ENGLISH

Every Living Thing

By Rob Dunn

Book information

Publisher
Smithsonian
Year
2008
ISBN
0061430307, 9780061430305, 9780061727009
LCC
QH83 .D87 2009
Open Library ID
OL23118115M
Language
english
Format
PDF
Filesize
1 MB (1184302 bytes)
Edition
1
Pages
290\290
Time added
2010-05-17 00:23:50

Description

Biologists and laypeople alike have repeatedly claimed victory over life. A thousand years ago we thought we knew almost everything; a hundred years ago, too. But even today, Rob Dunn argues, discoveries we can't yet imagine still await. In a series of vivid portraits of single-minded scientists, Dunn traces the history of human discovery, from the establishment of classification in the eighteenth century to today's attempts to find life in space. The narrative telescopes from a scientist's attempt to find one single thing (a rare ant-emulating beetle species) to another scientist's attempt to find everything in a small patch of jungle in Guanacaste, Costa Rica. With poetry and humor, Dunn reminds readers how tough and exhilarating it is to study the natural world, and why it matters.

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