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The Runes of Evolution: How the Universe became Self-Aware
How did human beings acquire imaginations that can conjure up untrue possibilities? How did the Universe become self-aware? In The Runes of Evolution , Simon Conway Morris revitalizes the study of evolution from the perspective of convergence, providing us with compelling new evidence to support the mounting scientific view that the history of life is far more predictable than once thought.
A leading evolutionary biologist at the University of Cambridge, Conway Morris came into international prominence for his work on the Cambrian explosion (especially fossils of the Burgess Shale) and evolutionary convergence, which is the process whereby organisms not closely related (not monophyletic), independently evolve similar traits as a result of having to adapt to similar environments or ecological niches.
In The Runes of Evolution , he illustrates how the ubiquity of convergence hints at an underlying framework whereby many outcomes, not least brains and intelligence, are virtually guaranteed on any Earth-like planet. Conway Morris also emphasizes how much of the complexity of advanced biological systems is inherent in microbial forms.
By casting a wider net, The Runes of Evolution explores many neglected evolutionary questions. Some are remarkably general. Why, for example, are convergences such as parasitism, carnivory, and nitrogen fixation in plants concentrated in particular taxonomic hot spots? Why do certain groups have a particular propensity to evolve toward particular states?
Some questions lead to unexpected evolutionary If bees sleep (as they do), do they dream? Why is that insect copulating with an orchid? Why have sponges evolved a system of fiber optics? What do mantis shrimps and submarines have in common? If dinosaurs had not gone extinct what would have happened next? Will a saber-toothed cat ever re-evolve?
Cona Morris “Even amongst the mammals, let alone the entire tree of life, humans represent one minute twig of a vast (and largely fossilized) arborescence. Every living species is a linear descendant of an immense string of now-vanished ancestors, but evolution itself is the very reverse of linear. Rather it is endlessly exploratory, probing the vast spaces of biological hyperspace. Indeed this book is a celebration of how our world is (and was) populated by a riot of forms, a coruscating tapestry of life.”
The Runes of Evolution is the most definitive synthesis of evolutionary convergence to be published to date.
A leading evolutionary biologist at the University of Cambridge, Conway Morris came into international prominence for his work on the Cambrian explosion (especially fossils of the Burgess Shale) and evolutionary convergence, which is the process whereby organisms not closely related (not monophyletic), independently evolve similar traits as a result of having to adapt to similar environments or ecological niches.
In The Runes of Evolution , he illustrates how the ubiquity of convergence hints at an underlying framework whereby many outcomes, not least brains and intelligence, are virtually guaranteed on any Earth-like planet. Conway Morris also emphasizes how much of the complexity of advanced biological systems is inherent in microbial forms.
By casting a wider net, The Runes of Evolution explores many neglected evolutionary questions. Some are remarkably general. Why, for example, are convergences such as parasitism, carnivory, and nitrogen fixation in plants concentrated in particular taxonomic hot spots? Why do certain groups have a particular propensity to evolve toward particular states?
Some questions lead to unexpected evolutionary If bees sleep (as they do), do they dream? Why is that insect copulating with an orchid? Why have sponges evolved a system of fiber optics? What do mantis shrimps and submarines have in common? If dinosaurs had not gone extinct what would have happened next? Will a saber-toothed cat ever re-evolve?
Cona Morris “Even amongst the mammals, let alone the entire tree of life, humans represent one minute twig of a vast (and largely fossilized) arborescence. Every living species is a linear descendant of an immense string of now-vanished ancestors, but evolution itself is the very reverse of linear. Rather it is endlessly exploratory, probing the vast spaces of biological hyperspace. Indeed this book is a celebration of how our world is (and was) populated by a riot of forms, a coruscating tapestry of life.”
The Runes of Evolution is the most definitive synthesis of evolutionary convergence to be published to date.
528 pages, Hardcover
First published June 16, 2014
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283 people want to read
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January 10, 2018
When I picture a theistic evolutionist, I envision someone who defends/celebrates Darwinism, who is committed to methodological naturalism in science, and who of course views their religious faith as compatible with evolutionary science. The Runes of Evolution is the first Simon Conway Morris book I have read, and I have to say that this evolutionary biologist and Christian doesn’t quite fit my preconceived notions of a theistic evolutionist.
