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Showing posts with label Books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Books. Show all posts

Sunday, March 20, 2016

Another failure: "The Mysterious World of the Human Genome"

The Mysterious World of the Human Genome
by Frank Ryan
William Collins, an imprint of Harper Collins, London UK (2015)
ISBN 978-0-00-754906-1

This is just another "gosh, gee whiz" book on the amazing and revolutionary (not!) discoveries about the human genome. The title tells you what to expect: The Mysterious World of the Human Genome.

The author is Frank P. Ryan, a physician who was employed as an "Honorary Senior Lecturer" in the Department of Medical Education at the University of Sheffield (UK). He's a member of The Third Way group. You can read more about him at their website: Frank P. Ryan.

Friday, August 28, 2015

Human Evolution: Genes, Genealogies and Phylogenies by Graeme Finlay

Human Evolution: Genes, Genealogies and Phylogenies was published in 2013 by Cambridge University Press. The author is Graeme Finlay, a cancer researcher at the University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.

I first learned about this book from a book review published in the journal Evolution (Johnson, 2014). It sounded interesting so I bought a copy and read it.

There are four main chapters and each one covers a specific topic related to genomes and function. The topics are: Retroviruses, Transposons, Pseudogenes, and New Genes. There's lots and lots of interesting information in these chapters including an up-to-date summary of co-opted DNA that probably serves a biologically relevant function in our genome. This is the book to buy if you want a good review of the scientific literature on those topics.

Monday, August 17, 2015

Summer Reading

These are the books I've read, or finished reading, this summer beginning in June.








This is the book that I'm re-reading very carefully.


This is still my favorite book



Friday, August 19, 2011

Reading Books


Now that I've finished writing my book, I'm back into reading. I have a pile of books that I have to get through before classes start. It's going to be difficult 'cause I'm off to Brussels next week to visit my granddaughter Zoë.

I mostly read non-fiction with an emphasis on science, philosophy, history, theology, and creationism. When I'm finished with a book it's usually full of highlighted text and margin notes and many of the pages have sticky tags for quick reference. Every single one of my books becomes part of my reference library and I almost always consult them again after reading.

I can't imagine how anyone like me could ever make use of an electronic reader. I've got exactly three books on my iPad (Pride and Prejudice, Treasure Island, and Aesop's Fables) and that's only because they came with the kindle app. I will never read them.

A couple of days ago I discovered another thing you can do with a real book (paperback) that you can't do with a kindle or other reader—especially an expensive iPad. It was a horrible book that I had just finished and it felt really, really, good to throw it across the room into the waste basket. I retrieved it later on for future reference but the gesture was immensely satisfying.


[Photo credit: My daughter flew in from Brussels a few days ago on her way to Newark. She had to take care of some business in Toronto so she stayed the night in her old room. I discovered this little scene on her bed after she had left.]

Thursday, June 26, 2008

The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing

 
The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing, Richard Dawkins ed., Oxford University Press, Oxford, United Kingdom (2008)


I'd be lying if I said I read this book from cover to cover. Richard Dawkins has collected 83 short examples of science writing. Most of them are quite good, some of them are excellent, and some I didn't finish. The examples span the entire range of traditional science disciplines with a heavy emphasis on physics, astronomy, and biology. There are very few examples from chemistry or geology.

These are selections picked by Richard Dawkins and they strongly reflect his views of science and of good writing. One of the criteria for inclusion is "good writing by professional scientists, not excursions into science by professional writers" (p. xvii). There's nothing wrong with that, as long as Dawkins sticks to his guns.

Unfortunately, there are so many exceptions to the rule that one wonders why the rule was made up in the first place. We don't have anything by Carl Zimmer (a non-scientist), for example, but we do have examples from Matt Ridley who, while he has a Ph.D. in science has never been a professional scientist. Neither has Daniel Dennett. Rachel Carson worked as a biologist for a while but she was a full-time writer by the time she wrote most of her books. Roger Lewin has never been a professional scientist, as far as I know.

