Review by Choice Review
Popular books on human evolutionary history feed the intense interest in our origins, in how we got to be the way we are. The challenge is to write an engaging narrative about a subject that may be incompletely understood by the writer. Wills has only partly succeeded; he has visited fossil sites and spoken with several major European paleoanthropologists, but he has not really integrated the vast range of information available today. Moreover, he keeps name-dropping and inserting his own opinions, perhaps in order to (inadequately) demonstrate how the story revolves around himself. Wills's genetics background leads to a reasonable if only partly relevant survey of human genetic load and variation; he briefly surveys the human fossil record and the work on genetic evolution in apes and humans, and returns to human genes, brain evolution. and the future of our species. Despite cover hype, all Wills says is that we will live longer and may become "smarter" by taking pills; only colonization of distant worlds with different environments may lead to really distinctive physical changes. There are better books on human evolution, such as Ian Tattersall's The Fossil Trail (CH, Nov'95) or Becoming Human (1998). E. Delson CUNY Herbert H. Lehman College
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
Wading into the human gene pool, biologist Wills argues that natural selection continues its work on humanity. That natural selection eliminated all other homo species except sapiens is evident from the fossil and archaeological record, so presuming it has ceased its influence seems plausible. Wills contends that that perception is illusory, because alternative forms of genes, alleles, are continually mixing. Wills outlines how this genetic activity promotes evolutionary races within the human body's immune system, and he adduces the case of the sickle cell allele, which induces an adaptation (anemia) beneficial if you have malaria, deleterious if you don't. Wills takes up the DNA of the hominid fossil record (reporting a grad student's claim to have replicated Neanderthal DNA), and that of the living primate world, to underscore its closeness to human DNA. Highlighting the drastic mental and physiological differences he believes are traceable to slight genetic differences, Wills himself can be an environmental influence on the evolving opinions of microbiology students. --Gilbert Taylor
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In an eclectic romp through the topic of human evolution, U.C.-San Diego biologist Wills (The Wisdom of the Genes, etc.) focuses on two related questions: Have humans followed the same evolutionary principles as the rest of the mammalian world? And are we still undergoing evolutionary change? He concludes that while the principles have indeed been the same, the rate of human evolution has been dramatically faster than for any of our close relatives and that, if anything, the pace has been speeding up of late. "Humans have accelerated the pace of evolutionary change everywhere, and at the forefront of that change, we are altering ourselves more rapidly than any other species." Wills attributes our rapid pace of change to the way our brains permit us to interact with our environment, the massive amount of environmental change for which we have been responsible over the millennia and the wholesale genetic mixing that is so typical of humans. He traverses broad territory, ranging from hominid phylogeny to a discussion of those who participate in extreme sports; from the physiology of Tibetan Sherpas to an analysis of the stresses faced by British civil servants. He also takes time in his articulate, provocative study to refute, convincingly, many of the claims linking IQ and genetics made in The Bell Curve. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Some believe that our species is no longer evolving in a positive direction because modern medicine enables even unfit individuals to survive and reproduce. Wills (biology, Univ. of California, San Diego), counters that we are still evolving and at an accelerating pace. In his earlier The Runaway Brain (LJ 8/93), Wills proposed an accelerating evolutionary feedback loop in which improvements in the human brain lead to the species changing its own social and physical environment, which in turn causes further selection for improved brain and social function. Here, Wills contrasts the rapid rate of human evolution with the much slower rate of our closest primate relatives. He suggests factors that may be exerting evolutionary pressures by affecting health, such as social and work-related stresses and environmental pollution. These suggestions are interesting but sometimes highly speculative. Clear and engaging, Wills's latest work should be of interest to a wide range of libraries.Marit MacArthur, Auraria Lib., Denver (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Building on earlier ideas (presented in The Runaway Brain, 1993, and Exons, Introns and Talking Genes, 1991), Wills, an English evolutionary biologist transplanted to the Univ. of Calif., San Diego, makes a cogent case for the continued and even more rapid future evolution of our species. The counterargument: Since the advent of life-saving drugs, vaccines, clean water, and other public health measures, even the unfit survive so handily that natural selection has nothing to work on. Not true, says Wills (and most evolutionary biologists), presenting such interesting evidence in support of his position as the finding that native Tibetans have as a group lived longer than anyone anywhere else at extreme altitudes with the help of adaptive changes. (Even during pregnancy, the Tibetan fetus is able to extract more oxygen and achieve a normal birth weight more successfully than newborns of nonadapted Chinese living the same area.) Wills is at his best in presenting examples such as this, as well as in his detailed discussions of the genetic trade-offs that have led to the survival of sickle cell or cystic fibrosis genes. Via these, he reprises the paleontological literature, focusing on his pet theme: the rapid growth of the human brain and mental faculties. His opinion: Environment plays a major role in interactions with genes, which among themselves may act quite mysteriously. He also points to new evidence that the uterus itself constitutes an environment that contributes to the concordance for certain traits seenand the difference in othersin identical twins. Ultimately, Wills forecasts a rosy future: smart pills for us to swallow as we learn more about the makeup of biochemical mind boosters; a gene pool diverse enough to meet future contingencies; life spans double what they are now. More important than this clearly optimistic vision are the cogent arguments about our evolutionary path to date and that make possible the uniquely human qualities of language, culture, and civilization.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
Review by Booklist Review
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Review by Library Journal Review
Review by Kirkus Book Review