For instance, though he certainly accepts a darwinian account of evolution, and though his monumental study of evolutionary convergence certainly helps demonstrate the power of adaptationism, he doesn’t so much defend and celebrate Darwinism as take it for granted. In fact, he thinks that biology needs to advance beyond Darwinism, and that convergence helps point the way: “A central theme of this book is, of course, how evolution rediscovers the inevitable, thus hinting at lawlike features that confer predictability, a central goal for all scientists.” (p. 19) “Biological form transcends phylogeny,” argues the author, who also contends that “evolution is unlikely to be thwarted it its exploration of all potentialities, including as it happens even the emergence of intelligence.” (p.26) Intelligence is central to Conway Morris’s project of revising the study of biology. As he states: “For Darwin the mystery of mysteries was the origin of species, but for us it is the nature of mind.” (p.7)
Like Alfred Wallace, Conway Morris does not think that Darwinism provides a convincing account of mind. However, he thinks convergent evolution helps give us some clues regarding this topic. On the one hand, convergence indicates that the “differences that separate us from the cognitive competence of corvids, New World monkeys, and perhaps even octopus are paper thin.” (p.294) On the other hand, the distinction between humans and other animals represents in a very real sense a profound gulf. How does one account for our simultaneously being so close to yet so far from various other animals? Conway Morris speculates that “mind is not so much self-realized as brains increase in size and complexity but rather the brain serves as conduit. In this way it encounters the abstract realms of mathematics, music, and language, all of infinite potentiality. Such realms are familiar, but they also hint at the existence of orthogonal worlds.” (p.8) Does this view of human distinctiveness imply that the processes that account for human cognition are fundamentally different than those that account for animal cognition? Not at all. “That animal cognition has begun to tap these Platonic worlds is consistent with such a view, but there seems to be limits to their intellectual capacities.” (p. 295) In other words, mind does not naturalistically emerge but rather is discovered during the evolutionary process, with humans simply having experienced the fullest, richest access to the pre-existing Mind.
Unlike my preconceived notion of a theistic evolutionist, Conway Morris does not defend/valorize methodological naturalism in science. As I have indicated, he seeks to reform biological science by bringing together Darwin and Plato. Speaking of this prospect, Conway Morris says “There will be no ‘End of Science,’ indeed very much the reverse,” as new paths open up for exploration.
Despite the move beyond methodological naturalism, Conway Morris distances himself from the Intelligent Design movement, which he implies rejects evolution, and which he claims is perpetrating “theological mischief.” (I assume he means by this the notion of repeated acts of special creation.) What I find more interesting than Conway Morris’s take on the ID crowd is his criticism of the “ultra-Darwinists” on the other side of the isle. Unlike the standard theistic evolutionist complaint about “new atheists” like Richard Dawkins overstepping the bounds of methodological naturalism by using their valid evolutionary science as a weapon to make illegitimate metaphysical claims against theism, Conway Morris argues that the often unexamined metaphysical assumptions of many darwinists skew their scientific views. With Stephen J. Gould in mind, who famously denied that evolution was predictable and that re-running the tape of life would produce vastly different outcomes, Conway Morris says “if we choose to live in a world wedded to relativism, then there is little surprise if counterfactual evolutionary stories find a resonance. Correspondingly, if we can demonstrate a deep structure to evolution, unsurprisingly other metaphysics will be more fruitful.” (p.22) The staggering amount of evidence related to evolutionary convergence in this book is thus essential as part of an effort to prepare the ground for a rejection of the contemporary zeitgeist. Gould’s “worldview made no sense unless humans were utter flukes of circumstance,” so Conway Morris seeks to demonstrate how profoundly wrong Gould was concerning evolutionary unpredictability.
I am not in a position to properly evaluate many of the scientific arguments regarding convergence Conway Morris makes in the text. Perhaps he provides an overly deterministic version of adaptationism; certainly his reliance on inherency (which is supposed to help overcome the contingency of evolution by accounting for seemingly improbable transitions) leaves a lot of unanswered questions regarding processes and details; I do not know enough yet about deep homology to know for sure to what extent (if any) it weakens Conway Morris’s thesis; such thoughts come immediately to mind. I do intend to read some scholarly reactions to this book and Conway Morris’s responses to get a better grasp on convergent evolution.
