by natural selection. Darwin was born in 1809 and published his most important work "Origin of Species" in 1859. Along the way, Dawkins also answers the critics of evolution.

Dawkins gives examples of three kinds of evolution. First is the case of artificial selection where humans deliberately choose attractive roses, sunflowers etc. for breeding, thereby preserving the genes that produce the attractive features. Second is sexual selection where peahens choose attractive peacocks for breeding, thereby preserving attractive genes. The last one is the case of natural selection where random mutations in genes lead to the survival of the fittest. The evolution of dog from a wolf, was a combination of natural and artificial selections.

Darwin's work was not based on genes, while Gregor Mendel's work was. Although Darwin and Mendel were contemporaries, Darwin did not read Mendel's work because it was in German. Darwin's work was largely based on evolution thru natural selection, while Mendel's work was based on artificial selection.

Dawkins talks about how rocks and fossils are dated, using a radioactive clock based on potassium-40 which has a half life of 1.26 billion years. The fossils tell a great story on the timeline of evolution.

Dawkins describes an experiment done by Richard Lenski, where e-coli were placed in different flasks containing glucose and citrate. Normally e-coli can make use of glucose, but not citrate. As e-coli population increased, the levels of glucose fell. Then the population decreased. A stunning incident took place. A random mutation occurred in one of the flasks, because of which e-coli started using citrate. This increased the population of e-coli in this flask, regardless of the lower levels of glucose. This experiment demonstrated evolution at work.

Another experiment performed by John Endler involved evolution of guppies in ponds. In ponds where there were no predators, fine gravel favored development of coarse spots in a few generations, so that the guppies could attract females. If the gravel was coarse instead, fine spots appeared for the same purpose. In presence of predators, however, the spots evolved in exactly the opposite manner because camouflaging from predators became important than attracting mates. Thus, contrasting or merging of body colors and spots, against the background, evolved depending on the presence of predators.

Dawkins talks about how geographically separated gene pool of the same species will eventually drift apart from one another, to the point where they evolve into different species. The cichlid faunas of Lake Victoria, Lake Tanganyika, Lake Malawi, each several hundred species strong, are completely distinct from each other. This tells us what evolution can do with geographical separation in a short space of time. The plate tectonics have caused vast geological changes on the earth. In fact, the geological changes described in great detail by Charles Lyell, sowed the seeds of evolution in Darwin's mind. Without plate tectonics, one cannot understand the distribution of animals and plants over the continents and islands of the world.

One criticism of evolution is if humans evolved from apes, why don't apes give birth to humans. Dawkins rightly points out that by and large, members of a specie breed amongst themselves and members across species do not. Also, modern species do not evolve into other modern species. They just share a common ancestor: they are cousins.

Another criticism against evolution is that of the missing link. Dawkins states that there will always be a missing link. As more fossils are found and laid on the timeline of evolution, there will always be gaps because this is like an investigation of evidence after the crime has taken place. Because one cannot reconstruct the whole timeline, generation by generation. But, we have enough discoveries to trace back the evolution of Homo Sapiens to Homo erectus to Homo habilis, with the evolution marked by increasing brain sizes.

Dawkins gives an example of how evolution resulted in a long detour of the laryngeal nerve down the giraffe's neck and which looped back up again. This happened because of incremental changes thru evolution, rather than going back to the drawing board and starting a new design from scratch, like what an intelligent designer would have done.
Similarly, the vas deferens in mammals is hooked the wrong way over the ureter, resulting from incremental changes and not from a brand new intelligent design.

Dawkins gives some insights into how a complex organism like a human baby evolves from a few cells. Something like an "inflating origami". Following the principles of Epigenesis in which the development of an organism occurs by progressive differentiation of an initially undifferentiated whole. Roger Sperry came up with "chemo-affinity" hypothesis, according to which the nervous system wires itself up not by following an overall blueprint but by each individual axon seeking out end organs with which it has a particular affinity. That is small local units following local rules, rather than a master builder guiding the whole process.

Dawkins mentions that the final evidence for all the creatures originating from a common ancestor is that all life on earth is based on the concepts of self replication and gene/protein synthesis. Which provides a molecular basis for evolution. Self-replication spawns a population of entities, which compete with each other to be replicated. Since no copying process is perfect, the population will inevitably come to contain variety. The fittest of the variety will survive, because the weaker one's have more chances of perishing, thus leading to natural selection. Enzymes are basically proteins which speed up the biological reactions inside the living organisms. The combination of the best replicating molecule, the DNA, and the best enzymes, the proteins, have made life possible. In the beginning, when life was very simple, the RNA molecule did both the jobs. As life became complex, the DNA and Enzymes came to play specialized roles to speed up evolution.

Finally, the detailed explanation of how complex organisms form from so simple a beginning, is still a work in progress. How the self replicating mechanism gets triggered, is not understood well. Evolutionists do not claim that they are omniscient. But the fact is that they have come long way since such a simple but profound beginning made by Darwin.

This is one of the few biology related texts that I literally could not put down. It is a page turner - a fascinating account of the beauty and simplicity of evolution, coupled with its extraordinary explanatory power. Dawkins covers many areas - biogeography, paleontology, molecular biology, comparitive anatomy, etc. and shows how all add to the mountain of evidence that supports the modern theory of evolution. Writing in a clear, informative style, Dawkins achieves exactly what he set out to do - provide enough evidence from various lines to prove once and for all that life arrived at its present form via descent with modification.

My only quibble is with the manner in which Dawkins dismisses and belittles people of faith. Now, having to deal with creationists on a daily basis must be an incredibly frustating experience. There is nothing worse for an educator than to be presented with the opinions of someone who is not simply ignorant, but is to all intents and purposes *willfully* ignorant. Be that as it may, I suspect that those who take issue with evolution will use Dawkins' obvious frustration as an excuse to dismiss the entire work. I would love to have members of my extended family read this book - but I know that they will reject it out of hand as the work of an atheist who is trying to destroy the basis of their beliefs. That may or may not be true, but it is certainly the perception that comes across. This is sad, becuase creationists could learn so much about the truth of evolution from this book.

This is the exact kind of explanatory non-fiction I love. Point after point is made, explained thoroughly, and finally backed up with solid, nigh-to-irrefutable evidence.

This book is a little easier to follow than some of Professor Dawkins' earlier works, but there's a sound reason for that: this book is written to be a concise point/counterpoint guide to the Creation myth. It's written with that goal in mind and barely deviates. You can think of this track as a solid, albeit a little snarky at times, step-by-step guide to putting the closed-minded in their place. That's only the bare-bones of the structure of it though. The rest is chock-full of amazing examples, both experimental and naturally occurring, for the why, how and WOW! of Evolution and Darwinian Natural Selection. Dawkins is careful never to mislead results and really does an excellent job of "holding your hand" through the explanation for why significant discoveries along the path to understanding Evolution are so important. If you've ever been frustrated trying to understand any of his other works, or if you've tried delving to learning Natural Selection methodology before and couldn't quite grasp it fully, THIS is the book for you.

One of the best aspects of this book is that, in the revisiting of the central "Creation debunking" theme, Dawkins carefully and plainly outline the precise misconceptions there are about how Natural Selection works, the origin of said misconceptions (in other words, how many of the staple Creationist strawman arguments came to be) and most importantly, what the proper use and role of that 'aspect' of biology is in relation to supporting Evolution.

Scientifically-minded individuals (believers or nonbelievers) who experience that wonderful "thirst" for origin-based, expository science like Carl Sagan, Through the Wormhole, and more contemporarily Neil DeGrasse Tyson provide, will simply be unable to put this one down. HIGHLY recommended!

I enjoyed this book as it walks you through the concepts that most creationists fail to acknowledge or if they do, completely dismiss. Dawkins makes the argument simple by using common facts to get his point across but then takes the time to walk through much of the detail to back the points up.

NO SHOW AT ALL: THE GREATEST BLUNDER ON EARTH!

With his new book, The Greatest Show on Earth, Evidence of Evolution, Richard Dawkins admits that he has always assumed evolution without ever proving it. Creationists have often accused him of doing exactly that. He attempts to fill this gap now. He will have to keep trying, though.

Richard Dawkins compares evolution with a crime scene to which there were no eye witnesses.

He arrives on the alleged crime scene and starts making his own detective-like inferences so as to present the evidence in a court. But, wait a minute! How does he know a crime has been committed in the first place? Dawkins wants to be left alone in his "crime-scene" and select and interpret the evidence in a way that supports his bias.

But the dead body might as well have been the result of an accident or a suicide! All the evidence must be analyzed, different witness accounts and interpretations must be admitted and thoroughly debated. That is true, even after the jury has already made its decision. Judicial decisions must be open to revision when new evidence shows up. There is no res judicata in the creation v. evolution debate.

Comparing evolution a priori nwith a crime scene only goes to show that Dawkins cannot help but approaching the evidence with his own (naturalist, evolutionary and uniformitarian) bias. That is an important point, when it comes to understanding all of Dawkins work.

Richard Dawkins accuses Creationists of being History-deniers, comparing them with Holocaust deniers. That's a nice rhetorical trick. Were you fooled by it?

In fact, Dawkins is the one who denies all the relevant historical records about God's presence in History, through the people of Israel and the life and death of Jesus Christ.

What's more, he denies more than 200 flood narratives from many different ancient cultures in all continents. Dawkins attempts to dismiss the biblical eyewitness accounts as Bronze age records, so as to fool his readers.

But he forgets that before and during the writing of the Bible, Pyramids were being built and the foundations and standards of philosophy, literature, mathematics, geometry, architecture, engineering and astronomy were being laid.

In fact, the naturalism, atomism and evolutionism emerged at that same time. Contrary to his suggestions, ancient Man was highly intelligent, and already debated creation v. evolution.

Archaeology demonstrates that the ancient Man could also be remarkably accurate in its eyewitness accounts of events. Dawkins also assumes that a personal God did not reveal Himself in historical and propositional way. But that's just his own assumption.

It must also be remembered, that the purpose of most Holocaust deniers is to degrade the Jews, because of their historical and theological significance.
The purpose of Richard Dawkins is to degrade Jewish sacred texts, also because of their historical and theological significance. That is not a coincidence. That is a highly significant pattern from a theological perspective.

Dawkins prefers DNA, skulls and bones as evidence, and dismisses eyewitness accounts. The problem is that science, with its emphasis on observation and experimentation is primarily based on eyewitness accounts.

Historiography depends basically on eyewitness accounts, there existing methods to validate them.

Did historians study the Roman Empire, whose denial Dawkins finds unthinkable, based on DNA, fossils and bones? Did historians dismiss eyewitness accounts when studying Hannibal, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Caesar, Charles Magnus or Henry VIII? Did they rely on DNA for that? So why should they dismiss independent ancient sources when studying the Flood or Jesus Christ?

There are long established ways of comparing, dating and validating ancient historical texts.

What's more, if Dawkins would leave out all eyewitness accounts of the Holocaust, he himself would probably become a Holocaust denier. And if he would study Adolph Hitler based only on skulls and bones, he would probably have concluded that Hitler was a woman!

Dawkins ideas are not only silly. They are self-defeating!

Then comes the so called evidence of evolution. We learn from Dawkins that living beings "evolve" according to their own kinds and that the different species come from original broader gene pools, without gaining new and complex structures.

Creationists would not really question this kind of observed "evolution", in which "Canis lupus" evolve to... "canis familiaris" (i.e. dogs evolve to... dogs), Primroses evolve to...Primroses, orchids evolve to...orchids, Hummingbirds evolve to... Hummingbirds, insects evolve to...insects, guppies evolve to... guppies, bacteria evolve to...bacteria, etc. evolves to... etc. Just like God said they would.

We also learn from Dawkins (as if we didn't already know!) that natural selection and speciation can take place very quickly. Those observations are totally compatible with what the Bible teaches. There are different kinds, there is great variety within each kind and rapid natural selection and speciation explain the post-flood variation, adaptation and specialization within each kind.

For Dawkins, evolution has as many different speeds as his evolutionary assumptions require.

However, when Dawkins speaks about rapid adaptation, selection and speciation he is actually proving an important biblical point about pos-flood diversity. He seems not to have understood this. When he speaks of living fossils with little or no change, he is also proving an important biblical point, about the preservation of the different kinds.

As to molecular comparisons of genetic similarities and differences, they point to a Common Creator, as in Genesis 1. Mutations and loss of organs and functions point do the curse and deterioration of Creation, as in Genesis 3. The geological and fossil record, along with plate tectonics and continental drift, point to a global Flood, as in Genesis 6 to 9.

Proving that the Earth is old is important to Dawkins.

But it is a very difficult task when one dismisses all ancient records, and relies only on present observations and extrapolations based on naturalistic and uniformitarian assumptions. Dawkins admits that dendrochronology does not allow him to get very far into deep time. The same is true about C-14. He has only some radioactive isotope dating methods, but he has to assume uniformitarian conditions to prove his point.

But that is not a logically sound way to deny a Global Flood, which, according to the Bible had a supernatural cause, a supernatural purpose and made a supernatural point: there is a spiritual, all powerful moral God who reigns above the laws of physics He has established and is able to enforce His moral law when, how and as He pleases. One cannot deny the acts of an omnipotent God simply by appealing to the laws of physics. On the one hand, the existence of the laws of physics, chemistry and biology points to an ordered Creation.

On the other hand, the independent, detailed and consistent records of historical events that derogate these same laws (v.g. global flood, miracles, physical resurrection of Jesus Christ) point to an omnipotent Creator. This should lead us to take God's revelation seriously, instead of relying in man made naturalistic and materialistic assumptions.

There is stronger historical evidence that Jesus Christ performed miracles and raised from the dead, than that life arose by chance of that we all came evolved from a common ancestor. We now know can say for sure that Moses wrote most of the the first five books of the Bible, possibly based on previous accounts, before other ancient texts like the Gilgamesh Epic or Enuma Elish.

Besides, how can we ignore more than 200 flood narratives from the ancient world, along with evidence of accelerated nuclear decay, C-14 in diamonds, fossils, rocks and coal dated as millions of years old?

How can we ignore the mounting global evidence of catastrophe in the rocks and fossils?

How can we ignore the evidence from Helium in zircon cristals, many discordant radioisotope dates, old ages for recent rocks, or Polonium radiohalos in granite?

How can we ignore soft tissue, amino acids, blood vessels, or proteins, in T Rex and Hadrossaur bones supposedly 65 and 80 million years old?

How can we ignore soft tissue in a Salamandra fossil supposedly 18 million years old? How can we ignore the fishes of the Silurian sees?

What about all the dinosaur bones found after the so called Cretaceous extinction?

What about all the recent evidence that suggests the Dover Cliffs, or the Mediterranean See, were the result of extraordinarily catastrophic water flows?

What about the recent studies on transposons that cast serious doubts on the theory of a common ancestor of Chimpanzees and Human beings? What about all the evidence that suggests that Neanderthals were fully human?

All this evidence is published in scientific books and journals. Just search Science Daily for references.

Dawkins' bias leads him to a selective approach to and a distorted interpretation of the evidence.

Richard Dawkins goes a great length to present the Lenski experiment as evidence that the "crime" is still being committed now. He states that it is really a brilliant experiment that Creationists hate and want to find fault in.

But Creationist don't hate real science. Creationists only have problems with Dawkins evolutionary "theora" (i.e. observed fact, evolutionary fiction and lots of bla, bla, bla!).

The fact is that Lenski himself admits that after 40 000 generations and the accumulation of 653 mutations things start to get pretty ugly to the Lenski 12 tribes of E.Coli. What started to be a powerful evolutionary experiment, with bactgeria gaining size and some of them processing citrate, turned out to be a lesson on the degenerative effect of cumulative mutations.

With the Lenski experiment don't learn much on how bacteria become bacteriologists, but at least we understand cancer and the spread of diseases much better.

Mutations are not about new information. They are mostly about noise that degrades pre-existing coded information. DNA may not be a blueprint in a literal sense, as Dawkins rightly remarks, but it is certainly coded information, whose transcription, translation, copy and execution (by complex specified molecular machines previously coded) allows for the production, reproduction and adaptation of the different kinds of living beings.

