Deep Time: Cladistics, The Revolution in Evolution
In Deep Time, Henry Gee, assistant editor of Nature, shows us that everything we think we know about evolution is wrong.
For a long time, popular scientists have told us that by looking at a fossilised bone we could tell whether it belonged to our ancestors or not. This is not true.
In Deep Time, Henry Gee, introduces for the first time in the popular science market a new way of thinking that has revolutionised the way that scientists are approaching the past – Cladistics. Cladistics ignores story-telling and authority and proposes a method based on shared characteristics, rather than ancestry and descent. As a result of using this new method Henry Gee is able to show us the wealth of new ideas that is radically altering our notions of the past: Dinosaurs with feathers; why fish developed fingers; what it means to be human.
This book will surprise, outrage and delight you - and make you think.'Jared Diamond -
'Gee takes the reader inside contemporary palaeontology, from the excitement of a fossil dig with Maeve Leakey to the thousands of carefully stored and catalogued specimens at the Natural History Museum.'New Scientist -
'As Gee's brilliant analysis shows, viewed afresh, evolution proves a more interesting and exciting - if more complex - story than we ever thought.' Scotsman -
’ A classic piece of reportage… Gee deserve high praise for these stimulating additions to the popular science canon.’ Independent -
”’Henry Gee’s fascinating book explains how a relatively new method of classifying life revolutionises our picture of the world… In the process of setting out his argument Gee gives us a fascinating introduction to Palaeontological biology.” - A C Grayling, Literary Review
”’In Deep Time, Henry Gee eloquently and entertainingly explains exactly why this revolution in evolution is both interesting and important to our understanding of the past.” - Herald
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