Book Reviews
 Anaximander and the Birth of Science, by Carlo Rovelli, Penguin Random House, 28 Feb 2023.
Giordano Bruno: Philosopher / Heretic by Ingred D. Rowland, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 19 Aug 2008.
What Is It Like to Be a Bat? by Thomas Nagel, Oxford University Press, 2024.
Quanta and Fields by Sean M. Carroll, Penguin Random House, 01 May 2024. Briefly reviewd with —
Escape from Shadow Physics by Adam Forrest Kay, Basic Books, 18 Jun 2024.
Is Earth Exceptional? by Mario Livio and Jack Szostak, Basic Books, 10 Sep 2024.
Compelling Evidence of Fossils and Microbialites on Ancient Mars, Vincenzo Rizzo and Giorgio Bianciardi, Sep 2024.
The Catalyst: RNA and the Quest to Unlock Life's Deepest Secrets, by Thomas R. Cech, 04 Jun 2024.
The Soul of an Octopus, by Sy Montgomery, Washington Square Press, 05 Apr 2016.
The Intelligent Universe, by Fred Hoyle, Michael Joseph Limited, London 1983.
A Brief History of Earth: Four Billion Years in Eight Chapters, by Andrew H. Knoll, Custom House, 27 Apr 2021.
The Transcendent Brain: Spirituality in the Age of Science, by Alan Lightman, Pantheon, 14 Mar 2023.
The Immense Journey by Loren Eisley, 1957.
Biocivilisations by Predrag B. Slijepcevic, 2023; review by James Powers (docx - close to return.)
Viruses: A Natural History by Marilyn J. Roossinck, Princeton University Press, 02 May 2023.
The MANIAC by Benjamin Labatut, Random House, coming 03 Oct 2023.
The New Biology by Michael J. Reiss and Michael Ruse, Harvard University Press, 20 Jun 2023.
Disturbing the Universe by Freeman Dyson, Sloan Foundation Science Series, 1981.
Life Comes from Space by Wainwright and Wickramasinghe, World Scientific, 2023.
Alien Oceans: The Search for Life in the Depths of Space by K.P. Hand, Princeton University Press, 07 Apr 2020.
The Whole Truth: A Cosmologist's Reflections on the Search for Objective Reality by P.J.E Peebles, Aug 2022
The Black Cloud by Fred Hoyle, 1957 (reviewed by James Powers.)
Evolution: A View from the 21st Century. Fortified by James A. Shapiro, Cognition Press, 2022.
Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear, Ballantine / Random House, 1999.
To Be Taught, If Fortunate: a Novella, by Becky Chambers, Harper Voyager, Sep 2019.
Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out? by Bill McKibben, Henry Holt, 2019.
Fossils of the Tennessee Valley by Richard Keyes, RGEO, Dec 2015.
Flashes of Creation: George Gamow, Fred Hoyle, and the Great Big Bang Debate by Paul Halpern, 2021.
Complete Course in Astrobiology, Gerda Horneck and Petra Rettberg, eds., 2007.
Origin of Life: What Everyone Needs to Know by David Deamer, Oxford University Press, 2019.
The Sirens of Mars: Searching for Life on Another World by Sarah Stewart Johnson, Crown, 07 Jul 2020.
The Orgueil meteorite (Atlas of microfossils) by Alexei Rozanov, Richard Hoover et al., Oct 2020.
Probable Impossibilities: Musings on Beginnings and Endings by Alan Lightman, Pantheon, 09 Feb 2021.
The Knowledge Machine: How Irrationality Created Modern Science, by Michael Strevens, Liveright, 13 Oct 2020.
Cosmic Genetic Evolution, E. J. Steele and N. C. Wickramasinghe, eds., v 106, Advances in Genetics, Oct 2020.
The Emergence of Life: From Chemical Origins to Synthetic Biology by Pier Luigi Luisi, 2016.
Some Assembly Required: Decoding ...Life, from Ancient Fossils to DNA by Neil Shubin, 17 Mar 2020.
Discovery on Vera Rubin Ridge - Trace Fossils on Mars? by Barry E. DiGregorio, 07 Feb 2020.
Our Cosmic Ancestry in the Stars by NC & Kamala Wickramasinghe and Gensuke Tokoro, 14 May 2019.
Darwin's Doubt: ...the Case for Intelligent Design by Stephen C. Meyer, 2013.
Darwin Overthrown: Hello Mechanobiology by Suzan Mazur, 2019.
The Demon in the Machine by Paul Davies, 25 Sep 2018.
Darwin Devolves: The New Science ...That Challenges Evolution, by Michael J. Behe, 26 Feb 2019.
To Mars with Love about the Viking LR experiments, by Patricia Ann Straat, 07 Feb 2019.
The Society of Genes by Itai Yanai and Martin Lercher, 11 Jan 2016.
The Story of Earth, by Robert Hazen, Penguin Books, 30 Jul 2013 (review by James Powers).
The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life by David Quammen, August 2018.
The Cosmic Zoo: Complex Life on Many Worlds by Dirk Schulze-Makuch and William Bains, 2017.
Improbable Destinies: Fate, Chance, and the Future of Evolution by Jonathan B. Losos, Aug 2017.
