A major new book overturning our assumptions about how evolution works Earth’s natural history is full of fascinating instances of convergence: phenomena like eyes and wings and tree-climbing lizards that have evolved independently, multiple times. But evolutionary biologists also point out many examples of contingency, cases where the tiniest change—a random mutation or an ancient butterfly sneeze—caused evolution to take a completely different course. What role does each force really play in the constantly changing natural world? Are the plants and animals that exist today, and we humans ourselves, inevitabilities or evolutionary flukes? And what does that say about life on other planets? Jonathan Losos reveals what the latest breakthroughs in evolutionary biology can tell us about one of the greatest ongoing debates in science. He takes us around the globe to meet the researchers who are solving the deepest mysteries of life on Earth through their work in experimental evolutionary science. Losos himself is one of the leaders in this exciting new field, and he illustrates how experiments with guppies, fruit flies, bacteria, foxes, and field mice, along with his own work with anole lizards on Caribbean islands, are rewinding the tape of life to reveal just how rapid and predictable evolution can be. Improbable Destinies will change the way we think and talk about evolution. Losos's insights into natural selection and evolutionary change have far-reaching applications for protecting ecosystems, securing our food supply, and fighting off harmful viruses and bacteria. This compelling narrative offers a new understanding of ourselves and our role in the natural world and the cosmos.

The assassin's bullet misses, the Archduke's carriage moves forward, and a catastrophic war is avoided. So too with the history of life. Re-run the tape of life, as Stephen J. Gould claimed, and the outcome must be entirely different: an alien world, without humans and maybe not even intelligence. The history of life is littered with accidents: any twist or turn may lead to a completely different world. Now this view is being challenged. Simon Conway Morris explores the evidence demonstrating life's almost eerie ability to navigate to a single solution, repeatedly. Eyes, brains, tools, even culture: all are very much on the cards. So if these are all evolutionary inevitabilities, where are our counterparts across the galaxy? The tape of life can only run on a suitable planet, and it seems that such Earth-like planets may be much rarer than hoped. Inevitable humans, yes, but in a lonely Universe.

The theoretical results in this monograph indicate that life provides alternative strategies to aging. The groundbreaking findings open a completely new field of research. The author gets away from the human centered vision of life showing that aging in any organism does not necessarily correspond to deterioration and senescence. The central insight of this monograph is: to deeply understand why some species age it is necessary to understand why other species do not.

Basic understanding: "What if I told you, that your most precious and fundamental values were controlled by others? I guess you most likely would doubt it. It's however both true and inevitable." Dossier context: “Have you ever felt like being that little child who discovered that the Emperor was naked and that there were no new clothes? What if I told you that the Holy Grail contains the answer to why the little child spoke up and you didn’t. This dossier presents a pathway to understanding. You and you alone can decide if you are ready.”

Becoming -- Cognifying -- Flowing -- Screening -- Accessing -- Sharing -- Filtering -- Remixing -- Interacting -- Tracking -- Questioning -- Beginning

This book is written as an addition to Darwin's work and that of molecular biologists on evolution so as to include views of it from the point of view of chemistry rather than just from our knowledge of the biology and genes of organisms. By concentrating on a wide range of chemical elements, not just those in traditional organic compounds, we show that there is a close relationship between the geological or environmental chemical changes from the formation of Earth and those of organisms from the time of their origin. These are considerations which Darwin or other scientists could not have explored until very recent times since sufficient analytical data were not available. They lead us to suggest that there is a combined geo- and bio-chemical evolution, that of an ecosystem, which has had a systematic chemical development. In this development the arrival of new very similar species is shown to be by random Darwinian competitive selection processes such that a huge variety of species coexist with only minor differences in chemistry and advantages. This is in agreement with previous studies. On the large scale of evolution of very different organisms, and over greater timescales, by way of contrast, we observe that groups of species have special, different, chemical features and function. It is more difficult to understand how they evolved and therefore we examine their chemical development in detail. Overall there is a cooperative evolution of a chemical system driven by capture of energy, mainly from the sun, and its degradation in which the chemistry of both the environment and organisms are facilitating intermediates. We shall suggest that the overall drive of the whole joint system is to optimise the rate of this energy degradation. Since the environmental changes are inorganic and relatively fast they move inevitably to equilibrium. The living part of the system, the organisms, under the influence of this inevitable environmental change are forced to follow but as they are increasingly energised and their reactions are slow, they move further away from equilibrium. We are able to explore the ways in which this chemical system evolved, recognising that as complexity of the chemistry of organisms increased, they had to be formed from more and more compartments and to become part of a chemically cooperative overall activity. They could not remain as isolated species. Only in the last chapter do we attempt to make a connection between the changing chemistry of organisms with the coded molecules of each cell which have to exist to explain reproduction.