Perhaps Dawkins meant to restrict his authors to those who have earned an advanced degree in science regardless or whether they actually became working scientists. Perhaps that's what he means by "professional scientist." If that's what he means then, as he points out on page 171, Margaret Thatcher might qualify since she got her Master's degree in Chemistry and worked with with Dorothy Hodgkin as an undergraduate. Hodgkin is included. Thatcher isn't.

Dawkins has three other rules. First, all of the works were produced within the past 100 years. This is an excellent restriction, in my opinion. Second, the works must have been first published in English—no translations are allowed (with a few exceptions). Finally, no works by Richard Dawkins are included.

Dawkins introduces each author with a few paragraphs of background material that often includes personal anecdotes. This is where we learn that Dawkins and Gould, "enjoyed—or suffered—a kind of love/hate relationship." We also discover that Fred Hoyle wrote an article that serves as, "an example of the insight that a physical scientist can bring to biology," bearing in mind that it was written, "before Hoyle began the perverse campaign of his old age, against all aspects of Darwinism."1

Some of the choices are very pleasant surprises. I had never heard of James Jeans, the first author in the book. His entry is so interesting—and so in line with modern thought—that I can't resist a quotation. Keep in mind that this was written in 1930.
Into such a universe we have stumbled, if not exactly by mistake, at least as the result of what may properly described as an accident. The use of such a word need not imply any surprise that our earth exists, for accidents will happen, and if the universe goes on for long enough, every conceivable accident is likely to happen in time.
Many of Dawkins' choices have nothing to do with biology but, of those that do, most extol the virtues of design and natural selection. For example, there is a passage from Helena Cronin's The Ant and the Peacock that's as fine an example of science-related prose as can be found anywhere in the anthology. It is good writing but I don't it is good science. Dawkins does, and it's his book and his choice.

This brings me to an important point. In order to be included in any collection of good science writing the work has to be both good writing and good science.2 Both of these criteria are subjective so whether an author is included or not will depend very much on the point of view of the editor. In this case we learn almost as much about Richard Dawkins as we do about the authors he selects.

And the authors he omits. Of the three giants of population genetics, R.A. Fisher and J.B.S. Haldane get included but Sewell Wright isn't even named. There's nothing by Richard Lewontin, Niles Eldredge, Gabriel Dover or David Raup. Ken Miller, Francis Collins, and Simon Conway-Morris are missing as well. Daniel Dennett is there but not Michael Ruse. One gets the impression that a similar book edited by Stephen Jay Gould would look quite different.

Now don't get me wrong. There's nothing wrong with this. As far as I'm concerned "good" science writing includes scientific accuracy and Dawkins has every right to pick and choose those authors who get it right, in his opinion. However, I'd prefer that editors lay their cards on the table and admit openly that their selections are influenced by this bias.3

No book of this sort should be complete without Peter Medawar and this book is no exception. Medawar's famous wit is unequaled, and often unappreciated. I fear it is a lost art. Dawkins is such a fan of Medawar (as am I) that he includes five excerpts from his books and essays—more than any other science writer.

Let me close with a quotation from Peter Medawar's essay on Science and Literature where Medawar is discussing a modern trend among philosophers and scientists to write very complicated prose,
Let me end this section with a declaration of my own. In all territories of thought which science or philosophy can lay claim to, including those upon which literature also has a proper claim, no one who has something original or important to say will willingly run the risk of being misunderstood: people who write obscurely are either unskilled in writing or up to some mischief. The writers I am speaking of are, however, in a purely literary sense, extremely skilled.

1. In contrast to Dawkins' praise, I found the passage from Hoyle to be almost incomprehensible. It is not good science writing, in my opinion, and it certainly isn't "insightful."

2. There are exceptions. Dawkins included a passage from R.A. Fisher's book The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection even though he (Dawkins) recognizes that it may not be an example of good writing.

3. I'm going to post some examples of my own biases with respect to good science writing, concentrating almost exclusively on those writers that don't appear in The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing.