The Richness of Life: The Essential Stephen Jay Gould"Nature is so wondrously complex and varied that almost anything possible does happen....I rejoice in [its] multifariousness and leave the chimera of certainty to politicians and preachers."—from Ever Since Darwin Upon his death in 2002, Stephen Jay Gould stood at the pinnacle among observers of the natural world, recognized by Congress as a "living legend." His prodigious legacy—sixteen best-selling and prize-winning books, dozens of scientific papers, an unbroken series of three hundred essays in Natural History—combined to make Gould the most widely read science writer of our time. This indispensable collection of forty-eight pieces from his brilliant oeuvre includes selections from classics such as Ever Since Darwin and The Mismeasure of Man, plus articles and speeches never before published in book form. This volume, the last that will bear his name, spotlights his elegance, depth, and sheer pleasure in our world—a true celebration of an extraordinary mind. |
What people are saying - Write a review
User ratings
5 stars |
| ||
4 stars |
| ||
3 stars |
| ||
2 stars |
| ||
1 star |
|
Reviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identified
LibraryThing Review
User Review - Princesca - LibraryThingI probably didn't understand it, but I have not found this collection of essays illuminating as I had expected. I didn't even find them interesting. Sorry about that :( Read full review
LibraryThing Review
User Review - psiloiordinary - LibraryThingA varied collection. Ranging form the short and punchy columns he published in Scientific American to extracts from his highly technical works. As I have previous remarked, I much prefer the former ... Read full review
Contents
I Have Landed | 15 |
The Median Isnt the Message | 26 |
The Streak of Streaks | 32 |
Baseball Father and Me | 41 |
A Brief Legal Survey from Scopes to Scalia | 49 |
Of Two Minds and One Nature | 59 |
Biographies | 65 |
Thomas Burnets Battleground of Time | 71 |
Opus 100 | 307 |
Size and Shape | 319 |
How the Zebra Gets Its Stripes | 324 |
Size and Scaling in Human Evolution | 333 |
Stages and Sequences | 359 |
Iconographies of Progress | 362 |
Up Against a Wall | 376 |
Sociobiology and Evolutionary Psychology | 391 |
The Lying Stones of Marrakech | 85 |
The Stinkstones of Oeningen | 103 |
The Razumovsky Duet | 114 |
The Power of Narrative | 127 |
Not Necessarily a Wing | 143 |
Worm for a Century and All Seasons | 155 |
Resolving Evolution Oddest Coupling | 166 |
The Piltdown Conspiracy | 182 |
Evolutionary Theory | 205 |
The Evolution of Life on Earth | 209 |
Challenges to NeoDarwinism and Their Meaning for a Revised View of Human Consciousness | 222 |
Revising the Three Central Features of Darwinian Logic | 238 |
The Episodic Nature of Evolutionary Change | 261 |
Betting on Chanceand No Fair Peeking | 267 |
The Power of the Modal Bacter or Why the Tail Cant Wag the Dog | 278 |
The Great Dying | 286 |
The Validation of Continental Drift | 290 |
Phyletic Size Decrease in Hershey Bars | 297 |
Size Form and Shape | 303 |
Pervasive Influence | 395 |
A Critique of the Adaptationist Program | 423 |
More Things in Heaven and Earth | 444 |
Posture Maketh the Man | 467 |
Freuds Evolutionary Fantasy | 473 |
Racism Scientific and Otherwise | 487 |
Paul Broca and the Heyday of Craniology | 490 |
The Most Unkindest Cut of All | 534 |
A Tale of Two Work Sites | 546 |
Carrie Bucks Daughter | 564 |
Just in the Middle | 574 |
Religion | 587 |
Nonoverlapping Magisteria | 590 |
The Diet of Worms and the Defenestration of Prague | 604 |
Darwin and the Munchkins of Kansas | 616 |
Hooking Leviathan by Its Past | 619 |
Sources and Acknowledgments | 636 |
641 | |
Other editions - View all
The Richness of Life: The Essential Stephen Jay Gould Stephen Jay Gould,Paul McGarr No preview available - 2006 |
Common terms and phrases
adaptive American animals appearance argued argument basic become beginning believe biological body brain Broca called cause central claim common complex continuity Darwin Darwinian direct early earth effect entire essay evidence evolution evolutionary evolved example extinction fact final force fossil functional Gould groups human idea important increasing interesting land larger later least letter living major meaning measure natural selection never once organisms origin particular past pattern physical Piltdown position present primary principle probably progress published races reasons record relative remains represent result scientific scientists sense simple skull social species stages story structure success surely surface Teilhard theory tion understand University writing wrote York