Regarding his willingness to jettison methodological naturalism in science, a step that convergent evolution does not necessarily entail, I do not think Conway Morris is likely to make much headway, and I am not entirely sure it would be a good thing were he able to. For many theistic evolutionist types, and for philosophers like Antony Flew, methodological naturalism in science can be thought of as a protective doctrine in that it not only legitimates but also delimits science’s proper sphere of authority, thereby giving space for other forms of intellectual inquiry. De-valorizing the doctrine of methodological naturalism thus might as a practical matter serve the interests of the powerful contingent of aggressively anti-theistic scientists who do not care to scrupulously distinguish methodological naturalism from their philosophical naturalism in the first place.
On the other hand, when Conway Morris says through the mouth of a fictitious scientific friend Mortimer that “if anybody thinks mind is entirely material they are barking up the wrong tree” (p.10), I find this a very plausible point of view, yet it is one precluded from consideration by methodological naturalism. Only if we had strong reasons to believe philosophical naturalism true could one plausibly claim that a commitment to methodological naturalism in science had no distorting effects on some of science’s topics of inquiry. Conway Morris’s considered opinion that the study of mind from a naturalistic perspective seems to lead to intractable philosophical difficulties is thus a defensible reason for him to argue that we should move beyond methodological naturalism. In addition, it must be said that methodological naturalism is hardly functioning as a very effective protective doctrine. Theistic evolutionists who carefully distinguish their BioLogos worldview from scientific theory are granted no intellectual legitimacy by the Dawkins crowd, which proceeds as if evolution and theism were irreconcilable. That Richard Dawkins is a celebrated establishment figure who makes the assumption that science can pronounce judgment on God’s existence (or lack thereof), while Discovery Institute types are intellectually marginalized-often with theistic evolutionists being among the loudest critics-for basically affirming the same assumption, seems troubling. Yes, the theistic evolutionists criticize Dawkins as well as the Discovery Institute, but where are the prominent non-religious academic critics of Dawkins’s breach of methodological naturalism? Though some surely do exist, they hardly seem very effective or zealous. So, theistic evolutionists who think that by defending methodological naturalism they are promoting good science and sheltering religion from illegitimate attacks might conceivably be mistaken on both counts. In any case, it is not clear to me that Conway Morris’s move beyond methodological naturalism is definitely misguided.
Another potentially problematic aspect of Conway Morris’s argument concerns the origin of life, a topic he is reticent about. A mainstream scientific point of view (shared by typical theistic evolutionists) insists that life is ultimately reducible to chemistry and physics, and that though we currently have no good explanation for how life emerged, a naturalistic explanation exists and might even be discovered in time. A different perspective comes from the late philosopher Antony Flew, who remarked: “The philosophical question that has not been answered in origin-of-life studies is this: How can a universe of mindless matter produce beings with intrinsic ends, self-replication capabilities, and ‘coded chemistry’?” Flew’s self-styled “pilgrimage of reason” led him to the conclusion that this question never could be satisfactorily answered, and this was crucial for his turn to Intelligent Design in the form of deism. Conway Morris, like Flew, thinks “Life is much more than just a sort of souped-up chemistry and physics.” However, given his distaste for the ID movement, I cannot imagine that he would ever advocate for a Designer’s touch at the origin of life, even though this could be intellectually reconciled with darwinian evolutionary mechanisms. (In addition, his articulation of evolutionary convergence has been seen as an extension of the so called “fine tuning” argument into the realm of biology; as this alleged process unfolds my hunch is he would view the postulation of special intervention from God at the origin of life like a scratch in the middle of a symphonic record.) If Conway Morris does not reduce life to physics and chemistry, yet if he does not employ the notion of special creation, what generalizations might he make regarding the emergence of life? Even if evolution serves as a search engine for the discovery of Platonic worlds, does he propose that somehow it just naturalistically comes about that life emerged to evolve to find these worlds? Now, mainstream scientific thinking itself seems at this point to do no better than to say “somehow it just naturalistically comes about that life emerges. Details hopefully to follow.” However, because Conway Morris, unlike mainstream scientists, considers life to transcend physics and chemistry, in some sense he seems to have set himself an even bigger challenge with regards to explaining the origin of life than the one facing the mainstream scientists. Perhaps he will argue that some other process besides evolution allowed a pre-life world access into the faintest, outermost level of Platonic existence, thereby inaugurating life in its initial, simplest form? Who knows for sure, but I would definitely be interested in hearing Conway Morris elaborate on the topic of life’s origins, and more generally in having him produce a book that elaborates on and extends the positions he stakes out in The Runes of Evolution, which I find very distinctive and very interesting.