And, Richard Dawkins RNA-world speculations notwithstanding, coded information can only have an intelligent source. There is no known natural law or physical process capable to create coded information.

What follows is a purely highly speculative and controversial interpretation of the fragmentary fossil record and its relation with molecular clocks, based on evolutionary assumptions and beliefs.

The fact is that hard evidence has recently raised serious doubts on DNA based dates, undermining many of Dawkins assumptions and conclusions. What's more, the fact that Dawkins lists the Darwinus masilae ("Ida") as evidence of evolution, when it has already been discarded as such by evolutionary scientists themselves, only shows that how good it is that the Bible is the Word of God and not just a scientific book.

The same is true about the Tiktaalik. It is presented as a perfect link between fish and tetrapods, even if it has already been dismissed by evolujtionists themselves, following recent footprints findings in Poland.

It is raining. Lenski, Ida, Tiktaalik, etc, are all wet. The "Greatest Show" is becomming the greatest cold water shower. Evolutionists will have to keep the rain ticket.

Dawkins book came out a few months ago and is already scientifically outdated. Richard Dawkins presents as evidence of evolution facts, fossils and experiments that really have nothing to do with evolution, according to evolutionists themselves.

If Dawkins can be so wrong when he speaks of evolution, a subject to which he has devoted so much attention to and pretends to know so well, just imagine how wrong and off the mark he can be when he speaks of alleged mistakes and contradictions of the Bible.

It is much easier to find silly ideas, contradictions and mistakes in Dawkins books. And one doesn't need to be a Creationist to do it.

There is no trace of evolution in this book. Coded information in the genomes, genetic similarities, mutations, trillions of fossils around the world, transcontinental sedimentary rock layers, isotope concentrations, continental drift, plate tectonics, natural selection, rapid adaptation and speciation, are all evidence of Creation, the Curse, the Flood and rapid repopulation of the world.

All the evidence presented in this book supports the Bible.

The only evidence we get from this book is that Dawkins indeed believes in evolution. That we already knew for sure.

How this book has been able to fool its endorsers and many readers around the world remains one of the greatest mysteries of evolutionary theory.

He will get 3 stars because he is an excellent scientific fiction writer, though.

This book goes through the evidence of evolution and how scientist came to the conclusion that evolution is a fact rather than a theory. At the same time, revealing how any God hypothesis is completely irrational or frankly just wrong. If you have questions about evolution, this book has the answers. No one can finish reading this book and not believe in evolution. Oh, and there are colored pictures too. I'm sure Dawkins would have even put in virtual holograms if such technology exist. There's only so much a modern book can do and he did everything possible to show the evidence.

When I first heard about Dawkins' new book on evolution, my first question was "Why?" After all, there have already been several books published in recent years that defend evolution against its critics- "Why Evolution is True," Sean Carroll's books, Ken Miller's "Only a Theory," several books on the Dover Trial, as well as anthologies of scientists writing essays against creationism. I was pleasantly surprised. "The Greatest Show on Earth" (here on out to be abbreviated as TGSOE), is in a sense another book on evolution that continues the trend of a backlash of scientists against Intelligent Design, but it stands out because Dawkins uses his best talent, science writing, to not only argue the case for evolution but to reach out to those who are not already especially well-versed in biology to understand it. According to the author, in his previous science books, such as "Blind Watchmaker" and "The Selfish Gene," he simply assumed evolution was true, and felt that he needed a new book to explain why it is true, and because of the alarmingly high rate of non-acceptance of evolution in the United States.

TGHOE's first order of business is to explore the use of the word "theory." "Evolution is only a theory" seems to be a ubiquitous phrase among its opponents these days, and Dawkins wants to dismantle the notion. He talks about how theory is understood:

"Theory, Sense 1: A scheme or system of ideas or statements held as an explanation or account of a group of facts or phenomena; a hypothesis that has been confirmed or established by observation or experiment, and is propounded oor accepted as accounting for the known facts; a statement of what are held to be the general laws, principles, or causes of something known or observed. Theory, Sense 2: A hypothesis proposed as an explanation; hence, a mere hypothesis, speculation, conjecture; an idea or set of ideas about something; an individual view or notion.
Obviously the two meanings are quite different from one another. And the short answer to my question about the theory of evolution is that the scientists are using Sense 1, while the creationists are- perhaps mischievously, perhaps sincerely- opting for Sense 2. A good example of Sense 1 is the Heliocentric Theory of the Solar System [or the Atomic Theory of Matter of the Theory of Gravity, etc], the theory that the Earth and the other planets orbit the sun. Evolution fits Sense 1 perfectly." (p. 9) He goes on to note that, strictly speaking, only Mathematicians can prove things, with theorems. However, evolution is proved in the same sense that the Heliocentric Theory is proved. "Even the undisputed theory that the moon is smaller than the sun cannot, to the satisfaction of a certain kind of philosopher, be proved in the way that, for example, the Pythagorean Theorem can be proved. But massive accretions of evidence support it so strongly that to deny it the status of 'fact' seems ridiculous to all but pedants. The same is true of evolution...Though logic choppers rule the town, some theories are beyond sensible doubt, and we call them facts. The more energetically and thoroughly you try to disprove a theory, if it survives the assault, the more closely it approaches what common sense happily calls a fact." (p. 10)

According to Dawkins, given all of this, and since the word theory in the context of evolution is so loaded with "Sense 2," it's better to call it "The Fact of Evolution." Will the strategy pay off? Since the cultural basis for creationism is so strong in the United States, it's hard to see how. Having said that, it may be worth a try. If different words and phrases can cause enough people to change their method of thinking, it may indeed have an impact.

Several other parts of TGSOE stood out for me: 1.) The analogy between artificial breeding and evolution by natural selection, and its relation to genetics. 2.) The discussion of barriers to understanding evolution, such as "essentialism" and "the Great Chain of Being," 3.) The analogy of embryonic development to origami

Darwin realized by observing plant and animal husbandry that people can change species through selective breeding. This was nothing new, of course. But the insight he extrapolated was that species themselves were not immutable and that nature itself acted as the selecting agents. Inheriting genes, Dawkins says, is more like shuffling cards than blending two different kinds of paint together. So no descendant is going to be exactly like its ancestor. With enough "selection," a particular species will change over time, as has happened with the domestication of many animals and plants. The same principle, that species are mutable and changeable, makes evolution by natural selection the next logical step- with nature as the selecting agent, we can get great diversity of life, given enough geographic variation.

Dawkins claims that "the dead hand of Plato," which he also calls "essentialism," is behind much of the confusion regarding evolution. There's the idea, going back to Plato, that there are ideal forms behind appearences; i.e., a perfect form of a rabbit behind rabbits. So many people think of different living things as somehow set, as in Platonic ideals. This is deeply unevolutionary. I agree, but I think that it's a mistake to blame this on Plato, because it doesn't explain why people who have never heard of Plato would want to be set in rigid categorization in the first place. Bruce Hood in Supersense makes a good case that the human brain naturally tends to classify objects, which will naturally make evolution hard to understand. With that aside, it's good for Dawkins to mention this. Species classification is something that biologists impose on themselves to explain the world- not absolute categories that exist "out there." Related to essentialism is the problem of what Dawkins calls the legacy of "The Great Chain of Being," which is implicit in the demand for "missing links." In the middle ages was the doctrine that there was a "great chain," or a ladder, with inanimate objects at the bottom, lower animals next, followed by man, angels, and finally God. With this doctrine entrenched, it's difficult to understand how there can be any form of transition or "link" from something on one chain. But according to evolutionary biology, among living things there is no "chain" as such, since everything is interrelated- there is only growing complexity and/or diversity in response to environmental pressures.

The final thing that really impressed me in TGSOE was Dawkins' discussion of embryonic development. The DNA code, though containing instructions for how proteins are to develop based on the gene sequence, cannot be described as a blueprint. Blueprints have a one-to-one relationship. In other words you can have a blueprint and construct a building, and go to a building and reconstruct its blueprint; the same reciprocal relationship simply does not exist with organisms and gene sequences. Dawkins says that the best way to look at embryonic development is like origami, or the unfolding of the gene sequences through proteins and catalysts. This chapter was simply fascinating.

There is much else in the book that I could discuss in this review, such as Dawkins' discussion of the last paragraph of "Origin," his discussion of "evolutionary theodicy," carbon-dating, fossils, etc. Whether this book will turn the current anti-science cultural/political tide in a more favorable direction is is hard to say, though it is definitely well-written and will greatly help those wanting to learn about evolution a means of doing so.

Prior to buying this product I had heard a lot of hype about Dawkins but never really paid any attention. I was raised as a firm believer in Creation and taught the reasons why Evolution was so 'ridiculous', after losing my earlier faith I began to wonder what the other side of the story was. This CD book was wonderful it explained the theory of evolution in a manner that I had never heard before, for the first time I learnt that the theory doesn't teach we came from monkeys, but that we had common ancestors. The writer is extremely erudite, but at the same time manages to keep the information at a level that doesn't go over the listeners head. Many people had told me that Dawkins is very anti-religious, but I didn't get that impression from listening to this. He evinces a dislike for a certain type of religion, doesn't seem opposed to all religion.

14 CD's seems like a lot and it took me a while to get through, but the benefit of having it on CD was being able to listen to it in the car. I did end up buying the book later for the ability to make notes in the margin something that CDs can't replace.

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"One of the truly bad effects of religion is that it teaches us that it is a virtue to be satisfied with not understanding...If you don't understand how something works, never mind: just give up and say God did it." (from the bestselling book "The God Delusion," 2006)

Don't worry!! This book, "The Greatest Show on Earth," is a book of understanding and...evidence (lots and lots of evidence). This book was written by Richard Dawkins.

Dawkins is a biological theorist and scientist (ethologist, evolutionary biologist, and sociobiologist). He is a popular science author focusing on evolution. (He also wrote the bestseller mentioned above.) Dawkins retired from Oxford University in 2008 but remains a writer and public figure.

Where did the title of this book come from? Years ago an anonymous well-wisher had sent Dawkins a T-shirt with the words: "Evolution, the Greatest Show on Earth, the Only Game in Town." From this slogan, he found his title. (I'd like to get myself one of these T-shirts.)

Why was this book written? All Dawkins' previous works dealing with evolution (as first proposed by Charles Darwin in his scientific masterpiece "On the Origin of Species," 1859) had simply assumed its truth and had not explicitly provided the evidence for it. Thus, this book was written to fill that gap.

It seems to me that Dawkins also wrote this book to honour Charles Darwin (1809 to 1882). It is no accident that this book has thirteen chapters. Darwin's 1859 masterpiece was fourteen chapters long but it's the first thirteen chapters that are the explanatory chapters with the last chapter being entitled "Recapitulation and Conclusion."

From the point of view of modern intellectual life and culture, "On the Origin of Species" is one of the most important scientific books of all time. It evoked a storm of controversy when it was first published and initiated a revolution in our thinking that continues to this very day. Darwin's book deserves to be more widely read, and, importantly, better understood. However, it can be a dense and for many, a difficult read. As well, some of the evidence is sparse. For these reasons, understanding may be lost.

Enter Dawkins' book (published on the 200TH year of Darwin's birth and 150TH anniversary of Darwin's masterpiece). It explains in modern and lucid language how Darwin's theory of Evolution by Natural Selection works. If you did not understand this theory before, I'll guarantee you'll understand it thoroughly after reading this book.

A hallmark of this book is that it expands the evidence for biological evolution. All this evidence makes it quite clear that this theory can now be regarded unequivocally as fact.

Another hallmark of this book is that it corrects the many, many erroneous interpretations of Darwin's work (brought about by those who don't understand or have twisted what Darwin has said). For example, we're constantly told that humans are descended from monkeys. Right? WRONG!! As Dawkins tells us, "We share a common ancestor with monkeys."

This book has generated controversy because some say it puts down creationists. NO. What Dawkins does is to explain some evidence for evolution and occasionally asks how it is possible that creationists can believe otherwise. (Note that Darwin also does this in his 1859 book but he had to be careful because the social culture of his time was soaked in supernaturalism. This may have been one of the reasons he delayed publication of his book for twenty years.) Richard Dawkins then dissects their belief showing how it is blatantly false.

My favourite chapter is the last one. Here Dawkins examines "line by line" the very last two long sentences in Darwin's 1859 book. For me, this last chapter was a joy to read!

Unlike Darwin's 1859 book, Dawkins' book contains many black and white illustrations throughout. What I found particularly impressive were the four sets of colour photographs that were also included. There are 32 colour photos in total.

Finally, and I said this for "The God Delusion," this book is long. This by itself is not a problem but those who should read this book from cover to cover will be deterred by its length. This is a pity.

In conclusion, this is truly a remarkable book, a tribute both to Charles Darwin and his 1859 classic, explaining and showing that evolution is indeed "the greatest show on Earth, the only game in town." I leave you with the very last sentence of Charles Darwin's 1859 classic and a sentence Richard Dawkins analyses in the last chapter of his book:

"There is grandeur in this view of life [that is, grandeur in the laws of nature], with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms [of life] or into one [form of life]; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."

(first published in 2009; preface; 13 chapters; main narrative 425 pages; appendix; notes; bibliography; picture acknowledgements; index)

<<Stephen Pletko, London, Ontario, Canada>>

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I was confident before that evolution was the correct theory toward explaining the diversity of life on Earth. Now, after reading "The Greatest Show on Earth," it really hit it out of the park. It is a tour de force including some of the most recent evidence but also including some classics examples.

The author begins with a description of evolution and goes into logic theory. It's a bit pedantic, but necessary, in order to lay the theory out for the novice. Dawkins then tackles evolution by way of describing artificial selection to show natural selection. He uses perhaps the most famous example of artificial selection: dog breeding. He even shows that in just a few generations wild foxes can be bred to become tamer. I like that Dawkins started off with describing dog breeding. So much surrounding the evolution debate is about millions of years and random mutations. Yet, all breeds of dogs happened within the last few thousand years and almost all were the result of diversifying a gene pool, not genetic mutation.

Dawkins is good at pointing out many things that are evidence for evolution that the general reader could ponder. A couple examples: why don't whales have gills; why don't bats have feathers. That, Dawkins points out, is evidence for evolution because a creator would (one would think) be engineering minded and create the best possible being. In another chapter he quashes intelligent design by pointing out how poorly designed some living structures are. Examples include the human eye (yes, that "bastion" of design for any creationist) and the laryngeal nerve in giraffes (it goes from the brain down the entire length of the giraffe's neck and back up before going to the larynx!)

Even with such unintelligent design, surely there must be a designer to create that--it can't happen on its own, right? Dawkins addresses that extensively in one chapter, showing how chemical interactions on the micro level (DNA, enzymes, etc.) create macro beings such as humans. Truly a fascinating chapter.

Above, I reviewed Dawkins's treatment of artificial selection and dog breeding; change that has occurred within the last few thousands of years. But Dawkins goes one step further: showing real evolution that's happened within a human lifetime. One of the best chapters in the book "Before our very eyes," details experimental verification of evolution in the lab. Dawkins goes into detail of an experiment whereby several thousands of generations of E. Coli were evolved, the resultant being they became more efficient at eating glucose. Another experiment dealt with the sexual selection of guppies in ponds with various degrees of predation.

The last couple chapters aren't as good as the others. "Arms races and `evolutionary theodicy'" deals with the notion of survival of the fittest and how one cannot justify both a benevolent intelligent designer with the suffering of life in the evolutionary "arms race." Dawkins talks in generalities without citing any specific experiments and a few times he repeats simple ideas that are obvious. The last chapter is simply a parsing of a passage in "The Origin of Species" and is of little worth. Maybe Dawkins had to find a way to conclude his book.

"The Greatest Show on Earth" isn't for everyone. Obviously, devote creationists would view it similarly to pornography: the work of Satan. The more liberally minded Christian might find this convincing, but the other topic Dawkins is well known for--atheism--might turn away that crowd. And frankly, in my opinion, if one accepts evolution one hundred percent, there's not much left for God to do. The people who gave this book one star probably from the get-go did not intend to have their beliefs questioned. This book is more for those who have already accepted evolution as fact, or those who are open-minded. For those, this book is a must read. For the others, don't even bother. You can't handle the truth.

