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January 24, 2006
"The Beak of the Finch" by Jonathan Weiner
When Darwin first published On the Origin of Species in 1859, he conceded that the evolution of a species by natural selection was so slow as to be impossible to observe directly. Ever since, critics have used science’s inability to observe selection as a weapon against evolutionary theory. Over the past several decades, however, dedicated teams of scientists conducting long-term studies of various populations of organisms have, in fact, observed evolution at work. Jonathan Weiner’s The Beak of the Finch tells the story of the most famous of these studies: Peter and Rosemary Grant’s decades-long work with the finches of the Galapagos Islands, off the coast of Peru. Returning to the same islands year after year, carefully trapping, measuring, and banding thousands of birds, the Grants demonstrated that changes in the finches’ environment resulted in changes in the physical characteristics of the finches themselves – often with surprising speed. Weiner tells their remarkable story in clear, simple language, carefully explaining the intricacies of evolutionary theory in terms understandable even to non-biologists. Although it’s now over ten years old, both the questions it poses and the Grant’s answers remain relevant to understanding evolutionary theory today.
-Scott M., Science
Posted by jnardine at January 24, 2006 11:03 AM