Volume 42, Number 4 · March 2, 1995
Life at the Edge of Chaos?
By John Maynard Smith
Darwinism Evolving
by David J. Depew, by Bruce H. Weber
MIT Press, 588 pp., $49.95
Darwinism Evolving is a history of ideas about biological diversity and evolution, from Aristotle to the present day. The last part of the book is an account of some recent developments, and an attempt to forecast the future. Most of this review will be concerned with the final section, which seems to me mistaken. I must therefore start by saying that I found the historical part well informed, and full of valuable insights. The ideas discussed are fundamental, not only to biology, but also to our view of our relationship to the rest of the natural world. The last twenty years have seen an explosion of scholarship centered on Darwin, by historians and philosophers. The book is an admirable summary of, and addition to, that scholarship.
Review, 4292 words
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