For instance, though he certainly accepts a darwinian account of evolution, and though his monumental study of evolutionary convergence certainly helps demonstrate the power of adaptationism, he doesn’t so much defend and celebrate Darwinism as take it for granted. In fact, he thinks that biology needs to advance beyond Darwinism, and that convergence helps point the way: “A central theme of this book is, of course, how evolution rediscovers the inevitable, thus hinting at lawlike features that confer predictability, a central goal for all scientists.” (p. 19) “Biological form transcends phylogeny,” argues the author, who also contends that “evolution is unlikely to be thwarted it its exploration of all potentialities, including as it happens even the emergence of intelligence.” (p.26) Intelligence is central to Conway Morris’s project of revising the study of biology. As he states: “For Darwin the mystery of mysteries was the origin of species, but for us it is the nature of mind.” (p.7)
Like Alfred Wallace, Conway Morris does not think that Darwinism provides a convincing account of mind. However, he thinks convergent evolution helps give us some clues regarding this topic. On the one hand, convergence indicates that the “differences that separate us from the cognitive competence of corvids, New World monkeys, and perhaps even octopus are paper thin.” (p.294) On the other hand, the distinction between humans and other animals represents in a very real sense a profound gulf. How does one account for our simultaneously being so close to yet so far from various other animals? Conway Morris speculates that “mind is not so much self-realized as brains increase in size and complexity but rather the brain serves as conduit. In this way it encounters the abstract realms of mathematics, music, and language, all of infinite potentiality. Such realms are familiar, but they also hint at the existence of orthogonal worlds.” (p.8) Does this view of human distinctiveness imply that the processes that account for human cognition are fundamentally different than those that account for animal cognition? Not at all. “That animal cognition has begun to tap these Platonic worlds is consistent with such a view, but there seems to be limits to their intellectual capacities.” (p. 295) In other words, mind does not naturalistically emerge but rather is discovered during the evolutionary process, with humans simply having experienced the fullest, richest access to the pre-existing Mind.
Unlike my preconceived notion of a theistic evolutionist, Conway Morris does not defend/valorize methodological naturalism in science. As I have indicated, he seeks to reform biological science by bringing together Darwin and Plato. Speaking of this prospect, Conway Morris says “There will be no ‘End of Science,’ indeed very much the reverse,” as new paths open up for exploration.
Despite the move beyond methodological naturalism, Conway Morris distances himself from the Intelligent Design movement, which he implies rejects evolution, and which he claims is perpetrating “theological mischief.” (I assume he means by this the notion of repeated acts of special creation.) What I find more interesting than Conway Morris’s take on the ID crowd is his criticism of the “ultra-Darwinists” on the other side of the isle. Unlike the standard theistic evolutionist complaint about “new atheists” like Richard Dawkins overstepping the bounds of methodological naturalism by using their valid evolutionary science as a weapon to make illegitimate metaphysical claims against theism, Conway Morris argues that the often unexamined metaphysical assumptions of many darwinists skew their scientific views. With Stephen J. Gould in mind, who famously denied that evolution was predictable and that re-running the tape of life would produce vastly different outcomes, Conway Morris says “if we choose to live in a world wedded to relativism, then there is little surprise if counterfactual evolutionary stories find a resonance. Correspondingly, if we can demonstrate a deep structure to evolution, unsurprisingly other metaphysics will be more fruitful.” (p.22) The staggering amount of evidence related to evolutionary convergence in this book is thus essential as part of an effort to prepare the ground for a rejection of the contemporary zeitgeist. Gould’s “worldview made no sense unless humans were utter flukes of circumstance,” so Conway Morris seeks to demonstrate how profoundly wrong Gould was concerning evolutionary unpredictability.
I am not in a position to properly evaluate many of the scientific arguments regarding convergence Conway Morris makes in the text. Perhaps he provides an overly deterministic version of adaptationism; certainly his reliance on inherency (which is supposed to help overcome the contingency of evolution by accounting for seemingly improbable transitions) leaves a lot of unanswered questions regarding processes and details; I do not know enough yet about deep homology to know for sure to what extent (if any) it weakens Conway Morris’s thesis; such thoughts come immediately to mind. I do intend to read some scholarly reactions to this book and Conway Morris’s responses to get a better grasp on convergent evolution.
