The Meaning Of Evolution by George Gaylord Simpson (PDF)

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1st Mentor M66 1951 edition vg paperback In stock shipped from our UK warehouse

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Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐343/5000Reading a book by GG Simposon is a pleasure. Its didactic and informative approach makes it very accessible to the general public. Being a biologist I find it very interesting and useful to read this book, since it helps me to find the valuable elements that it is important to spread to other people. Despite the years it is still a great book.

⭐I had read this as a teenager. About the only thing that stuck with me is the three schools of thought: materialism, vitalism, and finalism. Simpson is basically a materialist, though he waxes poetic when it comes to homo sapiens and language. I now have two copies of the book. I found the second in a dark corner of my library after I ordered the title from Amazon.

⭐This book talks about what makes species survive or fail in complex, changing ecosystems. It should be required reading for MBA students: Mother Nature has a lot to say about business strategy. It could be required reading for any high school student: Mother Nature has a lot to say about right and wrong, and how to tell the difference. The one downside of this book is that its lessons are so generally-applicable across so many fields that it’s difficult to easily pigeon-hole this book into any one field of study.

⭐A classic text about the broad outlines of evolution by a renowned expert. A bit dated, but a classic.

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⭐George Gaylord Simpson (1902-1984) was one of the most influential American paleontologists of the twentieth century. His major works include

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⭐, etc. This book was first written in 1949, then substantially revised/updated in 1967.He states in the Prologue, “I take it as now self-evident, requiring no further special discussion, that evolution and TRUE religion are compatible. It is also sufficiently clear that science, alone, does not reach all truths, plumb all mysteries, or exhaust all values and that the place and need for true religion is still very much with us.”He observes, “New major sorts of organisms have arisen, as a rule, not as more effective followers of ways of life already occupied but as groups extending into and eventually filling new ways.” He adds later, “It is noteworthy that such replacement is usually an approximate, not an exact, duplication of earlier ways of life. Conditions change and groups of later origin are never quite like those of earlier ages. Bats are only broadly, and not closely similar in habits to some, and not to all, pterodactyls.”Concerning the evolution of the eye, he states, “In fact, representative stages at every gradually different level happen to have survived, from diffuse photosensitivity of the whole body through scattered photosensitive cells to cell plates, basins, basins and vesicles plus lenses, and so on to the fully developed image-forming eye with lens, iris, and its other complexities. These photoreceptors function splendidly at every level and do not wait to start working until the final stage is reached. They simply enlarge, refine, and to some extent change their functions as they become more complex.”He muses, “it is quickly evident that there is no criterion of progress by which progress can be considered a universal phenomenon of evolution … To find that progress is universal would certainly be far more surprising than to find that it is only occasional.” He suggests, “Man has risen, not fallen. He can choose to develop his capacities as the highest animal and to try to rise still farther, or he can choose otherwise. The choice is his responsibility, and his alone…. Evolution has no purpose; man must supply this for himself.” He concludes the book on the note, “It is another unique quality of man that he, for the first time in the history of life, has increasing power to choose his course and to influence his own future evolution … Responsibility for defining and for seeking that end belongs to all of us.”

⭐First published in 1949, “The Meaning of Evolution” remains one of the best, unbiased introductions to the subject and very relevant today. Dr. Simpson was not only a world-renowned paleontologist, but a true humanitarian as well. The book describes evolution across geologic epochs and across species, with an emphasis on vertebrate evolution, and concludes with a series of eloquent chapters that attempt to synthesize from the lessons of evolution a human ethic and a few insights on the future of man. I studied this book at Brown Univ. in 1960 and have referred to it often over the years in my careers in business and law as I followed the popular ebb and flow of ideas in this field. I have not reviewed the revised version, but I trust it has merely updated the original and not altered the author’s interpretations. For me, the book stands for two propositions: (1) evolution has no direction and does not lead inexorably to the rise of homo sapiens, as many would like to think; and (2) all life on this planet is interrelated, connected through our genes, and that humanity has, therefore, an ethical obligation not to meddle in the continuing evolution of species in a way that diminishes biodiversity or inhibits the workings of natural selection, without very careful thought. Unlike many contemporary anthropologists and paleontologists, Dr. Simpson sticks to the facts and, thankfully, does not wander off into speculative political quagmires. In sum, this is a scholarly landmark in the field, and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

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