I did like the book - and I enjoyed the stuff I learned in it. It is just a bit wordy. What he ultimately says is interesting, but it was a bit of a slog to get through. I did enjoy it, just almost gave up at one point. I guess the reason why is because I felt like I already knew this information and getting into variations on what I already knew seemed like a bit of a waste of time. However, it was interesting and I learned some new things I didn't know before. So I have mixed feelings about the book. Liked it but as far as a book about evolution I enjoyed Your Inner Fish WAY more.

Yes, Charles Darwin would have been appalled at the percentage of scientific ignorance in the West, including the United States and Great Britain. According to recent polls, discussed by Dr. Richard Dawkins, about 40% of Americans believe that human beings existed at the same time as the dinosaurs. And if they think "that", they will not comprehend geological time in the billions of years; without an understanding of geological time, persons won't grasp what Darwin's theory is all about.

Surely, when Darwin introduced his groundbreaking book - "On the Origin of Species" - he expected a lot of religious fury over his conclusions. But when he died in 1882, he was so revered that he was buried in honor in England. My word, after so many scientific advances since his death...the Mendel revolution in genetics, the discovery of DNA, amazing fossil finds including primates 4 million years old that walked on two legs...how can so many be so ignorant? What has gone wrong with our educational system to allow this?

This is the challenge that Dr. Dawkins faces...and his response is to write this conversational introduction to evolution. What makes "The Greatest Show on Earth" better than other similar introductions is that Dawkins starts with the basics...and patiently and eloquently explains every principle.

I liked the fact he begins with the idea of "Fact" and "Proof." He explains that only mathematical conclusions can be proved. Or in his words - "to a mathematician, a proof is a logical demonstration that a conclusion necessarily follows from axioms that are assumed." Evolution, then, is not proved like a mathematical result. It is proved by being a collection of reliable observations or an inference that is not subject to reasonable scientific doubt. The earth is round, not flat. That is a "fact." Evolution reveals that each living creature and plant is a cousin, perhaps a distant cousin, of the other. That is a "fact."

From there, Professor Dawkins explains what Darwin actually discovered. His contribution was not just that one species can change into another (that is evolution); his contribution was the rationale why this occurs (that is natural selection). Alas, Darwin had not read Mendel's discoveries on genetics even though Mendel had read Darwin. As the author tells us, "if [Darwin] had read Mendel's paper, the history of biology would have been very different."

The book explains in simple language the concepts of evolution. He discusses "pleiotropry" (one gene governs several characteristics even though only one characteristic of the group may have been "naturally selected") or the concept of "homology" (such as the similarity of the bat skeleton to the human skeleton). He talks about the emergence of animals from sea to land...or in some cases back to the sea again. (Think of whales or manatees which breathe air).

Finally, near the end, he discusses the difference between inorganic and living matter. "The harder we look at the border between life and non-life, the more elusive does the distinction become....Right up to the middle of the twentieth century, life was thought to be qualitatively beyond physics and chemistry. No longer. The difference between life and non-life is a matter not of substance but of information."

In summary, this is "the book", the clearest introduction to evolution that is out there in print. Dawkins faced his challenge and he bested it. Every high school in America should require its students to read it. After that, it is time to teach the new physics, cosmology, and the birth and destiny of the universe.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It could have all been said more concisely, but that would have been less fun. It is a great summary of all aspects of the evolutionary process. I particularly appreciated the treatment of genetics, as I do not have a strong background in that. Dawkins probably could have been less smug in his teatment of the "history deniers", but that isn't his style. The book has many footnotes that offer additional explanation for those with less scientific backgrounds.

If you could give half stars, I would give it 4.5!

Dawkins' new book is a return to 'natural history' and evolution's wonders. What distinguishes this book from his earlier works -- all of which are incredible reads -- prior to The God Delusion, is that it follows a path from the simplest of changes in living organisms to the large-scale changes that characterize evolution over time. The journey invites the reader along with the scientist, visiting vistas where the evidence for evolution is apparent and convincing. Dawkins succeeds wonderfully in leading the patient reader along from one example to the next, until the full scope of the scale of evolutionary change and the reality of evolution as the best -- and only currently viable -- explanation for "how we got here" is revealed.

I would argue that this is NOT an anti-religious book; if it were, I might be writing a very different review. This is an anti-creationist, pro-science apologetic; in the classic sense of that word. Early in the text Dawkins talks about how he has co-signed letters with Christian bishops urging that evolution is a fact, standing against the infiltration of our schools by creationists. While he himself is an atheist, he is not the enemy of intelligent, open-minded religion as such -- even though he disagrees with it's tenets in very strong terms. I would encourage anyone who is religious and who is not a creationist to read this book, and wonder at the universe and at life and how life has actually come into existence; how it has evolved over time. The only kind of religion that is threatened by this book is that of the creationists and fundamentalists; as Dawkins calls them -- the "history deniers."

Dawkins' prose is clear and yet poetic; there is an aesthetic enjoyment to reading any of Dawkins' books on evolutionary biology, and his use of metaphor and simile is always engaging and rewarding. When he makes a point about how the evidence he is presenting will 'annoy' creationists and other history deniers--he is not being mean, but simply affirming that the evidence for evolution is so strong that someone of the creationist ilk must necessarily be made 'uncomfortable.' I do not find this book full of vitriolic rhetoric! (Not in the least!). It is a beautiful journey through the evidence for the fact of evolution. I would invite all genuinely religious people to read, understand and embrace this book, come to terms with evolution, and proclaim its truth against the 'history deniers.'

I thought this book will be another case against stupidity of creationism, but I was wrong. This book turned out to be one of the best summaries on Evolution I have ever read. Simply, Richard Dawkins is a brilliant guy who understands the topic in depth. His evidence for Evolution here was so well written and put in contest in logic progressive way. I shared my thought about this book with few of my doctor friends and they are reading it now.
I really like Dawkins and his books. He is a brilliant mind, with in depth knowledge of Evolution. I wish he wrote more about it.

I've been mulling over this issue since I was a teenager, and Richard Dawkins has laid it out to me plain as day like previous authors could not. He takes the issues such as morphology, the age of the earth (very important to understand the concept of self-replicating molecules becoming mammals), experiments that DO actually show evolution, and modern examples of it actually happening in nature, to put together the puzzle that those of us who were raised as creationists can understand (my dad read bible stories to me starting at two years old; my aunt introduced my to ID circa 1996/97 with an analogy comparing a human brain to a computer, both of which show "evidence" of design, way before it made its way to court cases).

This won't persuade hardcore creationists who view Charles Darwin's writings as a threat to their worldview and faith, but this, along with Jerry Coyne's Why Evolution is True, will give the layman a firm enough understanding of natural selection and descent with modification. Granted, I am not of a fundamentalist* persuasion, and when I was 5 or 6 simultaneously held the view that dinosaurs did die out 65 MYA AND that God created Adam and Eve, so obviously I have a different reaction than someone else of a different background, but I do encourage fundamentalists to read this and Jerry Coyne's book to, at the very least, read the "other side".

*I use "fundamentalist" in the traditional sense, that being of the bible-believing Christians who rejected modernity, situational ethics, moral relativism, the mainline churches' converns over "social justice" and unions than the cross of Christ, and modern interpretations of the bible, and do not mean it pejoratively.

I found this book a good read, i am not much of a reader but i was able to read this in about a week. If you are interested in the subject of evolution this is a great book to read. It explains alot of evidence and talks about numerous experiment with conclusions that support evolution. I found it great and learned quite a bit, there was a few instances where it gets a bit more difficult to follow( depends on reader) as it gets a bit technical a times but its not too bad. If you have a basic understanding of science its a good read.

Dawkins sets out to establish evolution as a fact, and does so in grand style. If there are any deficiencies in the work, they are sins of omission:
- He talks about radioactive dating, but doesn't discuss some of the tricks that can be used to obtain precision considerably better than the 1% which he mentions. For example, the age of the earth is now known to be 4566 million years [1]. Also, he doesn't mention dating by other means -- such as the work with sulfur 32 and 34 which pegs the oxygenation of the earth's atmosphere at about 2.5 billion years ago [2].
- He doesn't really address genetic recombination during meiosis, which is a crucial element of genetic diversification.
- He doesn't address the fact that the theory of evolution is unique among scientific theories in that it is provably correct. Even without this, the evidence is so overwhelming that anyone who does not believe in evolution must be characterized as scientifically illiterate.

For more on this, see [3].

Postscript (added 10/30/2010): The Caro paper [1] has been effectively superseded by a still better determination of the age of the earth [4]: it is 4,568,200,000 years, correct to within 0.01%.

-- RAS.

References:
1. Caro et al, Super-chondritic Sm/Nd ratios in Mars, the Earth, and the Moon. Nature, vol. 452, 20 March 2006, p. 336.

2. Goldblatt et al, Bistability of atmospheric oxygen and the Great Oxidation. Nature, vol 443, 12 Oct. 2006, p. 683.

3. Prothero, Evolution: what the fossils say, and why it matters. (Available on the store.)

4. Bouvier and Wadhwa, The age of the Solar System redefined by the oldest Pb-Pb age of a meteoric inclusion. Nature Geoscience, vol. 3, Sept. 2010, p. 637.

Brillant & very readable! Only one serious complaint. Chapter 0 (on human evolution) is very much biased & outdated. It has become clear e.g. (1) that australopithecines were probably no human ancestors, and (2) that no hominid regularly ran over the African plains (sweating water + salt = scarce in savannas).
The open-plain ideas of human evolution are based on the traditional assumption (but logical mistake) that Ape-->Man = quadruped-->biped = forest-->plain. But all objective data (paleo-environmental, fossil, physiological, nutritional...) show that Pleistocene Homo simply followed the African & Eurasian coasts & rivers, beach-combing, diving & wading bipedally for littoral, shallow aquatic & waterside foods (rich in brain-specific nutrients, e.g. DHA). Some recent publications on this "coastal dispersal model" (Munro 2010):
-J.Joordens... S.Munro... 2014 Homo erectus at Trinil on Java used shells for tool production and engraving, Nature doi 10.1038/nature13962
-S.Munro 2010 Molluscs as ecological indicators in palaeoanthropological contexts, PhD thesis Univ.Canberra
-J.Joordens... 2009 Relevance of aquatic environments for hominins: a case study from Trinil (Java, Indonesia), J.hum.Evol.57:656-671
-S.Cunnane 2005 Survival of the fattest: the key to human brain evolution, World Scient.Publ.Comp.
-M.Vaneechoutte... eds 2011 Was Man more aquatic in the past? eBook Bentham Sci.Publ.
-M.Verhaegen 2013 The aquatic ape evolves: common misconceptions and unproven assumptions about the so-called Aquatic Ape Hypothesis, Hum.Evol.28: 237-266, google researchGate marc verhaegen

Read the book for the love of biology, not to debate with creationists.

I really enjoyed reading this book as it went over and explained many of the recent advances in biology and was thought provoking in the process. What I didn't think it was so much geared towards was, was providing snappy and quick answers for debating. To me this book was for the person that wants to learn more about evolution and biology, and would perhaps would want to use this as a starter to go on and learn more.

It seems at some point one has to decide if they want to spend the majority of their time and energy arguing with creationists, or further exploring the wonders of biology. After all most of us are limited in our time and energy. This book is more for those that want to explore the wonders of biology. I really enjoyed reading this.

I bought his book without any great expectations as I have a scientific background (though not in biology) and was already convinced of Darwin's theory of evolution before I read the book.
I expected a rehash of things I knew or thought I knew.
Still, partly because I had a long flight ahead of me and partly because I like Richard Dawkins (watch his excellent BBC documentaries if you get the chance) and thought it would be money well spent I bought the book.

I was therefore very pleasantly surprised when I started reading it.
Not only did I find the style quite engaging (not at all a dry arduous boring science factbook)and easy to read but I was also very pleased at the amount of things I actually learned.
I was not aware (or only generally aware) of the experiments that have been conducted that show evolution at work on short timescales (a few years or decades):
- Wild foxes turned into dog-like animals (complete with wagging tails, floppy ears and human friendly behavior) in only a few decades.
- Fishes changing their camouflage patterns in a few years depending on the river bed (sandy, pebbly, stony) they've been relocated and the intensity of predatory activity (more predatory activity = best camouflage is favored, no predatory activity = flashiest males are favored!).
- Carnivorous lizards turning into herbivorous ones (ie changing skull shape and digestive system) when relocated on a different (but with less insects) island off the same coast.
- Lenski experiment on Bacteria (amazing!) splitting an initial population of bacteria in 12 'lineages' subsequently kept strictly separate but under identical conditions (same flask with same liquid and nutrients) and showing how those 12 lineage evolved to cope with their environment over 40'000 generations (a few year's time for bacteria)with one of the lineages hitting (as a consequence of random genetic mutations) on a way to use a different nutrient, leading to an explosion of their population density.

In a nutshell, this is an excellent book targeted at non-specialist audiences who either want to be able to articulate rational arguments about the theory of evolution or people who genuinely wonder what the theory is about, how it came to be and how it is supported by scientific evidence (including the most recent developments in genetics).

I thought this book will be another case against stupidity of creationism, but I was wrong. This book turned out to be one of the best summaries on Evolution I have ever read. Simply, Richard Dawkins is a brilliant guy who understands the topic in depth. His evidence for Evolution here was so well written and put in contest in logic progressive way. I shared my thought about this book with few of my doctor friends and they are reading it now.
I really like Dawkins and his books. He is a brilliant mind, with in depth knowledge of Evolution. I wish he wrote more about it.

I've been mulling over this issue since I was a teenager, and Richard Dawkins has laid it out to me plain as day like previous authors could not. He takes the issues such as morphology, the age of the earth (very important to understand the concept of self-replicating molecules becoming mammals), experiments that DO actually show evolution, and modern examples of it actually happening in nature, to put together the puzzle that those of us who were raised as creationists can understand (my dad read bible stories to me starting at two years old; my aunt introduced my to ID circa 1996/97 with an analogy comparing a human brain to a computer, both of which show "evidence" of design, way before it made its way to court cases).

This won't persuade hardcore creationists who view Charles Darwin's writings as a threat to their worldview and faith, but this, along with Jerry Coyne's Why Evolution is True, will give the layman a firm enough understanding of natural selection and descent with modification. Granted, I am not of a fundamentalist* persuasion, and when I was 5 or 6 simultaneously held the view that dinosaurs did die out 65 MYA AND that God created Adam and Eve, so obviously I have a different reaction than someone else of a different background, but I do encourage fundamentalists to read this and Jerry Coyne's book to, at the very least, read the "other side".

*I use "fundamentalist" in the traditional sense, that being of the bible-believing Christians who rejected modernity, situational ethics, moral relativism, the mainline churches' converns over "social justice" and unions than the cross of Christ, and modern interpretations of the bible, and do not mean it pejoratively.

I found this book a good read, i am not much of a reader but i was able to read this in about a week. If you are interested in the subject of evolution this is a great book to read. It explains alot of evidence and talks about numerous experiment with conclusions that support evolution. I found it great and learned quite a bit, there was a few instances where it gets a bit more difficult to follow( depends on reader) as it gets a bit technical a times but its not too bad. If you have a basic understanding of science its a good read.

Dawkins sets out to establish evolution as a fact, and does so in grand style. If there are any deficiencies in the work, they are sins of omission:
- He talks about radioactive dating, but doesn't discuss some of the tricks that can be used to obtain precision considerably better than the 1% which he mentions. For example, the age of the earth is now known to be 4566 million years [1]. Also, he doesn't mention dating by other means -- such as the work with sulfur 32 and 34 which pegs the oxygenation of the earth's atmosphere at about 2.5 billion years ago [2].
- He doesn't really address genetic recombination during meiosis, which is a crucial element of genetic diversification.
- He doesn't address the fact that the theory of evolution is unique among scientific theories in that it is provably correct. Even without this, the evidence is so overwhelming that anyone who does not believe in evolution must be characterized as scientifically illiterate.

For more on this, see [3].

Postscript (added 10/30/2010): The Caro paper [1] has been effectively superseded by a still better determination of the age of the earth [4]: it is 4,568,200,000 years, correct to within 0.01%.

-- RAS.

References:
1. Caro et al, Super-chondritic Sm/Nd ratios in Mars, the Earth, and the Moon. Nature, vol. 452, 20 March 2006, p. 336.