Regarding his willingness to jettison methodological naturalism in science, a step that convergent evolution does not necessarily entail, I do not think Conway Morris is likely to make much headway, and I am not entirely sure it would be a good thing were he able to. For many theistic evolutionist types, and for philosophers like Antony Flew, methodological naturalism in science can be thought of as a protective doctrine in that it not only legitimates but also delimits science’s proper sphere of authority, thereby giving space for other forms of intellectual inquiry. De-valorizing the doctrine of methodological naturalism thus might as a practical matter serve the interests of the powerful contingent of aggressively anti-theistic scientists who do not care to scrupulously distinguish methodological naturalism from their philosophical naturalism in the first place.
On the other hand, when Conway Morris says through the mouth of a fictitious scientific friend Mortimer that “if anybody thinks mind is entirely material they are barking up the wrong tree” (p.10), I find this a very plausible point of view, yet it is one precluded from consideration by methodological naturalism. Only if we had strong reasons to believe philosophical naturalism true could one plausibly claim that a commitment to methodological naturalism in science had no distorting effects on some of science’s topics of inquiry. Conway Morris’s considered opinion that the study of mind from a naturalistic perspective seems to lead to intractable philosophical difficulties is thus a defensible reason for him to argue that we should move beyond methodological naturalism. In addition, it must be said that methodological naturalism is hardly functioning as a very effective protective doctrine. Theistic evolutionists who carefully distinguish their BioLogos worldview from scientific theory are granted no intellectual legitimacy by the Dawkins crowd, which proceeds as if evolution and theism were irreconcilable. That Richard Dawkins is a celebrated establishment figure who makes the assumption that science can pronounce judgment on God’s existence (or lack thereof), while Discovery Institute types are intellectually marginalized-often with theistic evolutionists being among the loudest critics-for basically affirming the same assumption, seems troubling. Yes, the theistic evolutionists criticize Dawkins as well as the Discovery Institute, but where are the prominent non-religious academic critics of Dawkins’s breach of methodological naturalism? Though some surely do exist, they hardly seem very effective or zealous. So, theistic evolutionists who think that by defending methodological naturalism they are promoting good science and sheltering religion from illegitimate attacks might conceivably be mistaken on both counts. In any case, it is not clear to me that Conway Morris’s move beyond methodological naturalism is definitely misguided.
Another potentially problematic aspect of Conway Morris’s argument concerns the origin of life, a topic he is reticent about. A mainstream scientific point of view (shared by typical theistic evolutionists) insists that life is ultimately reducible to chemistry and physics, and that though we currently have no good explanation for how life emerged, a naturalistic explanation exists and might even be discovered in time. A different perspective comes from the late philosopher Antony Flew, who remarked: “The philosophical question that has not been answered in origin-of-life studies is this: How can a universe of mindless matter produce beings with intrinsic ends, self-replication capabilities, and ‘coded chemistry’?” Flew’s self-styled “pilgrimage of reason” led him to the conclusion that this question never could be satisfactorily answered, and this was crucial for his turn to Intelligent Design in the form of deism. Conway Morris, like Flew, thinks “Life is much more than just a sort of souped-up chemistry and physics.” However, given his distaste for the ID movement, I cannot imagine that he would ever advocate for a Designer’s touch at the origin of life, even though this could be intellectually reconciled with darwinian evolutionary mechanisms. (In addition, his articulation of evolutionary convergence has been seen as an extension of the so called “fine tuning” argument into the realm of biology; as this alleged process unfolds my hunch is he would view the postulation of special intervention from God at the origin of life like a scratch in the middle of a symphonic record.) If Conway Morris does not reduce life to physics and chemistry, yet if he does not employ the notion of special creation, what generalizations might he make regarding the emergence of life? Even if evolution serves as a search engine for the discovery of Platonic worlds, does he propose that somehow it just naturalistically comes about that life emerged to evolve to find these worlds? Now, mainstream scientific thinking itself seems at this point to do no better than to say “somehow it just naturalistically comes about that life emerges. Details hopefully to follow.” However, because Conway Morris, unlike mainstream scientists, considers life to transcend physics and chemistry, in some sense he seems to have set himself an even bigger challenge with regards to explaining the origin of life than the one facing the mainstream scientists. Perhaps he will argue that some other process besides evolution allowed a pre-life world access into the faintest, outermost level of Platonic existence, thereby inaugurating life in its initial, simplest form? Who knows for sure, but I would definitely be interested in hearing Conway Morris elaborate on the topic of life’s origins, and more generally in having him produce a book that elaborates on and extends the positions he stakes out in The Runes of Evolution, which I find very distinctive and very interesting.
