LIFE ASCENDING
The ten great inventions of evolution
By Nick Lane. Profile Books. 344 pages. £9.99
ISBN 978-1-86197818-9
Popular science writing has developed enormously over the past decade, such that the genre has become mainstream and financially significant for the book trade. The 2010 Winner of the Royal Society Prize for Science Books was Life Ascending by the biochemist Nick Page. The eulogies are copious: awe-inspiring, exhilarating, vivid and revealing insights, elegant, fascinating, beautifully written, utterly gripping, etc.
The content is about key evolutionary inventions. Lane makes it clear that he is employing an anthropomorphism: ‘I must clarify what I mean by invention, for I don’t want to imply a deliberate inventor. [. . .] Evolution has no foresight, and does not plan for the future. There is no inventor, no intelligent design’ (p.2).