2. Goldblatt et al, Bistability of atmospheric oxygen and the Great Oxidation. Nature, vol 443, 12 Oct. 2006, p. 683.

3. Prothero, Evolution: what the fossils say, and why it matters. (Available on the store.)

4. Bouvier and Wadhwa, The age of the Solar System redefined by the oldest Pb-Pb age of a meteoric inclusion. Nature Geoscience, vol. 3, Sept. 2010, p. 637.

Brillant & very readable! Only one serious complaint. Chapter 0 (on human evolution) is very much biased & outdated. It has become clear e.g. (1) that australopithecines were probably no human ancestors, and (2) that no hominid regularly ran over the African plains (sweating water + salt = scarce in savannas).
The open-plain ideas of human evolution are based on the traditional assumption (but logical mistake) that Ape-->Man = quadruped-->biped = forest-->plain. But all objective data (paleo-environmental, fossil, physiological, nutritional...) show that Pleistocene Homo simply followed the African & Eurasian coasts & rivers, beach-combing, diving & wading bipedally for littoral, shallow aquatic & waterside foods (rich in brain-specific nutrients, e.g. DHA). Some recent publications on this "coastal dispersal model" (Munro 2010):
-J.Joordens... S.Munro... 2014 Homo erectus at Trinil on Java used shells for tool production and engraving, Nature doi 10.1038/nature13962
-S.Munro 2010 Molluscs as ecological indicators in palaeoanthropological contexts, PhD thesis Univ.Canberra
-J.Joordens... 2009 Relevance of aquatic environments for hominins: a case study from Trinil (Java, Indonesia), J.hum.Evol.57:656-671
-S.Cunnane 2005 Survival of the fattest: the key to human brain evolution, World Scient.Publ.Comp.
-M.Vaneechoutte... eds 2011 Was Man more aquatic in the past? eBook Bentham Sci.Publ.
-M.Verhaegen 2013 The aquatic ape evolves: common misconceptions and unproven assumptions about the so-called Aquatic Ape Hypothesis, Hum.Evol.28: 237-266, google researchGate marc verhaegen

Read the book for the love of biology, not to debate with creationists.

I really enjoyed reading this book as it went over and explained many of the recent advances in biology and was thought provoking in the process. What I didn't think it was so much geared towards was, was providing snappy and quick answers for debating. To me this book was for the person that wants to learn more about evolution and biology, and would perhaps would want to use this as a starter to go on and learn more.

It seems at some point one has to decide if they want to spend the majority of their time and energy arguing with creationists, or further exploring the wonders of biology. After all most of us are limited in our time and energy. This book is more for those that want to explore the wonders of biology. I really enjoyed reading this.

I bought his book without any great expectations as I have a scientific background (though not in biology) and was already convinced of Darwin's theory of evolution before I read the book.
I expected a rehash of things I knew or thought I knew.
Still, partly because I had a long flight ahead of me and partly because I like Richard Dawkins (watch his excellent BBC documentaries if you get the chance) and thought it would be money well spent I bought the book.

I was therefore very pleasantly surprised when I started reading it.
Not only did I find the style quite engaging (not at all a dry arduous boring science factbook)and easy to read but I was also very pleased at the amount of things I actually learned.
I was not aware (or only generally aware) of the experiments that have been conducted that show evolution at work on short timescales (a few years or decades):
- Wild foxes turned into dog-like animals (complete with wagging tails, floppy ears and human friendly behavior) in only a few decades.
- Fishes changing their camouflage patterns in a few years depending on the river bed (sandy, pebbly, stony) they've been relocated and the intensity of predatory activity (more predatory activity = best camouflage is favored, no predatory activity = flashiest males are favored!).
- Carnivorous lizards turning into herbivorous ones (ie changing skull shape and digestive system) when relocated on a different (but with less insects) island off the same coast.
- Lenski experiment on Bacteria (amazing!) splitting an initial population of bacteria in 12 'lineages' subsequently kept strictly separate but under identical conditions (same flask with same liquid and nutrients) and showing how those 12 lineage evolved to cope with their environment over 40'000 generations (a few year's time for bacteria)with one of the lineages hitting (as a consequence of random genetic mutations) on a way to use a different nutrient, leading to an explosion of their population density.

In a nutshell, this is an excellent book targeted at non-specialist audiences who either want to be able to articulate rational arguments about the theory of evolution or people who genuinely wonder what the theory is about, how it came to be and how it is supported by scientific evidence (including the most recent developments in genetics).

Richard Dawkings is a wonderful science writer and his books are very easy and interesting to read, even for a layman. In this book, the author describes the dynamics of life and evolution, sustained by facts, and how perfectly it explains the variety of species and life forms in this planet, including Mankind. I highly recommend it - it's well worth the read.

In a way I'm glad Prof. Richard Dawkins wrote this book. So far I had a fairly rudimentary knowledge of evolution, and this helped me understand a bit more about it. But in a way I'm sad that books like these have to be written , not to inform or educate, but to refute the ignorant, the stupid or the dishonest(Like someone has said after reading this book they can no longer call themselves ignorant).
Prof. Dawkins has a lucid writing style, and when it comes to explaining science , I feel that he is only second to Carl Sagan. There is also the sense of sincerity and wonder about science that comes through in the writing, that makes anyone who has even a little of bit of curiosity, join Prof Dawkins on his journeys and explanations. Prof Dawkins manages to keep your interest even when he is discussing elaborate and intricate material like Richard Lenski's grand experiment. I read this section of the book on the train on the way home and I couldn't stop reading inspite of Prof Dawkins' warning to not read this at the end of a busy day.
The book itself covers a wide range of the evidence of evolution and discusses the various Creationist/Intelligent Design ploys and their fallacies, and Prof Dawkins deals with these issues appropriately(Warning if you are a creationist , it isn't pretty) . The book is full of witty anecdotes and I couldn't stop laughing at J.B.S. Haldane's 'You did it yourself and it only took you 9 months'. Professor Dawkins makes a comprehensive case for the various independent streams of evidence we have for evolution and the way that each one of them could have been falsified (take that Ann Coulter).
For those who are scared away by Prof Dawkins' atheism, this book does not touch on the subject (except in the preface) and even if you are , there are other books about evolution that you could and should read. If you discount evolution because of your religion, then you should remember Carl Sagan's words
'How is it that hardly any major religion has looked at science and concluded, "This is better than we thought! The Universe is much bigger than our prophets said, grander, more subtle, more elegant. God must be even greater than we dreamed"? Instead they say, "No, no, no! My god is a little god, and I want him to stay that way.'
After reading through this book I'm curious enough to read other books on evolution, on a couple of that interest me, this book has stoked my curiosity on the subject, and I'm sure that for Prof Dawkins, who is also an educator an who takes his teaching seriously , that is high praise.

I listened to the [...] version of this book. I also downloaded the reference material (illustrations) provided by Audible.

This is a really wonderful book which plainly provides plenty of evidence to support the idea that evolution, as defined by modern science, is how the profusion of life forms we witness today came to be. Influential people like Dennis Prager and Michael Medved should be required to consume the contents of this book before they utter another word on the subject. They currently both abandon their excellently evolved minds, and deny, in their "Intelligent Design" zeal, macro-evolution and natural selection.

Really, there is no need for them, or anyone for that matter, to address the question of how a deity fits into the picture. Dawkins does, unfortunately, get into that question within the book. He points out some obvious issues that make ID arguments look silly, but he need not have. He effectively makes the case for the facts of evolution without dragging in the "Darwin/ID" hassle.

The ID crowd are stuck in the doctrines they learned as children and will carry to their graves. It would be a major step forward for people like Dennis and Michael and the ID crowd to face the facts and the evidence and accept natural-selection evolution regardless of how it all got started.

Thank you, Professor Dawkins.

It was a very intresting book and is full of information. The book is very complete, well researched and well layed out.It's a very intresting book and well worth reading if your into science, evolution, nature or just want to know more about evolution because it does give's you all the evidence and imformation of evolution that you will need.

I have read much about this subject. I liked it, but may not be the best book for beginners; it assumes knowledge of natural selection to some extent.

However, it's a good book. It shows how natural selection and genetics and mutations combine to make changes over millions of generations. God's special little children argue that it "doesn't prove anything" and I guess that's true. But it's a better explanation than a god that designed us like a watch and then hates it when we eat meat on Fridays or work on Sundays or creates people who ask why bad thing happen to good people. We can never prove something that happened billions of years ago, and some would say "then why believe in that?" but it's still far more believable than "Jesus did it". Thanks Jesus.

Another Dawkins book that provides an excellent supplementary education for those of us that didn't get enough science in school. I sat at my computer for much of the audio book, so I could look up the images to which he referred. While I didn't need any persuasion with regard to the theories of Darwin, my details were lacking and I enjoyed learning from the good doctor in this book. Highly recommended reading for most of us that could have used a better education in the sciences.

Creationist or evolutionist, one has to agree Dawkins is sheer genius. Who else could afford to footnote that if humans had eight fingers -- rather than ten -- we would have been using computers about a century ago (hint: hexadecimal counting). Like his metaphorical detective, he radiates charm -- to a fish, an island is a pond surrounded by water. He catches attention before it wanders off by incongruousness -- in an isolated island ecosystem, big animals get smaller, and otherwise small animals get bigger (Galapagos Tortoise). He points out what could prove his belief wrong -- if one finds mammalian fossils, say, at rocks mapping to Davonian period much before any Darwinist estimates Mammals evolved at. Science is not about only showing the proof ('publication bias'), but also pointing out what situations would render the proof meaningless. That's exactly what differentiates Dawkins -- he spent a full chapter on why an 'intelligent design', like done by an architect on whiteboard, would not have made human back (think: chronic pain) like it is. It would either let a Cheetah win always, or Gazelle outrun Cheetah every time had the race been designed by someone like a 'computer designer'. But may be a game developer would leave that degree of freedom to let 'local factors' determine the end results in a complex, non-deterministic way? Since 'non-random natural selection' is 'the only game in the town' (as the book ends advocating) --analyzing the idea of that 'intelligent gamer' would have been fun!

Because I've read almost all of Dawkins' other books, I thought that I would have nothing new to learn from this one and I originally obtained it just to flip through the pages and look at the marvelous photos. But after a brief perusal, I became hooked and read the entire book in 4 long sittings. My review will not discuss the book in great depth, because others have already done that. Besides, wouldn't your time be better spent reading the book, not summaries of the book?

One of the things that I like about Dawkins' writing style is the clarity of his explanations. He goes to great lengths to make his points very clear, as if he anticipates every question that a reader might ask, as if he were speaking with them directly. This is the hallmark of a great science teacher. Dawkins is also a lover of poetry, history and literature, and this book, like all his others, is sprinkled liberally with analogies from world history and quotes from Shakespeare, Keats, Browning and whomever else has said something relevant to the discussion His footnotes are not to be skipped, as they contain some of the best writing and elucidations in the book. The witty verse about the double brain that some dinosaurs had, in the footnote on page 306, is a good example of this (I memorized it). The drawings, graphs and photographs are generous, though I thought that the index could have been deeper, as I often had to thumb through the book looking for where he made mention of a particular animal species. He also directs the reader to many outside resources such as the "starlings at Otmoor" video on YouTube and the Tree Of Life that can be downloaded from the University Of Texas website. Dawkins, is of course, a zoologist and the reader will learn a lot about fascinating animal behavior such as that displayed by the Ichneumon wasp and the Euglossine bee. Did you know that the hooves of a horse are homologous to the middle toes on your feet and the middle fingers of your hands and that the bones in the wings of a bat are homologous to the bones in your hands? Interesting stuff.

The final chapter, where he dissects and discusses, in minute detail, the last paragraph in the 1st edition of Darwin's Origin of Species, is a must-read; a brilliant piece of writing. For instance, part of that final paragraph said "having been originally breathed" in the 1st edition of Origin of Species, whereas, in subsequent editions it read "having been originally breathed by the Creator". Dawkins examines the reason for this and takes 5 pages to do so (but I wasn't bored one bit)!! The short answer, by the way, that Darwin added "the Creator", as well as other quasi-religious words to editions 2-6, was due to extreme public pressure.

The reviews that are less than four stars were obviously given by people who didn't actually read the book, most of which probably are creationists who would find a science book difficult to endure. They no doubt heard about The Greatest Show On Earth on Converapedia ( written by a right wing, anti-gay, anti-black, anti-gun control, misogynist group) or some other hate-mongering online publication, and then went over to the store to make sure that the book didn't get the 5 star average rating that it deserves. Their trivial comments clearly show this and most never say anything specific about the book. I don't see how Dawkins can contain his frustration when he talks directly with people like Wendy Wright, "President Of Concerned Women For America"; part of his interview with Wright is reproduced in this book. I'm sure that Wright has at least an average IQ, but she came across as very dense with no intention of changing her creationist point-of-view. Dawkins kept trying to tell her that the fossil evidence for evolution was in museums all over the world but she kept asking for hard evidence as if she didn't hear a word that he said!! This went on for several pages and Dawkins must have felt that he was trapped in some sort of "Groundhog Day" scenario. I've had similar discussions with creationists and I think that after a certain age is reached, it is impossible to educate them. Thinking scientifically has no benefit for them other than learning the truth about the natural world, whereas, religion acts as an interpreter of threats and promises conveyed from a supernatural world. Fantasy is apparently more alluring than reality.

In this book, Dawkins continues to amaze me by his dogged, indefatigable attempt to make creationists see the rationality of the information that science has mined in the almost century and a half since Origin of Species was first published. He continues to try to explain evolution to creationists because he seems to believe that deep down inside, every human being is as rational as himself. He's like a court room lawyer, who believes so much in his underdog client, that despite an obviously biased jury, if he explains things in just the right manner, then they will eventually see the light, put their preconceived ideas aside, and he will win his case. Only, for some reason, the attorney doesn't understand that the jury is deaf, dumb and blind and will never see the evidence that is so carefully presented to them. So Dawkins, the eternal optimist, continues his quest to convert a world filled with billions of creationists. On one hand, I admire his stalwart nature, but on the other hand, I believe that 99.99% of his readership doesn't need convincing. As I already said above, once people reach a certain age, most are "fixed" for life. They will never abandon their long-cherished beliefs because the ramifications are just too great. The ostracism by family and friends will be too much for them to bear, even if, and that's a big "if", they chose even to entertain the thought. The scientific ideas advanced by Dawkins, Gould, et al can't compete with the low-cost immortality insurance that religion peddles, which includes the promise of a grand reunion with all of one's loved ones in heaven. Reality is a bitter pill to swallow and most aren't having it. The Appendix, where Dawkins discusses the shameful world statistics, that show that a large percentage of the world's population still believes in creationism and other biblical myths, is quite depressing. The statistics also show that nothing has changed for the better in all the years that these statistics have been gathered and 40% of Americans still believe in the Noah's Ark myth--even more than decades ago. So, things are not getting any better and the only way that they will is if Time Magazine was right when they ran a cover story a few years ago suggesting that maybe there is a God gene. If that is so, we can hope that it mutates to something more benign. Because that seems to be about the only way that sane individuals will ever get control of this country or any other.

Though this book was written to explain why evolution is true, and should be read by creationists and young people who have not yet been brainwashed by our predominantly religious culture, in fact, it will (unfortunately) be read only by people such as myself who enjoy good science writing and are already "members of the choir". In 40 years of being an atheist and a believer in evolution, I have never brought even one person over to my way of thinking and I doubt that Dawkins will fare much better. But thank you, Mr. Dawkins for another great book, the reading of which has fine-tuned my knowledge of biology.

Are you a former creationist or Intelligent Design enthusiast? After growing up in an IFB (independent fundamental baptist) cult, I was clueless about evolution upon emergence. All I had heard about evolution was that "man came from monkeys." I needed to study the basics of evolutionary theory before I came to my conclusion about earth's having a creator.

Richard Dawkins is a vocal atheist trumpeting science as incompatible with fundamentalist religion (if not all religion.) Becoming an atheist sparked my critical thinking skills from dormancy into action. I chose The Greatest Show on Earth as my introductory lesson to Evolution.