July 14, 2025
ENGLISH: This is the first time I have read this excellent book, that contains an overwhelming number of examples of convergent evolution, many of which I didn't know before.
More information in my blog: https://populscience.blogspot.com/202...
ESPAÑOL: Esta es la primera vez que he leído este excelente libro, que contiene innumerables ejemplos de convergencia evolutiva, muchos de los cuales yo no conocía.
Más información en mi blog: https://divulciencia.blogspot.com/202...
More information in my blog: https://populscience.blogspot.com/202...
ESPAÑOL: Esta es la primera vez que he leído este excelente libro, que contiene innumerables ejemplos de convergencia evolutiva, muchos de los cuales yo no conocía.
Más información en mi blog: https://divulciencia.blogspot.com/202...
August 21, 2020
A deep look at convergent evolution. You will need a dictionary and a thesaurus and a lot of patience. Unless you are trained in a biological science. I was very pleasantly surprised especially by the ending. I will attempt another of the authors books soon.
October 15, 2025
Written for many audiences, and thus tough reading for one person, but worthwhile.
November 1, 2025
An amazing celebration of life. Truly astonishing, loads of food for thought, and loads of fascinating details. I think to really enjoy this book (and frankly to find much of it readable) then you need a good background knowledge of biology, especially microbiology. But there are some very fun sections, and flies through life in it's entirety.
Whilst at times it feels like the overarching argument (that Evolution is a predictable and law-abiding, directive force) is lost to the details, by the end Conway Morris is truly compelling - and I am struggling to think of any thorough alternative conception of evolution to his...
Whilst at times it feels like the overarching argument (that Evolution is a predictable and law-abiding, directive force) is lost to the details, by the end Conway Morris is truly compelling - and I am struggling to think of any thorough alternative conception of evolution to his...
June 23, 2018
Four-and-a-half stars (good program, only lightly marred by unnecessary snark, but doesn't stick the landing). This is not a book that goes out of its way to make itself easy for a non-specialist to read: the names of species and taxa and genera are thrown around with abandon and little explanation, as well as such terms as eusocialality, ecomorphs, homoplasy, etc. But despite that, it turns out to be a fun (if long) read, and practically an encyclopedia of evolutionary convergence. There is a lot to like here and the author's enthusiasm is contagious and enjoyable (even if he seemed a bit too eager to interpret all edge cases as being possible convergence as opposed to homology).
There's a certain amount not to like as well, such as the author's occasional snark against those who he disagrees with. Normally I like a bit of snark in my reading, but here is came across as simply dismissive of the scientists with opposing opinions. Not cool. And, curiously, the book spends a huge amount of time of describing examples of convergent evolution, but the theory behind it is discussed comparatively little and in a scattered manner. I was rather hoping that at the end he would summarize his reasoning and bring up fitness landscapes, ecomorphs and such and tie them into a unified model. But at very end, when he comes to consciousness, Morris turns to mysticism instead, which I find disappointing. There is nothing wrong with mysticism per se (and I did not mind the occasional traces of Platonism I encountered at the text) -- you can believe whatever you want and I'm fine with it. But it is basically an emotional argument, not a rational one, and it lacks any real power to convince -- it can only elicit recognition of similar beliefs, and if it doesn't do that, it does nothing much. So his coyness during the text, and his dualism at the end, somewhat weakens his argument in my eyes.
There is a lot of good stuff hidden in the notes -- practically an entire second book with comments and mini-essays and well as the usual references. I do believe the notes for the introduction are significantly longer than the actual introduction itself.
There's a certain amount not to like as well, such as the author's occasional snark against those who he disagrees with. Normally I like a bit of snark in my reading, but here is came across as simply dismissive of the scientists with opposing opinions. Not cool. And, curiously, the book spends a huge amount of time of describing examples of convergent evolution, but the theory behind it is discussed comparatively little and in a scattered manner. I was rather hoping that at the end he would summarize his reasoning and bring up fitness landscapes, ecomorphs and such and tie them into a unified model. But at very end, when he comes to consciousness, Morris turns to mysticism instead, which I find disappointing. There is nothing wrong with mysticism per se (and I did not mind the occasional traces of Platonism I encountered at the text) -- you can believe whatever you want and I'm fine with it. But it is basically an emotional argument, not a rational one, and it lacks any real power to convince -- it can only elicit recognition of similar beliefs, and if it doesn't do that, it does nothing much. So his coyness during the text, and his dualism at the end, somewhat weakens his argument in my eyes.
