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A Harvard museum curator draws on the latest breakthroughs in evolutionary biology to examine how tiny, random convergences, from mutations to butterfly sneezes, have triggered remarkable evolutionary changes. "Earth's natural history is full of fascinating instances of convergence: phenomena like eyes and wings and tree-climbing lizards that have evolved independently, multiple times. But evolutionary biologists also point out many examples of contingency,...

How the science of evolution explains how everything came to be, from bacteria and blue whales to cell phones, cities, and artificial intelligence Everything Evolves reveals how evolutionary dynamics shape the world as we know it and how we are harnessing the principles of evolution in pursuit of many goals, such as increasing the global food supply and creating artificial intelligence capable of evolving its own solutions to thorny problems. Taking...

"Dinosaurs to Chickens: How Evolution Works explains how evolution works using thirty of the most remarkable stories in biological history. Over 125 curious creatures--including some that no longer exist!"--Page 4 of cover.

A group of biologists and evolutionary theorists discuss how far evolution has come and take an educated guess at what lies in store, based on the mathematical synchronicity of fireflies and the similarity of genes to digital information.

Naming Darwin's Black Box to the National Review's list of the 100 most important nonfiction works of the twentieth century. From one end of the spectrum to the other, Darwin's Black Box has established itself as the key text in the Intelligent Design movement-the one argument that must be addressed in order to determine whether Darwinian evolution is sufficient to explain life as we know it, or not. For this edition, Behe has written a major new...

Explores the origins of humans, including how such developments as Linnaeus' classification system and recent understanding of the human genome have improved scientists' comprehension of evolution.

From star-nosed moles that have super-sensing snouts to electric eels that paralyze their prey, animals possess unique and extraordinary abilities. In Great Adaptations, Kenneth Catania presents an entertaining and engaging look at some of nature's most remarkable creatures. Telling the story of his biological detective work, Catania sheds light on the mysteries behind the behaviors of tentacled snakes, tiny shrews, zombie-making wasps, and more....

"Many animals and plants eke out seemingly unremarkable lives. Passive, constrained, modest, threatened. Then, in a blink of evolutionary time, they flourish spectacularly. Once we start to look, these "sleeping beauties" crop up everywhere. But why? Looking at the book of life, from apex predators to keystone crops, and informed by his own cutting-edge experiments, renowned scientist Andreas Wagner demonstrates that innovations can come frequently...