Here's my YouTube video review about my experience in listening to the audio version of this book: [...] (It was too large to upload here. YouTube Channel: MEAndersFit)

I would recommend this book to the following five groups:

- Those who are newly deconverted from Christianity.
- Christians questioning the validity of Creationism or Intelligent Design.
- Religious leaders seeking to explain the origins of the world to their congregations.
- Anyone who needs a refresher course about the basics of evolution.
- Brainwashed religious cult survivors.

Readers: What other books would you recommend to someone new to evolution? Any other favorite scientific authors you enjoy? Carl Sagan is next on my to be read list for evolution self-education.

After setting off a firecracker in every church in the West with his wildly controversial "The God Delusion" (a veritable industry of Christian books seems to have popped up in the last few years consisting solely of angry Christians denouncing Richard Dawkins and his book, and sometimes, in much less detail, other "New Atheist" writers), the good professor is returning once more (perhaps for the last time? I certainly hope not, but it seems likely) to the subject which he has built his fame and authorial career on: the theory of evolution. His previous evolution-centric writings have always (naturally) presumed the truth of evolution, and so focus on different aspects of it. This is no fault on his part. Teaching evolutionary biology is something that should ideally be accomplished in the K-12 classroom. Alas, science education is being assaulted non-stop lately by an international coalition of extremist Christians and Muslims who have made it their goal to systematically destroy the teaching of evolutionary biology by spreading misinformation and funding domestic propaganda vehicles. Perhaps due to the recent proliferation of Intelligent Design and Islamic creationism in Europe and the United States wrought by this, Dawkins has written a book on the evidence for evolution.

Or has he?

Certainly there is evidence here, but the title led me to believe this would be a rigorous and systematic presentation of the evidence for evolution. This is not what this book is. It is, rather, a chatty introduction to evolution. Specific examples are fairly scant, and instead of referencing technical articles, as one would expect from a former professor. he quotes more informal sources, many from the internet. If you're getting this because you're expecting a formal presentation of the evidence for evolution, I would give this a pass (while I have yet to read it, I hear Jerry Coyne's "Why Evolution is True" is excellent in this regard). If you want a relatively non-technical introduction to evolution, however, or if you just enjoy the good professor's style and find that he is always compelling, then I whole-heartedly recommend this book.

Do not read this expecting another "The God Delusion." While he does take a fair number of shots at creationists in this (or "history deniers," as he calls them, alluding to the ridiculous anti-semitic tendency to deny the Holocaust in the face of all contrary evidence and common-sense), this book is about evolution, not atheism. As he says in the book, he has already worn that T-shirt.

The beginning of the book is a 'softening-up' program, designed to lead the reader from the obvious (artificial selection) to the less obvious (natural selection). Dawkins explains how we know the age of the Earth. And then he gets into the meat of the book.

I think this will suffice as a brief overview of the book's content:

Only a Theory? - Evolution is just a theory in the same way the theory of heliocentrism is just a theory. Scientific theories are not mere conjectures.

Dogs, Cows, and Cabbages - Covers domestication and artificial selection by human breeders

The Primrose Path of Macroevolution - Artificial selection occurs in nature, too

Silence and Slow Time - The age of the Earth and how we know it

Before Our Very Eyes - Observable evolution of microbes

Missing Link, What Do You Mean Missing? - The fossil record and what it tells us

Missing Persons, Missing No Longer - Fossils relating to human evolution

You Did It Yourself in Nine Months - Bottom-up assembly in the womb

The Ark of the Continents - Continental drift and the geographical dispersion of different species

The Tree of Cousinship - The tree of life

History Written All Over Us - Clues to our evolutionary history in our bodies

Arms Races and Evolutionary Theodicy - Competition and the role of suffering in nature

There is Grandeur In This View of Life - In-depth examination of final paragraph of Darwin's On the Origin of Species and how it describes the natural world as a way to wrap up the book.

There is an appendix as well, which contains some frightening statistics about the spread of creationism throughout the world.

None of this is going to convince creationists, of course, and some people who have an adequate understanding of modern evolutionary biology will be bored by this rather simplistic overview, but this is perfect for the intelligent layman who doesn't really understand the science behind evolution and for the Dawkins fan who just appreciates getting another chance to read his clear and lucid prose.

EDIT: added 02/14/10 - I neglected to mention the BEAUTIFUL full-color photographs in this book. But they deserve mention. They're sublime.

EDIT(2): added 05/21/10 - I believe I neglected to mention just how condescending his language can be in this book. It becomes obnoxious on occasion, as when he advises his readers to "take a nap" before reading a section of the book that he feels might be difficult to understand. I understand he is targeting a very uninformed demographic with this book, but I think readers can decide for themselves when the optimal time to read his book is. This never amounts to more than a minor annoyance, however.

The espoused purpose of "The Greatest Show on Earth" by Richard Dawkins is to provide the evidence for evolution. It is the first book I've read by Dawkins, and based upon my preconceptions of the author, I expected a crisp, surgical, objective, fact-filled presentation. It didn't quite measure up to my expectations, but it was an interesting and enlightening read nonetheless. Dawkins' evidence for the veracity of evolution is compelling for someone who already believes or who is open minded and accepting of scientific proof. The book is replete with asides and digressions which are quite entertaining even though they detracted somewhat from the case for evolution. On the flip side, his coverage of irreducible complexity and living fossils are brief and unsatisfactory. Plus, his purpose would have been better served if had just presented the facts and resisted the temptation to attack the opposition - "History Deniers" as he euphemistically calls them.

Award winning evolutionary biologist and popular science author Richard Dawkins meticulously constructs a scaffolding of examples plucked from the natural world in order to present evidence of evolutionary processes in action. The range of topics is immense, spanning size dimensions from microorganisms to mega-mammals, and time scales from months to millennia. The human position on the evolutionary tree of life is proudly confirmed, and Dawkins' attack on creationism is always front and center.

In "The Greatest Show on Earth" Dawkins reveals to the audience a grand carousel of evolution evidence. The work is monumental in scope, inspiring in detail, and breathtaking at every turn. An enjoyable read packed with free flowing scientific information, the book displays a mastery of broad fields of knowledge not often found in popular science. Whether it is the biology of large scale speciation across the planet, the microbial evolution of bacteria within a lab, the chemistry of essential macromolecule assembly and enzymatic tools, or the physics of radioactive dating and thermodynamics, professor Dawkins provides clear and patient explanations of life's "smooth gradient of improvement". While a more timid author may tip toe delicately around the controversial aspects of the subject, Dawkins jumps in with both feet. He floods the reader with examples of animal and human cousinship, and openly addresses the biological mistakes resulting from evolutionary processes. He never shirks away from the harsh reality of natural selection, but seems to develop slight tunnel vision when showcasing his well known notion to the "selfish gene" (Dawkins 1976) without mentioning any aspects of kin selection, or some of the modern published work on the subject (notably, Henry H. Lee, M. N.(2010, September 2). Bacterial charity work leads to population-wide resistance. Nature , pp. 82-86). However, the few examples of hand-waving are easily excused, for when he needs to lead the reader gingerly through difficult concepts, he does so carefully and politely (as when detailing Dr. Lenski's lab work with evolving tribes of E.Coli); and when he wants to take large leaps over continents and millennia to connect disparate concepts, he does so with agile grace and style (as with piecing together the fossil record). The academic seriousness of the topic is countered by a conversational tone, sprinkled with just enough British wit and cynicism to keep things lively. Full color photographs and illustrations provide stunning emphasis of the more visual topics throughout. By any measure the book is successful in filling in the author's self described "serious gap" in evolution evidence found lacking in his previous works. In doing so, its breadth and rigor rises above mere popular science and makes it a welcome addition to any biology class reading list.

Ardent fans of Dr. Dawkins will be pleased find him once again engaging in a full frontal assault on the dogmatic religious sect. The face off is announced in the early pages, and motivated by some alarming polling data showing a large percentage of Americans to be ignorant of, confused by, or in denial of the process of evolution (the full polling data is referenced in the Appendix). Unfortunately however, Dawkins seems blinded to the reality of the situation. Attempting to convince `young-earth' creationists of their folly is simply a wasted effort. They are unlikely (or rather, unwilling) to be reached by his argument, as their position is necessarily based on a premise of proof-less faith, leaving them disconnected from the scientific reasoning employed in the book. His badgering attack on these "history deniers", although executed with typical Dawkins precision, wears down the convinced reader as much as the intended victim and gives a foolish notion an unnecessarily large stage. In the tradition of his beloved Darwin, Dawkins would do well to strike a more humble tone, and let the science and evidence speak for itself. "The Greatest Show on Earth" includes enough fine material on the subject to do just that. Dawkins' best avenue for success with this most recent work is to reach out to open minded youth and allow evolution to become a permanent part of their intellectual genome.

The material in this book will be of no surprise to anyone who has a strong understanding of evolution and the massive amount of evidence supporting it. However, I felt that the title was slightly misleading, considering that it focused more on how evolution/natural selection works. Regardless, there were great sections within the book focusing on the evidence; such as Richard Lenski's work, important areas of the fossil record and vestigiality among other things.

This book would be great to read alongside Jerry Coyne's "Why Evolution Is True".

Another good book by Dawkins. Not excellent, but good. I think he tries to do too many things in his life to strive for that perfection. Believers will believe and haters will still hate. I thought the latter half was not nearly as interesting as the first half. Somewhat rambled on with stuff that was obvious or not really interesting

Dawkins, as usual, is spot on with his writing. He explains multiple pieces of evidence for evolution, but in a way where his goal is to help readers make the logical connections. He isn't brash with his writing, this is one of his more sensitive writings, so I say everyone should read this.

I suspect at least 95% of the people reading this book already are in the "evolutionist" camp. The other 5% are either on the fence, or looking for ammunition to refute evolution and support ID. (Or as I like to think, perhaps it should be called UID -- Un-Intelligent Design).

I basically fall into the evolutionist camp, but the more I read, the more questions I have. Not really unusual, I find it's common to have more questions the more you learn about something. The questions just get more specific.

In this case the main thing that stuck in my mind after reading the book is the CONSISTENCY of mammalian skeletons -- they're are ALL THE SAME in number and order of bones, while the size and function of each bone varies among different mammals. The same thing is true for crustaceans -- the relative location of various body parts are all the same, while the size & function changes significantly.

I fully "get" that this can be seen as proof of evolution. However, the thing that bothers me is that the evolution in these examples seem to "BEGIN" with a basic defined structure that DOES NOT VARY. It seems like there ought to be fossil remains that show the evolution (at least an occasional mammal fossil with fewer bones, for instance) to this basic structure that's in place today. I don't recall the book offering that. Of course maybe they exist, but palaeontologists might "fill in the blanks" as they EXPECT them to be, as opposed to what they really uncover.

I need to go back to another book I read "Shattering the Myths of Darwinism" by Richard Milton. I seem to recall he had something to say about this sort of thing.

This isn't the best introductory book I've read on evolution, Dawkins loves to insult the people who don't hold his views, goes way to far sometimes to get his point across and has a tendency to ramble on and mention interesting but irrelevant stuff. Once you get past the flaws this actually is a pretty good book, oddly by the end some of those qualities I hated about the book in the beginning, I started to appreciate more in the end (I kind of enjoy the almost pointless side stories and facts).

When I started reading this book, I put it down for a while because I got tired of the creationist rants, which apparently the high number of people who deny evolution is why this book is written. Dawkins even goes as far as comparing an evolution denier as the equivalent of someone denying the existence of the roman civilization or even worse a holocaust denier. I'm sorry but lacking the understanding or denying evolution is nothing like denying the holocaust. For one thing we've never really witnessed one animal evolving into another completely different species, meaning one "kind" into another "kind", in our lifetime (which is far too short of a time scale) or even more a bacteria evolving into a mammal, this doesn't mean evolution is false (its not), but it is far different than denying the holocaust. Anyways eventually I picked the book back up and it was far better as I got further into it. Also expect to hear the word "history-deniers" every few pages, I guess he wants us to remember just how terrible the evolution deniers are. Since this book is written to convince the 40% of American who deny evolution, Dawkins should realize by now that insulting your target audience isn't the best way to get them to listen to you. If anything his books do more help to the young earth creationist movement and intelligent design.

The subtitle of this book is "The Evidence for Evolution", which is kind of an unfitting title, I found that Coyne's Why Evolution is True contains far more evidence in far fewer pages and is overall a better introduction to evolution. You see Dawkins often goes off on rants which do not to move the evidence along. For example in a chapter he discusses the age of the earth, he spends several pages discussing getting the age from tree rings. You see you can match the width of tree rings with others and go back to earlier dates, but then he says that the chain of tree rings goes back 11,000 years only, well the pages he spent on this argument do nothing to convince a young earth creationist of the age of the earth, in fact the argument works in their favor. The book is full of these little side notes and stories which causes the page numbers to go up, but the relevant information doesn't follow. Also expect tons of foot notes with mostly rants about TV shows he wants to be on, his childhood, or why we should call the Beijing Man, the Peking fossil, ect.

I know I've complained some but don't get me wrong, this book, once you look past the flaws, is still very interesting and worth reading (assuming that you're not a creationist). Many of the side stories which I complained about are actually interesting if you don't mind frequent diversions and he goes into DNA a little more than the other non DNA specific evolution books I've read. So in the end I do think its pretty good, just not as a first book on evolution.

Great book, almost too much for the those who only have a passing interest in evolution. If there are creationists who can read this book and still believe the world is 5000 years old, I do not know what to say.

One and a half thumbs up.

Dawkins is a rock star not because of his scientific standing but for his ongoing crusade against religion. One infuriating tendency are the smartass digs he manages to insert regardless of their aptness for the current conversation whether writing or speaking. Dawkins is not an original or creative thinker as many think. No new insights or discoveries ca be recalled. Instead, he is an explicator, a teacher and debater, perhaps as important as new discoveries of great truths. He excells in connecting the dots - quotes, scientific wonderings, old and new research along with some science for the layman - all with an educated, witty style.

THE GREATEST SHOW is unlike his other books in that it deals with "evidence" that is simultaneously overwhelming and stark. He delights in berating ignorant folks (primarily Americans) who believe the world is 6,000 years old and cave folk played with T Rex. As a lifelong Bible Belt resident I can attest that this thinking exists but it is more due to lack of scientific exposure as religion. Many times, a simple explanation will set folks right or at least thinking.

The included color photos are FANTASTIC. Prose is nice but accompanying photographs add so much more. Hopefully, this will become the norm for all his future books. An initial discussion of "types" of Evolution (human-directed, other specie-directed, nature/mutation directed) is followed by several related subjects, He slowly builds a magnificent edifice of logic and data that leaves no room for doubt and covers almost all the bases - from dating to missing links. While its audience may be diehard Evolution advocates (the "saved" as Clinton was so fond of saying) it is a book that deserved to be written. My Grade - A-

I'm a contractor and like to listen to audio books at work. I have to be careful not to get something that is too dense to allow for a lapses in attention, or I miss out on the book. I was a little worried this might fall into that category, but for whatever reason, maybe the switching narrators, maybe the quality and style of writing, but this was perfect! I love the subject matter, and have both read and listened to Your Inner Fish, Life Ascending, and so on but those didn't lend themselves to listening at work and this really did. Some great books are just that, great books, and don't translate well to any other format, this is both a great read, and great listen.

A marvelous book, very well written, a thorough exposition of evolution by a true believer, pitched at the popular (introductory college) level. I always prefer to have things explained by true believers, particularly if they are well-written and break away from the cliches on the subject. With some minor quibbles, this book does that quite well. I predict that in time it will become a classic, perhaps even a notch better than Dr. Sean Carroll's excellent Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo and Dr. Jerry A. Coyne's Why Evolution Is True, both of which Dr. Dawkins (and I) recommend.

For those who know Dr. Dawkins as a rabid atheist and polemicist, this book is a welcome waft of fresh air. To quote, (p5) "This is a book about the positive evidence that evolution is a fact. It is not intended as an anti-religious book." Personally, I would re-word this slightly to "positive factual evidence for evolution."