There is a lot of good stuff hidden in the notes -- practically an entire second book with comments and mini-essays and well as the usual references. I do believe the notes for the introduction are significantly longer than the actual introduction itself.
November 14, 2018
Fascinating, amazing, interesting, and over my head. Worth reading if it does not tax your brain too badly. It probably deserves five stars, but I am giving it four because of the difficulty I had with it.
May 23, 2024
The premise is intriguing: that there exists certain laws concerning the evolution of life, that evolutionary development is not merely a completely random series of mutations which confer a benefit to a species.
A warning however: this book is written to be read by people in the field. I am a layman and had difficulties with the more complex scientific concepts and terms. I exited about a quarter of the way in, satisfied that I understood the overall premise, but not willing to expend the energy to more deeply delve into the subject.
A warning however: this book is written to be read by people in the field. I am a layman and had difficulties with the more complex scientific concepts and terms. I exited about a quarter of the way in, satisfied that I understood the overall premise, but not willing to expend the energy to more deeply delve into the subject.
March 21, 2016
I've been hoping Conway Morris would write a book like this for some time now, since the past decade has been so eventful in terms of convergence. As a catalog of recent findings and a jumping-off point for further study and debate, it's excellent. It would be fun to teach a class on the different chapters and dive into the evidence with advanced biochem students. I have a nagging suspicion that maybe a quarter of the cases Conway Morris presents as scientific evidence for convergence may have other explanation, but as long as a majority of the evidence presented here "sticks," you have a pretty convincing hodgepodge of data that evolution has a deep structure that it repeatedly finds.
My main issue is with the lack of organization. There's so much here and it's presented at such a high level that some pages read like a list rather than a sustained argument. That's fine -- I could use a list like this very much, thank you -- but it makes for slower reading especially by a non-biologist. There are connections made from chapter to chapter, but they are abrupt and don't have a deep structure themselves, except that the more complex matters of brains and minds are put at the end of the book. Conway Morris is entertaining as ever, and the balance of writing far favors wit over clarity. There's a place for that. As long as you expect that, I think you'll find a lot to think about here. Not sure if it helps convince a hostile audience, but this non-hostile audience member is glad this book came out, and it helped point out a few dozen papers I was unaware of as well.
My main issue is with the lack of organization. There's so much here and it's presented at such a high level that some pages read like a list rather than a sustained argument. That's fine -- I could use a list like this very much, thank you -- but it makes for slower reading especially by a non-biologist. There are connections made from chapter to chapter, but they are abrupt and don't have a deep structure themselves, except that the more complex matters of brains and minds are put at the end of the book. Conway Morris is entertaining as ever, and the balance of writing far favors wit over clarity. There's a place for that. As long as you expect that, I think you'll find a lot to think about here. Not sure if it helps convince a hostile audience, but this non-hostile audience member is glad this book came out, and it helped point out a few dozen papers I was unaware of as well.
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September 23, 2018This book was not at all what I was expecting and hoping for, and as a result was a huge disappointment. I greatly respect the author and have been very interested in his topic of convergence. Since the sub-title of the book suggests that “how” questions would be addressed, I thought this book would be ideal for hearing the authors thoughts on how convergence happens, and “how the universe became self-aware”. But, these types of questions were not dealt with the in book – at all! Instead the book is a painfully long encyclopaedic description of where convergence is seen in the natural world. This convergence is “explained” by stating that only an idiot would not accept that this has all happened due to traditional Darwinian (not even Neo-Darwinian) processes. No scientific or even philosophical explanation was given or even hypothesised regarding how this happened, or why this happened. Instead the author simply states that it was all inevitable; sounding like the mathematician in the movie Jurassic Park. If I was to rate the book on what I was expecting, I would give it at most one star out of five. But, this would likely be unfair, given the large amount of research and work that went into the text. Ultimately, I did not care about what the author presented – one example would have been sufficient for me. And, what I hoped to learn in book was not covered. So, after reading too many pages of material I was not interested in, I arrive at the final chapter to have the author state that Darwinism needs the same treatment that Einstein gave to Newtonian gravitation. At least I can agree with this. So, I am still interested in learning from the author about how or why he believes that convergence has happened. But after reading this highly disappointing book, I am reluctant to try another one by the same author without a good recommendation. Any suggestions?
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