The Making of the Fittest: DNA and the Ultimate Forensic Record of Evolution

The Making of the Fittest: DNA and the Ultimate Forensic Record of Evolution | Sean B. Carroll | The Fittest Record

books:

The Making of the ...

	The Making of the Fittest: DNA and the Ultimate Forensic Record of Evolution Sean B. Carroll W. W. Norton, 2006 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 38 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

highly recommended

DNA evidence not only solves crimes?in Sean Carroll's hands it will now end the Evolution Wars.

DNA is the genetic material that defines us as individuals. Over the last two decades, it has emerged as a powerful tool for solving crimes and determining guilt & innocence. But, very recently, an important new aspect of DNA has been revealed?it contains a detailed record of evolution. That is, DNA is a living chronicle of how the marvelous creatures that inhabit our planet have adapted to its many environments, from the freezing waters of the Antarctic to the lush canopy of the rain forest.

In the pages of this highly readable narrative, Sean Carroll guides the general reader on a tour of the massive DNA record of three billion years of evolution to see how the fittest are made. And what a eye-opening tour it is - one featuring immortal genes, fossil genes, and genes that bear the scars of past battles with horrible diseases. This book clinches the case for evolution, beyond any reasonable doubt. 50 illustrations; 8 pages of color.

for more information click here

How DNA supports the fact of biological evolution

Most of this book is a primer on how the study of DNA code from various species sheds light on the evolutionary process. The text is as clear as such a text can be considering how abstract the DNA sequences are to even the well educated reader. There are numerous charts and tables, drawings, black and white photos (and some color plates) and such in this timely, handsome and well-presented book to guide the reader. I only wish that I could have grasped the details in a more concrete manner.

DNA codes for proteins, of which there are vast numbers. These proteins are formed from amino acids of which life uses twenty, and in turn these amino acids are called up by the sequence of letters in the code. Presumably (Carroll does not make this clear) as the zygotic cell divides, working its way to the composition of the complete organism, the DNA code is read in sequence like a tape fed into a bar code. First this protein and then that protein and then still another is made and somehow strung together in an exacting order so that, voila! a massively complex organism is constructed. What is not in this book is an explanation of how these proteins know where to go and when. Presumably that knowledge is part of the very sequence of the code, or perhaps it is implicit in the positions in space of the proteins relative to one another. In others words, the DNA code is only the most obvious and "visible" part of the microscopic reproductive process.

If you are like me and are looking for the same sort of explanation, this book will be of limited value. Prof. Carroll's purpose is not to make transparent the reproductive process at the chemical level. His purpose--and a laudable one it is--is to show how DNA analysis is yet another piece of evidence pointing to the truth of biological evolution. That is why he uses the word "forensic" in the subtitle.

One of the most powerful uses of DNA is in reconstructing the so-called "tree" (or "bush") of life. Carroll shows how it is now clear beyond almost any doubt that our closest relatives are chimpanzees and bonobos followed by the other great apes and then monkeys. He shows how DNA analysis can also (and by the same logic) be used to show the relative age of species. Interesting is the discovery of how exactly similar are some sections of code in diverse species, indicating that such code is very ancient. In fact Carroll points to "immortal" sequences of code that have resisted all attempts at corruption or mutation. He explains that such code is so nearly indispensible to living forms that natural selection is, and has always been, active in keeping it intact.

In this regard (and moving to the latter chapters of the book) we find a particularly delightful refutation of one of the notions of "Intelligent Design." Carroll quotes perhaps the best known of the intelligent designers, Dr. Michael Behe, as writing:

"Suppose that nearly four billion years ago the designer made the first cell, already containing all of the incredibly complex biochemical systems discussed here and many others. (One can postulate that the design for systems that were to be used later, such as blood clotting, were present but not `turned on.' In present-day organisms plenty of genes are turned off for a while, sometimes for generations, to be turned on at a later time)." (p. 244)

How brilliant this sounds! However Carroll writes:

"This is utter nonsense that disregards fundamentals of genetics. Dr. Ken Miller of Brown University has described this scenario as `an absolutely hopeless genetic fantasy of pre-formed genes waiting for the organisms that might need them to gradually appear.' As we saw in chapter 5, the rule of DNA code is use it or lose it. The constant bombardment of mutation will erode the text of genes that are not used, as it has in icefish, yeast, humans, and virtually every other species. There is no mechanism for genes to be preserved while awaiting the need for them to arise." (p. 244)

Indeed, if Behe were correct, there would be in virtually all species "silent pre-formed genes" waiting to be called upon. There aren't.

In the chapter entitled "Seeing and Believing" Carroll recalls Louis Pasteur's struggle to demonstrate to non-seeing and non-believing doctors that childbed fever was caused by their dirty hands. He reprises the horrific and bizarre story of the Soviet head of (political) biology Trofim Denisovich Lysenko who denied genetics, and how Stalin's support of him led to massive failures in agriculture and subsequent starvation. He further recalls how Mao Zedong, using the same unscientific ideas, sponsored massive starvation in China due to crop failures.

What Carroll is getting at is that political corruption of science can be very dangerous. In the United States today under the power of the Bush administration, faith-based (and corporate-sponsored) science is denying global warming and other deleterious effects of rampant pollution. This sort of science denial is likely to lead to human suffering and death, just as did the communist denial of genetics.

for more information click here

The Fittest Record

We do not know how much farther science will take us, but from "Making of the Fittest", Prof Carroll in tracing the record of evolution through genetic studies suggests that even though we have come a long way, the distance ahead may appear infinite, but has all the prospects of exhilaring scholarship. The genetic record of evolution is an impressive record that goes back 2 billion years. Carroll explains how the record of evolution (descent with modification and the related "survival of the fittest" principle)is embedded in our genes. If the idea of it all is breathtaking and seemingly incredible, it was set out and explained in very clearly and lucidly that non-scientists will have no difficulty understanding the text or its implications. If all living things have common amino acids, and genetic codes, as well as how and why they evolved and differentiated as they did, the idea of a personal god promising heaven and hell seem to belong to the category of fairy tales - naturally. The genetic tale of evolution is told through a series of stories, beginning with how and why the Antarctic ice fish evolved its red blood cells into oblivion save for the tell-tale record of its previous existence. He explains how genetic evolution is part of a constant battle among living things. If sickle cells are weaker and more fallible than normal cells, why did they continue to be manufactured? The link turned out to be that people with sickle cells are more resistant to malaria. The stories include the cloak-and-dagger account of the discovery and explication of the DNA. It wasn't too long ago when people were screaming, "DNA! DNA! Everyone talks about it but has anyone seen it?" Carroll not only shows us the DNA but explains to us what it does and how it works.

for more information click here

Destined to be a classic.

I was reading "The Origin of Species" along with this book, and it truly was an amazing experience. To read Darwin questioning (150 years ago) how varieties arise (and to remarkably attribute it to "something" with the reproductive organs by watching animals in domestication), and then within the same day read examples about gene duplication and the effects of point mutations, about the effect of just ONE amino acid substitution, about fossil genes, etc etc..was incredibly beautiful.

I'm a 3rd year Biology/Chemistry undergrad, and this really cemented my love for science. Sean B. Carroll has a passion that just flows through the pages, and is just infectious. Highly recommended.

for more information click here

Black box no more

Ever since Darwin, scientists have worked their way closer and closer to a real model of how in fact natural selection could produce both the extant and extinct biodiversity of this planet. Carrol's book (written for the interested but not necessarily academically experienced reader) does an excellent job at bridging the gap from Darwin's grand theory to actual mechanism.

The terrible truth is that without a class in genetics less than ten years ago, all would be lacking in some of the greatest insights science has to offer on evolution of life's diversity. Carrol here does a great service in updating the general reader on the nuts-and-bolts of how random mutation and natural selection work together to create new traits and discard old traits. These arguments are not 'compelling' in the sense that they 'sound good', but rather are compelling through the evidence--in short, the writing is on the wall, with little doubt as to just how evolution in fact works.

Of most interest to me was the discussion of 'fossilized' genes, how probability ensures that certain traits will arise (given that they are permitted by natural selection), and the discussion of how certain traits have evolved multiple times and why.

As mentioned elsewhere, the discussion of creationism may in large be pointless. While I am glad to see both Carrol's and Miller's dismantling of ID, it is simultaneously a waste of time. The last nail in literal creationism/ID's coffin was pounded in long before all the new evidence from genetics, so regardless of how well we understand the mechanisms by which evolution happen, these arguments are going to fall on deaf ears.

What must be done, if Carrol feels as strongly as he does in regards to this matter of ID, is to popularize the information in these pages such that they can reach a larger audience--larger than the one which reads science books. That means articles in popular magazines, and new documentaries that reach a broader public. That also means forgetting the ID movement for a second and instead focusing on the facts and evidence.

for more information click here

reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

products you might be interested in