Almost always he delivers on this promise, but he cannot resist the occasional dig at "creationists" in various asides, which all appear to be of the crazy-aunt young-earth variety. Surely he knows some creationists who are not of the crazy-aunt variety (surely he must know Owen Gingerich God's Universe?) It would be like equating "evolutionists" with Hitler or Lenin or Mao (who indeed carried out social evolution to its pathological extremes). Not fair on either side. Fortunately, these examples are almost incidental, and do not detract from the genuinely excellent exposition.

His crazy-aunt stance leads to statements such as this (p. 130),
"There is a comic sequel to this triumphant tale of scientific endeavour. Creationists hate it. Not only does it show evolution in action; not only does it show new information entering genomes without the intervention of a designer, which is something they have all been told to deny is possible ... it also undermines their central dogma of `irreducible complexity'." Well, I'm a creationist with many friends of a similar persuasion, and we see the Lenski research and applaud it. Especially for its careful scientific methodology, which is not always the basis for the more extreme claims of evolutionist true believers.

On that subject, however, I am not convinced that this research says as much as Dr. Dawkins asserts. The extended laboratory experiment which tracked a number of strains of e-coli for over twenty years, with truly remarkably prescient planning is an outstanding example of true science. The experiment regularly led the e-coli strains to near-starvation to force (I assume) evolutionary change. The denouement came with one strain at generation 20,000 or so when it switched its genetic make-up so that it could more efficiently process food. The result was indeed remarkable and unambiguous, but I think the explanation would require more proof before I accepted it as an evidence of true evolutionary innovation. The problem as I see it is that the e-coli genome is relatively large and has built-in several alternative ways to conduct metabolism, depending on the availability and type of food. The default assumption, then, would be that starvation activated one of these built-in alternative metabolism paths. It is not obvious that the observed results were really evolutionary innovation in the sense of creating new genes. Perhaps so, but Dr. Dawkins' argument is not persuasive. It would be interesting to follow-up the Lenski "evolution" with a detailed sequencing of the e-coli just before and just after the switch. That would at least show precisely where the change occurred (although sequencing in itself would not necessarily reveal changes in the gene expression).

In his defense of evolution as "fact" Dr. Dawkins mixes science with metascience. True science cannot exist without metascience, but metascience cannot be asserted with the same confidence (as "fact") that is possible in science. Both are needed, but should be presented with some modesty and room for alternative views (not notable virtues in Dr. Dawkins!) The data of science are indeed factual, but the data of metascience are assumptions and hypotheses which can never rise to the level of fact, however reasonable or compelling they may be.

An example of metaphysics is the "hairpin" assumption (pg. 25) "[F]or any two animals there has to be a hairpin path linking them, for the simple reason that every species shares an ancestor with every other species." This is not a provable "fact" -- it is a metaphysical assumption. In my metaphysics, relatedness (common genes, etc.) does not necessarily mean descent from a common ancestor; it may simply mean creation (either by fiat or through natural processes) by a common creator: God can certainly re-use genetic code, if being the creator means anything at all. My point is that this is not a statement, much less a fact, of science. It falls into the realm of metascience, and should not be presented as scientific fact.

My own metaphysical view is that God uses natural processes whenever they suffice to achieve an intended result. And since all living species have a (demonstrable) large amount of developmental flexibility, there is a lot of room for evolutionary change that can result in species divergence. But these things should be proved by scientific experiments (as astrophysicists do with stellar evolution). What cannot be proved by scientific experiment is the universal hairpin, although I have no objection to it being part of Dr. Dawkins' metaphysics.

Along these lines, I thoroughly enjoyed Dr. Dawkins' explanation of why the males of many bird species have gorgeous plumage even though that would seem to make them vulnerable to predation (p62ff). At the same time I would note that this observation is only a (perhaps reasonable) hypothesis. It is far from "fact" which would be evident if some other brilliant insight provided an alternative interpretation. Facts don't change. Meta-facts do.

At one point Dr. Dawkins mentions computer simulations of evolution, such as his Blind Watchmaker program (pg. 40). In my view these simulations are a great way to test development rules by following their consequences: but one must follow up in the lab to show that the assumed underlying rules exist in reality! These simulations don't prove evolution; they show the consequences of evolutionary assumptions, which can then be the focus of laboratory experiments. I say this as a person with a lifetime devoted to scientific computer simulation.

In summary, this is a great resource book for examples of evolution, and will undoubtedly become a well-thumbed book appreciated by both evolutionists and creationists.

HMS Challenger

I just completed this book and found it absolutely intriguing and fascinating. Well written, I was engaged cover to cover. In between reading, I was note taking and looking up references. The book, its contents, the authors style and comprehensive, deep knowledge - was an "experience" and I am still breathless for the take.

Richard Dawkins shows us that the appearance of a designer is just appearance.

How do you ask? By pointing out design "flaws" that should not exist if we were conceived originally in our present form. This includes a nerve that travels a lenght greater than twice the height of a human being to connect two parts less than a foot apart!(In a giraffe).

In its different chapters he talks about microbiology and fossils. Some reviewers complain that each of these is not done in as great detail as other books which provide emphasis in that one area, and that is true. However the intent here is not to get lost in one area, but rather to present all areas of scientific inquiry that provide proof evolution is true, and how the different sciences coincide with each other.

He avoids religion in this book, except where religious groups pose a challenge to evolution, specially those of the "Young Earth Creationism" creed. His point is that these groups discount available evidence from the sciences and present challenges to evolutionary biology that are the equivalent of asking a physicist to measure the falling speed of all objects on the earth prior to accepting the theory of gravity as true.

Interestingly one reviewer who identified himself as Jewish called Dawkin a fascist because of his ideology of portraying a struggle of the strong VS the weak Jews. It is rather shocking to me that a Jew would call himself part of the "weak" when we consider Jews have gotten more Nobel awards for Science than any other group!

If you are interested in an evolutionary explanation of Jewish intelligence(yes there actually is one), you might want to read "The 10,000 Year Explosion".

I never thought that evolution would ever defense. Even in Utah (of all places), evolution was taught in my high school, and I don't remember anyone in the class raised an objection. The evidences presented in class back then seemed sufficient. When I picked up this book at Hongkong airport, I was more curious about additional information that can presented about evolution, since I didn't study biology beyond AP biology in High School, which is because I don't want to go into any field similar to my dad, who has a Ph.D. in some subfield of biology.

As a book on popular science to the layman, this certainly achieves that. I was always curious about what they mean when they say chimps and humans have 98% of DNA in common, and how the radioactive dating worked. The information are presented so well that I couldn't put the book down.

A good portion of the book seems to be an effort to convert the creationists. A book as such is much needed since so many political leaders in US are so scientifically illiterate. However, I think the book fails on that effort. For someone so stupid to be a creationist, they can't possibly possession the mental capacity to follow the dense chapters on embryology or molecular genetics. What they need is to have ideas reduced into sounds bites, one liners, and colorful pamphlets. Someone please write such a book.

First, let me start by saying I am an unapologetic fan of Richard Dawkins. Secondly, I think it important to be aware that Dawkins is 'devotional' to the sentiment that natural selective pressures are able to account for the entirety of evolution. While this isn't particularly relevant to this book, and it shouldn't be taken as criticism, it is a worthwhile frame to have in mind.

Richard Dawkins has presented a near perfect 'primer' on Evolution and Evolutionary Theory in general. It is a smooth flowing narrative that guides the reader step by step through the broad sweeping ideas that lead through the accumulation of various forms of evidence (morphological, geographical distribution, molecular chemistry, fossil, etc) to build an understanding in the reader of what Evolution is and what kinds of evidence are available to present for its acceptance and the kinds of studies being engaged in.

It is a tribute to the 150th anniversary of the publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species. And it is simply brilliant. I might be inclined to dock him a mark or two for unnecessarily tweaking creationists noses every once in a while, but I also recognize what Richard Dawkins' "voice" is in his writing, and I can easily over the extraneous tweaking for the greater enjoyment of his style.

Whether You are someone that accepts Evolution or rejects it, this is an incredibly worthwhile read. It is a reasonably easy read, and should be enjoyable to all. Even if You are one that rejects evolution, it shouldn't dissuade You from reading this book if for no other reason than to at least get a thumbnail sketch of what it is that You are rejecting. Dawkins provides us with an extraordinary primer on the subject of evolution that can enable us all to come to a common understanding of what the subject is, even if we don't all agree with the conclusion.

I can recommend this book to any and everyone without the slightest hesitation.

This book was an excellent common sense read on the logic, elegance, and 'mechanics' of Evolution. I enjoyed it just as much as Donald Prothero's great book, 'Evolution: What The Fossils Say And Why It Matters', and Michael Shermer's awesome book 'Why Darwin Matters: The Case Against Intelligent Design'. Of course, as articulate and informative as it is, it will 'go over the heads' of those that are not capable of introspective and logical thought, especially those that have been brainwashed by overzealous, fanatical religious conservatives in this country, and around the world, who wouldn't know reality if their lives depended on it! There will always be AIDS and Holocaust denialists, as well as Evolution denialists. Curiously, in a country as supposedly technologically and scientifically advanced as ours, there are many more here who don't believe in Evolution as compared to other industrialized nations (Europe, for example). I attribute this to the utter and complete brainwashing by the manipulative, anti-science religious right that has dumbed down America with their poisoned agenda, and created mental illness on a level that has never been seen before.

Dawkins fills in what he saw as a gap in his writing — he had defended evolution many times, but until now he hadn’t presented the step-by-step evidence for it. A clear, standard account of the science, peppered with Dawkins’s trademark arrogance and a few mandatory shots at the creationists he loves to hate.

As I prepared to read this volume I expected that some new compelling evidence had been found that absolutely proved evolution beyond a shadow of a doubt, however was greatly dissapointed. In summary, I did not find anything new in this book that has not already been discussed or presented before. The "must have" evidence to support evolution is the existence of transition fossils, indeed even Darwin expressed that the absence of "GRADATED" transition fossils is a "grave concern" for his theory ("gradated" is key here). Bottom line is that gradated transition fossils that show the evolution of one species into another MUST be presented. I understand the difficulty with this in that few fossils are formed, however this still does not take away that these must be presented otherwise one can easily conclude that a species was produced independently. The "transition fossils" that Professor Dawkins presents certainly could form some linkage in the so called "Tree of Life" but are some way off being the gradated transition fossils that Darwin demanded must be found. Dawkin's was right in that there is simply too big a gap to conclude that these fossils represent an intermediate species in the transition of one species to another. This is surely a fair criticism. Next we come to the evolving lizards that were supplanted on the island & that transformed in features over 37 years. Again, this only shows how animals are adaptable & have the physiological machinery to adapt to a changing environment. There is no evidence of genetic mutation combined with natural selection at work here but just a shifting of genes in the gene pool to form lizards that are more in tune for life in their new environment. Again, we do not see a transition of one species to another species, which is what must be shown for evolution through natural selection to be concluded as the driving force of the change. Another of Professor Dawkin's arguments is the high sequence homology of the genetic code across species, that he claims to prove that species descended from a common ancestor. It is a nice theory but this commonality doesn't prove this at all, but provides circumstantial evidence (weak at that). Think about it, if there was indeed a Divine Creator at work then it makes complete sense that he would use similar DNA sequences, genes & proteins across species to code for proteins that work to ensure the survivability of the species on earth. Cars manufactured by different auto companies all use wheels, exhaust pipes & carburetta's but it doesn't mean they descended from a single car. They have a designer who uses designs that simply work across different models. Of course, the Designer would extrapolate genes encoding important proteins across the whole Tree of Life - this makes absolute sense. I think the most controversial chapter is the one where Professor Dawkins argues that there can be no God based on all the wastage there is in the world....trees growing to unessessary high hights to compete, predators & prey continually competing against one another in the economy of nature to outpace the other, & (arguably the best one of all) the cruelty that animals inflict on one another. It may be worth reading the Bible here to better understand who God really is & what line of business he is in (saving man's soul). Given that God uses animals in the Mosaic sacrificial system I hardly think cruely inflicted by one animal to the next is really top of his agenda, although there are a couple of Scriptures that condemn unessessary cruely inflicted by a human to an animal (& rightly so). Most unbelievable of all is the argument that the imperfections in human physiology (back to front retina, excessively long vas deferens, lower back pain etc) support the concept that there can be no God, since God wouldn't have got this wrong is he existed. Professor Dawkin's has completely missed the amazing perfection & detail of the human body & singles out a back to front retina as a major flaw...this is truly spiritual blindness! How is your eyesight? I bet it's pretty good isn't it? So what about the lower back pain? Well, Romans 5:12 provides the answer & tells us that death (& disease) entered the human race at the Fall of Man, which provides a Biblical explanation of all the imperfections, aches, pains & diseases we unfortunately must suffer, together with mortality. Finally, I see that Professor Dawkins leave the most important question until last, that is, how did life get started in the first place. Unfortunately, evolution by natural selection demands an answer to this question in his book, but Professor Dawkin's completely minimizes the importance of this critical question, putting it down to mere chance (& a little bit of RNA). If you tried to use that rationale in a quality scientific journal, I think it's safe to say that your paper would be rejected! We must face the facts here, if you look with an open heart at the three dimensional structure of DNA (together with its perfectly entwined histone complexes) & can truly say there can be no God, you probably need to reconsider reality. We could even term a personal who thinks this as a "Reality denier". Having said all of this, I do think the book is well written & humorous in places (which is why I gave it 2 stars & not 1). The only problem is that Professor Dawkin's is fairly insulting to the very people he is supposed to be reaching out to i.e. the 40 percenters, the "History Deniers". This is probably not the best approach & shows that he probably didn't ever intend to try to change their minds but merely to vent his anger & frustration at them through his book. I think to really understand whether evolution through natural selection could have played a part in the formation of life on earth, we need to drill down to the biochemistry of life, which is something Professor Dawkins doesn't really touch upon in any depth....let's move onto "Darwin's Black Box" & resume the debate....

As a staunch atheist and someone who needs no convincing about evolution, and really has nothing to do with creationists or evolution-doubters, I wondered how relevant this book would be to me. I already agreed with Dawkins before I picked up the book that evolution is not a theory, it's a fact. Did I need to spend several hours of my life reading a book only to further convince myself that I was right?

The answer: yes. Because aside from building an overwhelmingly strong case for evolution as a fact, the book is thoroughly engaging and interesting to read. While all the little examples and stories given by Dawkins are part of the story and add to his argument, they are also immensely fascinating in and of themselves. I'm no biologist and had no interest in reading a thorough textbook-like document examining all the details of all the evidence. I didn't need convincing about evolution and don't personally know anyone I need to convince. But the book was entertaining, interesting, and took me away to another world for a little while - in the end, isn't that really why we read in our spare time?

There is a difference between a science book and a science book that aims to defend itself against criticism. As the latter, it stands strong behind it's claims while revealing the beauty of nature with Dawkins' usual wit and charm in the process. A must read for anyone interested in how well supported Evolution really is, and how silly the reasoning held by its criticizers.

The book on tape kept me awake for 15 hours of driving. Dawkins summarizes all aspects of scientific research that seamlessly fits together to support the theory of evolution, and explains why theory is a problematic word to creationist and intelligent design advocates. He is a little hard on them at times - but really, c'mon. Science and religion are two different things, like apples and oranges. Or emus and manatees.

Yet another brilliant work from Richard Dawkins, but this time it's slightly different. The majority of Richard's books are crisp pathways through often counter intuitive ideas. Although evolution is completely backed up with real evidence, the pattern and meaning about the history of life on earth is often unclear, or at least psychologically jarring - if given adequate reflection. In his writing, Richard Dawkins uses clear and brilliant analogies to help us appreciate the meaning of evolutionary patterns and this book is packed with `salt liquorice' explanations of how present day life is the way it is. However it was Richard's last chapter `There is grandeur in this view of life' (Charles Darwin's words), that gave me the tingling feeling that one gets when understanding the apparent truth and meaning of so much evidence. I won't spoil your reading pleasure, but here's a quote from near the end of Richard's book "How is it that we find ourselves not merely existing but surrounded by such complexity, such elegance, such endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful? The answer is this. It..."

