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Darwin's On the Origin of Species: A Modern Rendition
Charles Darwin's most famous book On the Origin of Species is without question, one of the most important books ever written. While even the grandest works of Victorian English can prove difficult to modern readers, Darwin wrote his text in haste and under intense pressure. For an era in which Darwin is more talked about than read, Daniel Duzdevich offers a clear, modern English rendering of Darwin's first edition. Neither an abridgement nor a summary, this version might best be described as a "translation" for contemporary English readers. A monument to reasoned insight, the Origin illustrates the value of extensive reflection, carefully gathered evidence, and sound scientific reasoning. By removing the linguistic barriers to understanding and appreciating the Origin , this edition aims to bring 21st-century readers into closer contact with Darwin's revolutionary ideas.
352 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2014
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 5, 2016
Very good. In Darwin's own words and yet easier to understand and follow.
February 9, 2019
I won't presume to rate Darwin. This book is an abridged modern rendition of the Origin, and since I've never read the original text in its 19th century English, with its idiosyncrasies, its difficult to review the editing.
What one can say is that the book is fairly easy to comprehend in an audio format to someone who is mostly ignorant of the modern biological sciences, which shouldn't be surprising since the Origin is to "modern" biology as the Principia is to "modern" mechanics. With the later being constructed using opaque (to the modern eye) constructions substituting simple polynomial algebra with analysis on conics, with liberal use of plane and solid classical Euclidian constructions. A modern student would have to purposely master mostly useless prerequisite mathematics which is very challenging just grok that material.
To grok the origins is nowhere near as onerous to a student. Though its focus, a study of descent via observation in varying morphology of animals and plants, of their distribution across varying geographies and ecologies, and the practice of the "logic" of descent via the analysis of "varieties", "forms", and species is probably similarly foreign for modern practitioners, who's tools seem to be mostly computational, and who's unit of measurement is probably closer to the nano rather than inches or feet.
Still, what the Origin is, seems to be a sequence of "back-of-the-envelope" like inferences based on naked eye observations and hand dissections of a specimen. What is so surprising is how close Darwin got to what is currently accepted as truth with these inexact and naive tools. A few little possible errors in the details I picked up were excusable like Darwin's hypothesis that migration of various plant seeds and landlocked mammals could have occurred in distant history when seas and oceans had receded and were isolated when water levels rose. This was prior to the theory of continental drift, Darwin's explanation is still plausible.
If anything this books greatest value to the modern general reader may be as a case study of excellent exactitude of thinking when one is dealing with a domain that has not yet been mastered by quantitative methods. Had the social Darwinist read this book more carefully, they may have jettisoned their ill-conceived application of these notions to human sociology, an ill-suited graft.
Darwin makes several comments on the imperfection of analogical thinking, tempering some of his own assertions, and more directly against the notion of a "monochromatic" social Darwinism, he even states that a permutation or introduction of diversity in an environment probably accounts for increased chances of survival where the environmental pressures on organisms can be unexpected and multifarious.
Darwin's analysis of the bi-directional influence organisms have with their environment is profound, and this mechanic has yet to be mastered computationally. Great study, recommended
What one can say is that the book is fairly easy to comprehend in an audio format to someone who is mostly ignorant of the modern biological sciences, which shouldn't be surprising since the Origin is to "modern" biology as the Principia is to "modern" mechanics. With the later being constructed using opaque (to the modern eye) constructions substituting simple polynomial algebra with analysis on conics, with liberal use of plane and solid classical Euclidian constructions. A modern student would have to purposely master mostly useless prerequisite mathematics which is very challenging just grok that material.
To grok the origins is nowhere near as onerous to a student. Though its focus, a study of descent via observation in varying morphology of animals and plants, of their distribution across varying geographies and ecologies, and the practice of the "logic" of descent via the analysis of "varieties", "forms", and species is probably similarly foreign for modern practitioners, who's tools seem to be mostly computational, and who's unit of measurement is probably closer to the nano rather than inches or feet.
Still, what the Origin is, seems to be a sequence of "back-of-the-envelope" like inferences based on naked eye observations and hand dissections of a specimen. What is so surprising is how close Darwin got to what is currently accepted as truth with these inexact and naive tools. A few little possible errors in the details I picked up were excusable like Darwin's hypothesis that migration of various plant seeds and landlocked mammals could have occurred in distant history when seas and oceans had receded and were isolated when water levels rose. This was prior to the theory of continental drift, Darwin's explanation is still plausible.
If anything this books greatest value to the modern general reader may be as a case study of excellent exactitude of thinking when one is dealing with a domain that has not yet been mastered by quantitative methods. Had the social Darwinist read this book more carefully, they may have jettisoned their ill-conceived application of these notions to human sociology, an ill-suited graft.
Darwin makes several comments on the imperfection of analogical thinking, tempering some of his own assertions, and more directly against the notion of a "monochromatic" social Darwinism, he even states that a permutation or introduction of diversity in an environment probably accounts for increased chances of survival where the environmental pressures on organisms can be unexpected and multifarious.
Darwin's analysis of the bi-directional influence organisms have with their environment is profound, and this mechanic has yet to be mastered computationally. Great study, recommended
March 31, 2019
Brilliantly conceived and executed. The prose, while rendered in contemporary academic idiom, remains faithful (for good and bad) to the original and manages to carry over Darwin's unique blend of bemusement, curiosity and--let's be honest--sometimes plodding polemical style. When I reread the Origin, which I will, I plan to read the original text.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews