A series of fortunate events Chance and the making of the planet, life, and you

Carroll (Univ. of Maryland) presents an eclectic set of examples where chance has played a pivotal role in the evolution of life, the human species, and particular individuals. Chapters cover in turn the asteroid impact that ended the dinosaurs' reign; stochastic variation in temperature during the Ice Age; the role of chance in evolution (and in Darwin's long study, which resulted in modern evolutionary theory's first expression); genetic variation among humans; hypermutability of the immune system; and the relationship between mutation and cancer. His afterword features a fictitious conversation among comedians, science fiction writers, and philosophers about the role of chance in society. Carroll's central theme is that chance is the driving force in the evolution and lives of all organisms--there is no divine intervention. Although he completely fails to prove the absence of god (and in this he has lots of company), his prose is extremely easy to read, and his examples are artfully and humorously developed. Carroll goes a bit deep into molecular biology for the average reader, but he then quickly returns to layman's language and sensibilities. This book lays bare how often unpredictable events have shaped our world; it educates, engages, and entertains. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers. --Roger M. Denome, MCPHS University

The award-winning science writer offers evidence that pure chance governs life. "Look at…all the beauty, complexity, and variety of life," writes Carroll. "We live in a world of mistakes, governed by chance." Near the beginning, the author looks at the asteroid that struck Earth 66 million years ago, throwing up so much debris that it blocked the sun, cooling the planet for decades and exterminating most species, including the dinosaurs. Within a few hundred thousand years, the survivors, including mammals, flourished and evolved into many families, including primates and then humans. Such a collision is extremely rare, but humans wouldn't exist without it. Carroll then offers an expert summary of evolution, a process heavily influenced by geological processes and climate changes that have fluctuated wildly over the past 1 million years, during which our species appeared and grew its large brain. Darwin explained evolution as a series of random variations in offspring that persist if they increase an organism's reproductive fitness and, over time, spread throughout the species. His work teems with evidence, but scientists found much to quarrel with. Nearly a century passed before discoveries in genetics (the dazzling if clunky mechanism through which variations are passed on) and details of DNA (the engine of genetic changes, itself an ad hoc collection of chemicals) convinced the scientific community. Readers will learn numerous fascinating tales, such as a failed effort to produce a human-chimpanzee hybrid (a "humanzee"), how the ancestors of wooly mammoths from tropical Africa learned to live in the Arctic, and how the AIDS virus jumped from chimps to humans. An amusing coda featuring an invented conversation between dead geniuses and living comedians reinforces the necessity of science even when millions eschew it in favor of a belief that things happen for a reason. Ricky Gervais: "[Science] doesn't hold on to medieval practices because they are tradition. If it did, you wouldn't get a shot of penicillin, you'd pop a leach down your trousers and pray." A short, sweet, and scientifically solid view of life. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.