The Greatest Show on Earth is a fascinating and comprehensive account of the wide array of evidence for evolution. It is still quite astonishing that in the US alone, 40% of the population profess to a denial of evolution as a fact, and Dawkins takes this worrying figure as his impetus, to set out straight why we can be confident in the factual veracity of evolution. As he says in his foreword, his previous books on the subject took for granted the acceptance of evolution, little realising that there would still be in 2009 such a strong need to go back a few steps in order to convince large proportions of the population that evolution really does explain the rich variety we see in nature. In that respect, The Greatest Show acts like a solid foundation for Dawkins' other works (and any book about evolution) and anyone who is still on the fence would probably be best off reading this book before any others.

As ever and as you'd expect from someone who held the post of Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford, Dawkins delivers an account that is somewhat easy to understand for the layperson, effortlessly juggling metaphors to facilitate what can sometimes be quite daunting science. For instance, the chapter on embryology where he delves into the workings of proteins and enzymes I feel was greatly helped by his use of the origami analogy, or the metaphor of the police detective at a crime scene piecing together the many clues - which in turn led to the use of the spy camera analogy to explain the crafty `god of the gaps' argument so loved by creationists.

I'm glad the book began with an explanation of the word `theory' as used by scientists as this seems to be one of the most pervasive and unfortunate misunderstandings surrounding evolution and it's not solely the fault of mischievous creationists - it's not difficult to see why one would conclude that evolution is `only a theory' in the unsubstantiated sense of the word and therefore reserve their judgement on its ultimate veracity. Whether Dawkins' new term `theorum' to replace `theory' will take off remains to be seen but I think he is absolutely right that a new term is needed.

I also found many examples simply fascinating; such as the tadpole in a lab that had a small square cut from its back and grafted onto its underbelly which then grew into a frog that would itch it's back when that patch (now distinct from the rest of its underside) was tickled! (Actually I still can't quite fathom why this happens since that patch of skin I'm assuming still has its own nerve endings and I would have thought the frog would have learnt over time from where the sensation occurs - and does scratching the back alleviate the itch? Anyway, it does occur and I guess that's what matters!)

I also enjoyed reading about some of the examples I already knew about such as the laryngeal nerve and the vestigial leg bones in whales - actually Dawkins mentions in the book the Channel 4 documentary he took part in where they dissected a giraffe and removed the laryngeal nerve but on a previous episode of the same show (Natures Giants I think it was called) they did a dissection of a beached whale and uncovered the vestigial leg bones. Fascinating stuff. I also enjoyed revisiting Dawkins' full uncut interview with Wendy Wright which I think you can find on YouTube - slap the head frustrating for sure!

There is of course a whole lot more science and evidence in the book and feel it amounts to a well rounded and useful reference.

However, I do have a couple of minor issues. Firstly, when outlining the procedure for radioactive dating, I found myself still lacking understanding over one key point which I don't think was explained at all and that was how we can be certain of the fact of the decaying half-lives that are millions or billions of years. I don't doubt for a moment that this dating method is well verified by scientists but I don't recall Dawkins pointing this out, I think he said something along the lines of "...and we know that the half-life of such and such is x billion years...". It is a key point and means I'll have to do some additional research for an answer - perhaps I need to re-read that chapter...?

However my main criticism is the way Dawkins often used the imperfections inherent in nature (e.g. immense suffering, arms races between predator and prey, the laryngeal nerve detour, the eye,) as `evidence' against an intelligent designer. I am not for one minute saying that I believe there is a divine creator because as an atheist myself, I think it's unlikely but I still find this line of reasoning highly flawed if only because it presumes to know the mind / intentions / capabilities of said supposed creator. The argument also leaves itself open to a wide range of easy simplistic answers from creationists (i.e. `even if nature contains flaws anything that can create all this life is still intelligent'; `he works in mysterious ways'; `we can't understand his ultimate plan'; `maybe there are many gods creating life, some better at it than others' and `they use each other's templates'!!!) - the list could go on. I found myself wincing each time Dawkins used this argument only because I feel it is very weak in that it doesn't constitute actual evidence against a god like he seems to think it does.

Despite those two niggles, Dawkins has written another great book, full of fascination and awe. It's no doubt a much needed book and has filled the gap brilliantly - highly recommended for those who want a solid grounding in the wide range of evidence of evolution.

Dawkins is one of my favorite authors. In "The Greatest Show On Earth", he clearly lays out all the scientific proof mankind has for evolution. This includes genetic comparisons, anatomical observations, the fossil record, and clear occurrences of evolution happening before our eyes. In the end, this is perhaps the best book on evolution I've read. Dawkins manages to be instructive without the hostility towards religion he has exhibited in some of his other books. Further, the proof is well-explained for the non-scientists without being "dumbed down". Overall, I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the origins of modern species and biology in general.

This is a valuable book for anyone interested in adding to their understanding of evolution. Dawkins offers insight and solid scientific example. You will really enjoy the last chapter and Appendix.

I was hoping Dawkins would be more understanding and considerate of non-believers this time. Instead of his jihad to jam it down their throats, I was hoping for a kinder explanation of why he prefers science and reason over the supernatural. Even though he has toned it down some, he still comes off as pedantic and condescending, at times burying opposition in scientific minutia. There were times I had enough and skipped ahead.

Disappointingly, I doubt this book will be read by anyone who dismisses evolution and very few who have their doubts

Don't skip over the section on trees in the forest and the section on predator and prey.

This is certainly the most comprehensive exposition of evolution to date and it is breathtaking in its scope and astonishing detail. But one question can be asked: Is the classification of life forms the history of life forms? One can only classify what one can observe and to posit the classification of life forms for the history of life forms seems to be scientifically untenable and scientifically invalid.

But it is not his superb knowledge of evolution and the validity of that knowledge that is in question, but his insisting that his engrained atheism has its basis in the fact of evolution.

You can't find God at the end of a microscope or at the end of a syllogism; you discover God at the end of reality itself as the only explanation for that reality. Dr. Dawkins has enclosed his mind in the changes and processes of nature, as if the changes and processes of nature explained the existence of what is changed. His science never grapples with the problem within the problem: not why the cosmic egg is white or changes into an atom, a cosmos or a chick, but where the cosmic egg came from in the first place.

Clifford Stevens
Boys Town, Nebraska

There is something I noticed about this book that I don't think others have picked up on. Before getting to that, let me say that it has nothing to so with whether I agreed with his argument about evolution, which I do. The problem is this: In his Appendix (which was extremely interesting), Dawkins tells us that studies how that 36% of us believe in evolution "but God guided the process", 14% believe in evolution but God had no part in the process, and 44% believe that God created human beings within the last 10,000 years. He also tells us that the book is basically being written to those 44% "history-deniers". In his words, "this book is necessary" to reach those 44%.

While I consider myself agnostic, I know many people of all faiths who I consider to be very religious. While I don't agree with their views on religion or the historicity of the Bible, I do consider most of them quite smart. And here's the thing--not one of them falls into that 44% category. Rather they all fall into the 36% category. In other words, to their mind, the validity of the theory of evolution (or fact of evolution as he calls it) is not inconsistent with their views on religion and God's role in history. The two can co-exist. In fact, I don't know a single person who falls into the 44% category. While I don't doubt that they exist, I suspect that they must occupy the very lowest intellectual rungs of our society.

I read the whole book pretty carefully and, although I consider myself reasonably intelligent, I honestly couldn't follow the science in at least 80% of the book. It seemed to me that one would need an advanced degree in biology and perhaps anthropology or chemistry to really comprehend the book. So, if he's really addressing the book to that particular 44%, I have a very hard time believing that a single one of them would even buy it, much less understand it if they did. In fact, I would venture to say that there is not a single person in the world whose mind would be changed by this book, and that's not because his argument is not highly persuasive. It's because the people he is allegedly trying to persuade would never buy or understand the book.

In addition, by purporting to address his arguments to the 44% group rather than the 36% group (which he pretty much ignores entirely), I fee that he picked the wrong target. It's like saying: I don't want to go after the smart religious people, so I'll go after the moronic religious people. Or, let's take his Holocaust-denial analogy a step further: Say there are two groups out there. One of them denies that the Holocaust ever occurred at all. The other believes that it occurred exactly as reported but believes that the number of dead killed in the concetration camps has been highly inflated. While both of these groups may be wrong, which one would be easier to challenge? Obviously, it's the Holocaust-deniers. And by analogy, that's the target that Dawkins has chosen. This is not to say that the 36% group may not be wrong as well. But the fact is that it would have been much more interesting for him to attempt to debunk the beliefs of that group rather than the group that believes obvious nonsense.

While many will no doubt already know much of the material contained in the book, seeing the case for evolution as fact built in a step by step manner, makes for quite a good read while also providing excellent answers for anyone who questions any aspect of evolution by natural selection. Anyone who actually wants to learn about evolution and its undoubted existence would be advised to read this book. The only people who will not be convinced are those unconvinceable fanatics who do and always will ignorantly believe in a young earth and require no evidence to back up this claim.

This is a very fine book. I would recommend it to all those not yet convinced by evolutionary thought, to those who, like me, need refreshing from time to time in the basics of this science, and to all who enjoy the English language. I found chapter 12 -- "Arms Races and Evolutionary Theodicy" -- one of the best, most succinct answers to the problem of pain and theodicy in general. Chapter 13 is a Dawkins masterstroke, an homage to Darwin's eloquent conclusion to On the Origin of Species and an eloquent conclusion in its own right. The photographs are superb.

Another great book by Richard Dawkins! He shows that we have so much evidence for evolution, that evolution is the by far best theory we have. Darwin's theory has now survived for over 150 years, and even with advanced scientific tools we haven't been able to disprove it. Dawkins shows in this book that the new scientific tools have just made the theory of evolution more likely. I was already familiar with most of the evidence presented in this book, like C-14-dating(I should be familiar with this, as I have taken a few courses in physics) and the fossil records, but there was also some new information, like the use of dead trees to date things that are thousands of years old (with a very small error).

So I have to say it again, this is another great book by Richard Dawkins. It is clearly a 5-star book, and I will highly recommend it, but there is another book by the same author that is even better: "The Selfish Gene".

A good read, entertaining and enlightening. Well written, it kept me interested, though I have to admit I am a Dawkins fan so maybe I am a bit biased, good information to know and understand even if you are not a particular fan.

...well, you know, we all want to change the world..." Just a little misquotation from the Beatles' remastered "White Album," also available from the store...
The book was the cover story of "Free Inquiry" December 2009/January 2010 issue.
The periodical and Dawkin's book do a good job of dissecting what they call the 40 percenters who believe man and the dinosaurs walked together when the world was created by God a mere ten thousand, or less, years ago.
Unfortunately for both, their argument is too intellectual to affect the understanding of anyone who believes each and every word of the King James is divinely inspired and Darwin was directly inspired by Satan.
Actually, the book is a great supplement to evolutionary history, except for the defense against the creationists' arguments. Although his discussion of the horrible sufferings and fear in nature (beginning on page 391) parallel my assumption that everything was put here to be eaten and that, if you are not lunch, you have beaten the system, noting that we are all playing against the house and will lose in the end anyhow. Feel free to quote me...
In reality, the 40 percenters will increase their share of the public opinion in the very same ways as other religions prosper. The book "Signs and wonders: Why Pentecostalism is the world's fastest growing faith," by Paul Alexander will provide insight into that demographic.
I have given Dawkin's book a four star, not because it was not well done or flaunts obvious flaws, but because it will do little to shed light unto his theological opponents.

If you want a more long-winded explanation of evolution and colored photographs this is the book for you. But if you want a more concise (233 vs. 437 pages) and clear explanation, read Why Evaluation is True by Jerry A. Coyne. And when Richard Dawkins is concise Jerry A. Coyne quotes him: "Richard Dawkins provided the most concise definition of natural selection: it is 'the non-random survival of random variants.'"

Fascinating book. I found it full of new information about science and evolution and animals I'm interested in. Well written and very funny at times. It's so full of information I might have to read it two or three or four times.

I am currently reading the iPhone Kindle version of Richard Dawkins' "The Greatest Show on Earth." An excellent layman's explanation of evolution. Throughout the book there are links to colored illustrations, linking, it says, to some page that contains the illustration. However the link doesn't take you to a colored illustration. Perhaps the iPhone Kindle doesn't do color. I think a buyer should be told of that before he downloads and pays for it.

This is a great book, I listened to the audiobook read by Dawkins and I have to say he did an excellent job. The book presents a great deal of information which can be used to persuade those in doubt toward understanding and accepting evolution as a part of our existence.

I enjoyed it and plan to read it again very soon.

This is generally an exceptionally clear and cogent presentation of the arguments that evolution does occur, and that it goes far towards explaining animal and human history.

Where it frustrates is that the book preaches to the choir. I would love to be able to present this book to an intelligent person who is on the fence re creation vs evolution, but Dawkins insults and demeaning of opposing beliefs (starting in the prefix) would generally dissuade such a person from advancing to chapter 1.

Would love to see a version of this book with the science retained but the us_against_them polemics edited out.

This book delivers exactly what the title says it will. Fun read. Learned a lot about up to date evidence on the case for the theory of evolution. I recommend the audiobook as well, gotta love his british accent. Like a sir.

I did not buy this book to examine the evidence for evolution; I've kept up with evolutionary findings for some time. However, this book is extremely well-written, and was useful for finding things out that I didn't study (e.g. abiogenesis and embryology). This book is excellent for finding sources and further information.
However, since I did not get this book to be convinced of anything, I can only say that I would assume it does.

I received "The Greatest Show on Earth" for Christmas and am well into reading it. I was initially concerned about the narrative of "40 percenters" (evolution non-believers) and the general bullying he engages in. I find that terribly juvenile from a scientific point of view. I am a former aerospace test engineer and have many times been forced to prove technical points in writing over the objections of affected aerospace vendors with regard to scientific anomalies and as to whether these anomalies constituted aircraft safety concerns. One uses just the facts. Name-calling and sarcasm are not convincing tools and are never employed in technical proofs.

I wanted to get a feel for where the author was coming from, so I Googled "Professor Dawkin" and "global warming." Very interesting to find a quote from him hailing Al Gore's movie "An Inconvenient Truth" as the go-to guide to global warming. This movie is filled with scientific errors including the childish use of a Mercator Projection World Map, instead of a simple globe, to calculate warming and cooling global surface areas.

It seems as if Professor Dawkins is simply churning out book after book against religion and hyping evolution with no additional facts.

FYI, I am no religious zealot and am constantly in search of "proof of evolution" in order to promote that fact with an actual fact or two. Looks like I must continue that search...

Everyone should read this book. Though parts of evolution are open to criticism, the idea of evolution has been proven. If you don't believe me, then this is the best argument that supports the idea of evolution that I have come across. I learned much of this information at college, but the reading level is not very difficult and any adult should be able to grasp why people defend the theory of evolution, if they read this book.

I found the book really annoying, even though other books by Dawkins were extremely good (especially The Blind Watchmaker). I was very disappointed by this book. Dawkins goes off on tons of self indulgent tangents and parenthetical statements that don't add anything. At times he repeated himself so many times that he was flogging a dead horse, something that I found very condescending. It does take some knowledge of biology to understand some of his arguments, and perhaps I felt that way because I am not the intended audience. Nonetheless, I didn't get much in the way of useful arguments to use when confronted by a creationist. Toward the middle of the book, I started wishing he would hurry up and end be done with it. I think the editors did a poor job, but I speculate the possibility that Dawkins simply "got his way" with things due to his generally bullish personality.

I understand evolution is undoubtedly the overwhelming most probable explanation of the diversity of life on earth. I didn't need examples Ad nauseam to be convinced. Would someone who bases their understanding of life on faith be willing to stick with this book with so many variations on the argument? There are many interesting examples that make the case: it is a good resource for a teacher filling out a course relating to the topic.

Creationists are History Deniers. Like the willfull denial of the Holocaust, dispite all the evidence, so too must History Deniers willfully ignore the evidence in fossils, our genes, morphologies, and biogeography, to assert their ideologically-driven hatred of evolution.

But, I don't want to talk about the "debate" of evolution. The "debate" merely provides a compelling framework to explore many facinating facts and stories of natural history and science. Indeed, evolution and the very history of life is the greatest show on Earth: thats why I read it. I certainly didn't need Dawkins to debunk Creationist ideologies; rather, I treasured Dawkins amazing talent to weave together the very story of evolution and science into a compelling read.

