Evolution: A Beginner's Guide

Beginner's Guide (Oneworld Publications)

by Burton S. Guttman

Covering everything from fossilized dinosaurs to intelligent apes, this is an accessible guide to one of the most important scientific theories of all time. Burt Guttman assumes no prior scientific knowledge on the part of the reader, and explains each of the key ideas and concepts, including natural selection, genetics and the evolution of animal behavior, in a lively and informative way. Looking ahead to the future of evolutionary theory, and assessing its possible implications for the way we understand morality, human nature and our place in the world, this book provides the perfect starting point for understanding what evolution is and why it matters.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction

224 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2005

Reviews

[Alan]

I have not read this book in its entirety so it would be inappropriate and presumptious to assign a rating. I was asked to review specific chapters by a church friend who, having read it, wanted a second opinion. The text copied from my e-mail reply to him summarises my reaction and thoughts on the limited parts I read.

"Guttman is very outspoken and adopts a mocking tone toward those Christian forces so strong in the US that promote creationism and reject evolution. One gets the feeling that his tone may have resulted from uncharitable treatment he himself might have received.

The probability arguments do not satisfy me. He is basically saying that, although the probability is vanishingly small, it is theoretically possible. Hence, step two of his argument is that because we see the complex world around us it must mean that, despite being vanishing small, it is the way it occurred. This view, called by Dawkins, a ‘cummulative’ process seems to me to also be a faith statement.
He additionally recognises that genetic systems demonstrate the ability to move to more complexity but invokes that wonderfully ability to have produced the ability.
Bizarrely, in the traditional monkey/Shakespeare example, he has to invoke some guided process to select particular monkeys to make it work. He has an outside agent selecting a promising primate.

The section on entropy is also unsatisfying for he confirms that closed systems must move to increased entropy and recognises that biological systems decrease entropy locally by drawing on solar energy and the sun’s increasing entropy. He cannot get round the entropy issues without drawing on his unproven probability issues that produce genetic structures.
Even his tidying up the room illustration requires some form of external director but you cannot have an external director in a closed system. He maintains that we are in a closed system.

Overall, I find his arguments unconvincing. He can legitimately (and must as a responsible scientist) probe the ‘how’ but I cannot see how he can claim it is proven. I think he is left, like me, with the inescapable and wonderful reality around him. He must ask how and he must look in awe. (Dawkins would support this.) Neither he nor Creationists are, in my view, in a position to be dogmatic.

Also, ironically, I have more sympathy with his view than the statements of Creationists for his view does not exclude the possibility that God might have done it that way. To me Creationists are misrepresenting God.

Final thought, he is writing from the US context and I suspect it understandably contributes to the vehemence of his views."

[Will]

Not really for beginners

I started this book with my cousin as a means for her to learn more about evolution (I am not an expert but I have read more than enough to have a good understanding). Well after a couple chapters my cousin dropped out because the book made her feel stupid. I continued it thanks to my compulsion to finish books I start. While I did not find the book unreadable by any means, and it in fact included quite a bit of interesting information, I could definitely see why a beginner would be put off. The writer often seems to assume the reader has background knowledge about several things. He also adds so much information about things a beginner would not be interested in (like birds ...so so much information about birds)

[Marco · Rating 3 out of 5]

erudite and at times very useful introduction, but alas it has been very poorly written and the writer did not have in mind what a reader could have learned, but rather what he felt like sharing.
overall, still a good read, but could have been made so much better by serious editing and a better book plan. recommendations on a great introduction to evolution (clearer than this please) are gracefully appreciated

[Hamish · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is clearly not written for beginners.

[Divya · Rating 1 out of 5]

If you want a book with talking points against Christians this is your book. If you wanna learn about evolution, you might wanna check some other book.

[Akash Das · Rating 2 out of 5]

90% bullshit 10% Evolution.

[Jana · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pretty average audiobook

[FARSHAD · Rating 3 out of 5]

The title of this book has two parts, separated by a colon. The first part is evolution. The second, is "A beginner's guide". To me, the first part is correct but the second is erroneous. The first part is right because the book deals with diverse elements of evolution, namely speciation, natural selection, the root of variations, human evolution, etc. The second part is erroneous because it simply is not a guide for beginners. Although, the blurb behind the book reads that "this book assumes no previous scientific knowledge", my general feeling is that it a novice layman will quickly grow tired or confused with this book. But why?

There are two main methods to write a beginner's book in any field: one way, is to lay out the essentials of the field, without getting into the details, through a clear, easy to comprehend prose you can come up with. And then leave the reader with further reading list in case he or she wants to investigate more. The second way, is to worry that you might leave out certain subjects out of the book and then try to pack it with a load of information.

This book is written in the second manner. The prose introduces biological jargon page after page, even though it might not be necessary at every step. Second, the paragraphs jump to diverse subjects on the same topic, introducing diverse sub-topics all the while. These two aspects give the reader a bumpy ride because you are bombarded with new information in each paragraph. The result is that the book is very informative but difficult to follow. It seems mostly like a good summary of the topic once you want to make a review and refresh you understanding.

I recommend starting with other books such Why Evolution Is True and then coming back to this book.

[Dan Horvat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Poorly written. People who are just looking for an overview of the basic concepts of evolution might feel overwhelmed by the big - and unexplained - words, and biologists will recognize certain parts where Guttman is just wrong. There's nothing wrong with the science but Guttman does occasionally make a statement which doesn't stand.

One of the main phrases of this book is ''we'll explain later''. Meaning, an important concept is mentioned briefly and then abandoned until some later chapter. The idea of introducing a general concept - without proof - and then discussing it later in detail doesn't seem fit for what should be a beginners guide. It's very difficult to learn from this book.

I bought it because I was hoping it might serve as a reference point for the general concepts of evolution, if I forget something, but it doesn't fulfill this purpose. The book is meant to be read from cover to cover, you can't just open the chapter about speciation and remind yourself how speciation works.

The author is mentioning all the important topics, and then some, but the book is just difficult to read and it's poorly organized. I have a problem with making claims without giving evidence to support these claims, even if I happen to know what's written in this book is correct.

There's no real substance here. Guttman is mentioning all the concepts but isn't really explaining how they work. What he's saying is correct though, hence my positive three-star rating.

[Maria · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome book! Not a beginner's guide in a sense that you'll need some basic knowledge of biology, bits of genetics and organic chemistry to go through especially first chapters. But a beginner's guide in a sense that it puts all these bits together into a nice picture covering all major aspects of evolution theory. The chapter about genome and DNA made me nostalgic about my molecular biology classes, I wish I still had my records from it to refresh the details. Boy! I am usually too lazy to write any book review, but this book made me so excited and revived (don't want to be big-sounding, but really) my sense of awe about the nature and its complexity, that I just had to do it. Guttman also provides a further reading list for each chapter and I've already marked several titles as worth following up.

[Any Length · Rating 4 out of 5]

WOW, what a fantastic book. If you don't know anything at all about evolution, get a few rudimentary facts first. But if you know a few little things, then this is the book for you.
It's just amazing how Burton Guttman relayed all the important information about evolution in such an easy to understand format. And at the end Guttman takes all the arguments of the "Creationists" misguided ideas about the earth being 3000-5000 years old. I'm so glad Guttman took the time to write this book so we can all be armed with the facts.