My favourite Dawkins book is the Ancestor's Tale, and it has much in common with this book too. In AT, Dawkins weaved together an amazing collection of stories of life and evolution, each one worthy of as the cover-story in a National Geographic, into a backwards-journey through human speciation to the very origins of life. The Greatest Show on Earth tackles complimentary stories of equal delight (from bacterial evolution experiments, birds-as-dinosaurs, to radioactive clocks in the Earth), and sets it up to show that evolution is the only sensible explanation to the multitudes of evidence in fossils, genes, morphologies, and biogeography. (Mixed in are some funny acounts of History Denialism: if Norah did save all the animals who lived to repopulate the Earth, wouldn't Mount Ararat be the epicentre of biodiversity, with concentric circles of increasied speciation away from the mythological landing-point of the Ark? Hahaha!)

I don't know if Dawkins actively does science anymore, but he has an uncanny insight into the field. This book is not like some cozy popular science books, but is well-written and has detailed accounts of some of the most important studies on life, accessible to everyone, but deep enough to captive scientists too.

This book is great for people who know nothing of, little of, or a lot about Evolution.
people who read this book and still doubt evolution shouldn't rightly be called "people" but rather some lower lifeform incapable of objective, rational thought.

Richard Dawkins assembles another book worthy of praise. However, after reading it, I was a little dissapointed. I was hoping for a bit more depth and for it to be a bit more technical. It is a great book for those people that comment with "if we came from monkeys then why dont some monkeys talk," (which is an actual quote from somebody I work with). It certainly will help those not familiar with evolution to see this stunning marvel at work. I, personally, would love to see "The Evidence for Evolution-'advanced edition.'" But it serves its purpose- to spread the vast evidence for evolution and therefore I give it 5 stars.

This is not the best book Dawkins has ever written. I thought The God Delusion had more passion, more verve and was better written than this offering. I really didn't like how Dawkins seems to want to cede ground and reinvent the definition of "theory" right up front. This makes no sense to me. Nothing Dawkins or any evolutionist does will ever make the fact of evolution any more palatable to history and science deniers. So why bother trying to do it by redefining the term "theory" -- just because these same history deniers are too ignorant to actually understand what the term means?

Forget that.

Anyway, Dawkins has all the usual stuff we come to expect from him: a passionate defense of evolution. But, sadly, it's written in a style that will not be easily accessible to ordinary readers. I think anyone who is already a fan of Dawkins (and I am) will probably enjoy this book. But for people who do not have at least a passing grounding in science I think the book may well be over their heads in many respects.

This book was amazing! A must read for anybody that has ever felt like they needed to defend modern science against irrational theists.

The beginning was very readable and it felt like having a conversation or a personal science lesson with Richard Dawkins. It slowly got more complex but no less interesting or readable. His adoration for Darwin's work begins to really show near the end.

He also identifies many of the classic creationist arguments, if you can call them that, against evolution. He addresses the fact that such a large amount of Americans, and a growing number of British, have been fooled into thinking there is a controversy concerning evolution.

Wonderful book. I recommend it to everyone.

Rarely does a book bring me to tears...I remember the last chapter of Dawkins' "The God Delusion" doing so, as well as many ideas of Jared Diamond. Dawkins' latest masterpiece is a journey. Not only is it a wonderful narrative, it is also written with analytical craft and cunning rarely experienced.

I give this book 5 stars, and how can I not? When 426 pages of literature increases your wonderment and appreciation of life - while increasing your capacity for analytical thought - I'd say that by definition is 5 starts.

Fabulous book! It is well written, logical and entertaining. Extremely informative and pursuasive. It is an honest and direct explanation of the evidence for evolution.

If you don't accept (or more likely don't know anything about) evolution I strongly urge you to read this book. If you are correct you have nothing to fear from evidence or investigation.

Great book on Evolution!!! My only gripe with the book was the ending, I thought the book would go out with a bang, poking the creationist in the eyes...but instead it ended kind of dull....nonetheless if you want to know about evolution this book is for you!!

I found this book to be well informed. Dawkins knows greatly of what he is talking about. This book is not as much of an attacking on creationist as his previous work in "God Delusion," but was more focused on a continuation and support that Evolution does occur.

An interesting perspective Dawkins brings up about the notion of theories, was "the Earth being round," "Photosynthesis," and "plate tectonics" are all examples of theories that no one hardly questions anymore, these theories are now incorporated into our every day lives as accepted things that happen, yet they still have the term theory attached to them. This is an interesting argument that Dawkins brings up to those who question the factual nature of "Just a theory," which I found to be fascinating.

Another fine example of how Evolution is occurring right now in viewable evidence is the E. coli experiment being done at Michigan State University. Which showed after 20,000 generations in E. coli that a particular strain developed the ability to feed on citric acid in an agler petri dishes, which was explained as unheard of for E. coli to do.

I highly recommend reading this book it is an excellent companion to Darwin's On the Origins of Species.

Just kidding! Unlike Tricky Nicky I think it would be dumb to write a review for a book I haven't read and have no intention of reading. Ever. I think Dawkins is a putz, regardless if he is right or wrong.
Just saying. Since Tricky Nicky does this all the time I figured why shouldn't I?
the store doesn't stop him.

I give it five stars because I know Mr. Dawkins ego is very very fragile.

In this fascinating and informative book, Professor Dawkins demonstrates that evolution is the greatest show on earth.He makes a comparison between those who deny the evolution theory and the Holocaust deniers.To say that evolution does not exist is exactly like saying there had never been a Holocaust.
This book is an attack on creationists and all those who are still questioning the fact of evolution through natural selection.
He invites us to be detectives in order to look for evidence and facts supporting his ideas.We join him on a very interesting trail of various facts and examples from many disciplines and not just biology.These are taken from the world of insets, birds,trees-where he shows us how to measure time-fossils and traces of our ancestors.In addition,there are examples taken from genetics.There is an endless number of photos and diagrams to prove his ideas.
At the end of the book there is an appendix on the how evolution as a theory is being constantly oppressed and undermined in classrooms by those who seek to destroy it.Although there is room for optimism, the road to convince the creationists is still long and full of obstacles.
Perhaps it would be wise to quote his words towards the end of the book:"It is no accident that we find ourselves ....surrounded by endless forms,most beautiful and most wonderful, and it is no accident that we are surrounded by green plants ...(which all) give us the energy to power us".
Evolution is a fact, the Holocaust is a fact and all those deniers are trying in vain to distort reality.

This book, in my opinion, is one of Richard Dawkins' best works. He presents many fascinating theories and ideas, backed up by incontrovertible scientific evidence. Hopefully, at least a few of the embarrassing 40% of Americans, who believe in literal Creation and that the age of the earth is less than 10,000 years can read this book with an open mind.

This is a long book but every sentence is beautifully placed to bring home the point! i.e. we are a product of billions years of slow and progressive evolution of species, completely debunking the mythological account of creationist.
I like the fact that Dawkins debunks the foolish creationists theory of earth being <6000 years old and all those floods and stuff.
The evidence presented is solid and the book structure is smooth and logical to make informed readers appreciate this game of nature, which we call evolution.

I read Richard Dawkins latest book because I was drawn by the subtitle: "The Evidence for Evolution."

Not surprisingly, I did not find much "evidence." Rather, Dawkins does a commendable job of "explaining" Evolution. Moreover, I appreciated his considerable attention to universally-accepted science on such fundamental subjects as: plant and animal characteristics, radioactive dating, and plate tectonics. Therefore, since all are in agreement on universally-accepted science, why must Dawkins open Chapter 4 by declaring: "If the history-deniers [i.e. which includes people like me who accept Intelligent design] who doubt the fact of evolution are ignorant of biology ... "? That's like saying: "Those who appreciate the form and habits of reindeer are, nevertheless, ignorant of the reality of Santa Claus."

On the specific subject of Evolution, Dawkins resorts primarily to "speculation." To illustrate, I counted no less than 83 "speculative terms" such as: maybe, my guess, highly plausible, likely/not likely, perhaps, no harm in asking, fair bet, wondering, pretty confident, suggesting, may/may not, might have, speculate, assume, if, seemingly, presupposes, possibly, cautious, inclined, take seriously, probably, surmise, somehow, something happened, believe, and imagine.

Dawkins spends a considerable amount of attention to equating "Evolution" with "great periods of time." However, why does he think Evolution has a monopoly on "billions of years"? In fact, he conspicuously avoids even mentioning the now universally-accepted "Big Bang Theory." Why? Because he knows that even our universe's estimated age of 13 billion years is not nearly enough time for the Theory of Evolution to take place.

While Dawkins frequently quotes Darwin's "On the Origin of Species," he confesses that he cannot identify the initial origin that the Theory is based on: the single cell. Moreover, even given the existence of a single cell, Dawkins agrees with J.B.S. Haldane that "there is a mystery, merging on the miraculous ... in the very fact that a single cell gives rise to a human body in all its complexity." Yes, I like the word: "miraculous."

Speaking of "Species," why, is it that species are dying out on a daily basis, but since man has been on this earth no evidence of a single new species has been discovered?

Perhaps most baffling for me is how, on the one hand, Dawkins insists that the laws of Natural Selection are amoral, he, nevertheless, resorts to value judgments. For example, in the Chapter he titles: "Arms Races and `Evolutionary Theodicy," he agonizes: " ... if only hunter and hunted could sit down together and hammer out a sensible agreement, everybody would be better off." This empathetic commentary is meaningless in an amoral world based on Natural Selection.

Dawkins can't resist the "belief" (in the absence of "evidence") that aliens from outer space exist. "My GUESS," says Dawkins," is that life is very rare, but that the number of planets is so large that we are PROBABLY not alone, and there MAY be millions of islands of life ..." In the meantime, he completely ignores the current 322 EVIDENCES for the fine-tuning of earth and its cosmic environment for intelligent life which makes it mathematically impossible for life to exist on any other planet than ours.

Finally, and perhaps most ridiculous, is Darwin's assertion that Evolutionists are being persecuted in American society! The opposite is true, as portrayed in Ben Stein's movie: "Expelled - Intelligence Not Allowed."

I would rate TGSOE five stars if it was a naturalist writing about what he knows. But does it prove evolution is a fact, which is its implied purpose? It depends on the criteria you would use to judge that. Beyond that, Dawkins has an irritating habit in this work of attacking creationists to the point of it being a pointless distraction.

By what criteria shall we judge this book? If one thinks evolution is a fact or not, does this book succeed in proving it? No. He doesn't say so, but there is an implicit notion when he presents his case: What else could it be than proof of evolution? While the material in book dovetails well with Dawkins theory of evolution, dovetailing is not the same as proof.

He does discuss some amazing phenomena and in that regard this book is delightful. But that doesn't demonstrate his theory to be a fact.

Let's go through some of his points.

Point one is that microbes evolve. While they indeed evolve, he doesn't specifically seem to say that they change species in their observed evolution. What he does say is that creationists--the people without whom he would not be well known--are lesser because they ignore such obvious forms of evolution. Yet many creationists actually hold that micro evolution does take place. The fact of that moth species whose members were mostly light colored and over generations became dark with their environment when the lighter colored members were picked off by birds, this is well accepted by many creationists.

While we are on the topic of creationists, Dawkins seems to find a breed of creationist who is not overly aware and intellectually capable. An analogy would be for a top creationist to find people who are below average in curiosity and/or intellect and who also believe in evolution--and hold them up as examples of those who believe in evolution. This is high school stuff.

Dawkins assures us that life forms can gradually morph from generation to generation resulting eventually in everything we see--apparently from a single ancestor if Dawkins is to be believed. Though he does mention devolution, he does not hold up the obvious idea that, if his theories are correct, any life form is not precluded from being able to morph into any other life form eventually. Such as a dogs into cats. Or humans into Amoeba proteus.

At no point in the major portion of the book that I read does Dawkins state what a species is in a way that makes sense to believe that what he is showing and arguing allows a thread of one species to become another. Guppies are still called guppies whether they change colors or not. Dogs are still dogs, whether Great Dane or poodle.

So, if Richard's evidence was effective, it would not just be plausible, it would bring closure. We have fossil records and some life forms appear at this point in time and similar forms appear later. So what appears in the record over time is consistent both with different forms of life existing and the theory of evolution of species. But why move to the evolution as a fact, unless we go with, "What else could it be?"

Another thing, it is unclear why Dawkins thinks that there are single ancestors and not lots of life forms in parallel. If life springs from matter, then why might it not happen an infinite number of times? And are there limits to the number of life forms that may occur? I don't have a sense of this from Dawkins work here.

And what about sexual reproduction? How did that come about? And can we mate in vitro a mouse with an elephant, and why not? There are lots of whys and what abouts that Richard has left unaddressed.

At one point Dawkins suggests that life forms when dissected show a lack of design. Has Dawkins looked inside a computer or a radio? Does he have an alternate design for a living form that is more advanced? Certainly life forms trump man's designs so far.

So if we take away Richard's unending attacks on those he portrays as creationist fools and just look at the evidence he supplies, it is beautiful information coming from a naturalist. But there is not closure for those who do critical thinking and aren't bound to be led down Richard's thinking path without drawing back and thinking expansively about things. The missing links are not in physical creatures or their fossils, the links are in evidence.

Have we been able to orchestrate the origin of a species?

Great news for Richard: he has an opportunity to produce another book and perhaps advance his theories better with better evidence. Hopefully he will not dilute his work with his gratuitous attacks on creationists and instead focus on the quality of his work and what it takes to bring stronger closure to the idea that evolution is a fact.

Another totally enchanting, impassioned and enthralling opus from the author of "The Selfish Gene", "The Blind Watchmaker", "Unweaving the Rainbow" and "The God Delusion". What evolution by non-random natural selection has provided for us to marvel at is indeed truly amazing... I hadn't even heard of the dancing sifaka or the blue-footed booby before! This is Dawkins' personal summary of the evidence that the "theory" of evolution is actually a fact as incontrovertible as any in science. And what evidence there is!!! A very timely and highly necessary book. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

To those who have studied Biology in-depth, the evidence for Evolution as outlined in this book comes as no surprise. There were a few proofs (such as proteins and rabbit immunology) that I was unfamiliar with from my time in College.

The interesting point, I think, is that the fossil record is not considered as the hallmark of the proof of evolution, but rather as an interesting bonus. Dawkins makes the point - and backs it up - that even if the fossil record did not exist there exists overwhelming evidence that Evolution is a fact.

Dawkins eviscerates the arguments put forth by creationists, and they will be hard pressed to counter the arguments outlined in the book. (But anyone with a background in Biology already knows this).

The book will probably be read only by those who already have an understanding of Evolution, and this is a shame. It should be read by everyone. Those who already have an understanding, and of course, those who do not. No argument to "teach the controversy" (There is not one as Dawkins points out in the book) can survive against the factual evidence.

If you are curious about all the myriad of details about Evolution, then you need to read this book, as it will bring you on a wonderful tour. The inclusion of the color plates is a wonderful addon to the hardcover edition - and makes the book all that more engaging.

You owe it to yourself to read this and gain a good grounding in one of the most important ideas in science. And perhaps a copy for those people you know who don't have as good of a background.

Hello,
I've been hearing a lot of intelligent people speaking of evolution as an undisputed fact so I wanted to check out the evidence. The preface for TGSOE told me I came to the right place since this book was expressly written to provide the evidence for evolution.

At least one reviewer (an evolutionist) believed the book was well done but he was already sold on evolution. He wondered its impact on someone not sold on evolution. Consider me one who was not sold on evolution but as one seeking answers.

Mister Dawkins did a credible job telling of various experiments that "proved" evolution. To me they seemed to prove a refining of systems that were already in place but no evidence of how a new complex system could come to be -that is my stumbling block with evolution. Also our inability to make anything "living" from basic non-living elements was freely admitted (but he was confident we will accomplish this in the next few decades). It would seem to me that that key piece of evidence should be in place before evolution could be nominated for "fact" status.

I gave the book four stars not because it sold me on evolution, but it did a good job of informing me of the current state of its knowledge.

In the interest of full disclosure, I am a Christian. Having become a Christian late in life, I am always evaluating what I believe with an open mind. I have a deep respect for science and strive to keep my beliefs in line with reality.

Strange as it will sound -this book actually strengthened my belief in a Creator.