Facts and Speculations in Cosmology, by Jayant Narlikar and Geoffrey Burbidge, 2008.
He Knew He Was Right: ...James Lovelock by John and Mary Gribbin, 17 Nov 2009.
The Kingdom of Speech by Tom Wolfe, 30 Aug 2016.
Herding Hemingway's Cats: Understanding how our genes work by Kat Arney, 14 Jan 2016.
Where Did We Come From? Life of an Astrobiologist by Chandra Wickramasinghe, Mar 2015.
Reticulate Evolution, Nathalie Gontier, ed., 10 Jul 2015.
The Mysterious World of the Human Genome by Frank Ryan, 18 Jun 2015.
The Origin of Life Circus by Suzan Mazur, publicised, 03 Jan 2015.
This Idea Must Die, John Brockman, ed., 17 Feb 2015.
Evolution Revolution: Evolution is True. Darwin is Wrong... by Alan Bennett, 7 May 2014.
The Search for Our Cosmic Ancestry by Chandra Wickramasinghe, Dec 2014.
The Origin And Evolution of Eukaryotes, Patrick J. Keeling and Eugene V. Koonin, eds., 31 May 2014.
A Rough Ride to the Future by James Lovelock, 3 Apr 2014.
The Logic of Chance: The Nature and Origin of Biological Evolution by Eugene V. Koonin, 31 Aug 2011.
Astrobiology: A Very Short Introduction by David C. Catling, ISBN:978-0-19-958645-5, Jan 2014.
From Strange Simplicity to Complex Familiarity by Manfred Eigen, 18 Jul 2013.
The Major Transitions in Evolution Revisited, B. Calcott and K. Sterelny, eds., Apr 2011.
Mind and Cosmos: Why [Neo-Darwinism] Is Almost Certainly False by Thomas Nagel, 26 Sep 2012.
Evolution: A View from the 21st Century by James A. Shapiro, 22 Jun 2011. 2nd edition, 2022.
Proving Darwin: Making Biology Mathematical by Gregory Chaitin, 8 May 2012.
First Contact: Scientific Breakthroughs in the Hunt for Life Beyond Earth by Marc Kaufman, Apr 2011.
The Life of Super-Earths by Dimitar Sasselov, 24 Jan 2012.
A Planet of Viruses by Carl Zimmer, University of Chicago Press, May 2011.
The Tyranny of Science by Paul Feyerabend, Apr 2011.
Virolution by Frank Ryan, HaperCollins, 2009.
What Darwin Got Wrong by Jerry Fodor and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, 16 Feb 2010.
We Are Not Alone: ...Extraterrestrial Life by Dirk Schulze-Makuch and David Darling, Mar 2010.
Comets and the Origin of Life, by Janaki and Chandra Wickramasinghe and William Napier, Aug 2009.
The Vanishing Face of Gaia: A Final Warning by James Lovelock, 13 Apr 2009.
Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America's Soul by Kenneth R. Miller, 12 Jun 2008.
Proofs that Life is Cosmic by Fred Hoyle and Chandra Wickramasinghe, Dec 1982.
The Design Matrix: A Consilience of Clues by Mike Gene, 30 Nov 2007.
The Limits of Organic Life in Planetary Systems by John A Baross et al., 2007.
The Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism by Michael J. Behe, 5 June 2007.
Evolutionary Dynamics: Exploring the Equations of Life by Martin Nowak, 29 Sep 2006.
Exceeding Our Grasp: ...the Problem of Unconceived Alternatives by P. Kyle Stanford, 20 Apr 2006.
The Making of the Fittest: DNA and the ...Record of Evolution by Sean B. Carroll, 9 Oct 2006.
Viruses And The Evolution Of Life by Luis P. Villarreal, Jan 2005.
Life as We Do Not Know It: The NASA Search for ...Life by Peter D. Ward, 3 Nov 2005.
The Scientific Legacy of Fred Hoyle, Douglas Gough, ed., 17 Mar 2005.
The Plausibility of Life: Resolving Darwin's Dilemma by Marc W. Kirschner and John C. Gerhart, 2005.
Genesis: The Scientific Quest for Life's Origins by Robert Hazen, 2005.
A Journey with Fred Hoyle: The search for cosmic life by Chandra Wickramasinghe, Jan 2005.
Life's Solution: Inevitable Humans in a Lonely Universe by Simon Conway Morris, 2003.
Fitness Landscapes and the Origin of Species by Sergey Gavrilets, 2004.
The God Gene: How Faith is Hardwired Into Our Genes by Dean H. Hamer, Sep 2004.
The Living Universe: NASA and the Development of Astrobiology by Steven J. Dick and James R. Strick, 2004.
Life on a Young Planet: The First Three Billion Years of Evolution on Earth by Andrew Knoll, 2003.
Darwinism, Design, and Public Education, John Angus Campbell and Stephen C. Meyer, eds., 2003.
Encyclopedia of Evolution, Mark D. Pagel, ed., 2002.
Here Be Dragons: The Scientific Quest for Extraterrestrial Life by David W. Koerner and Simon Levay, 2000.
What Evolution Is by Ernst Mayr, foreword by Jared Diamond, 2001.
Life's Origin: The Beginnings of Biological Evolution, J. William Schopf, ed., 2002.
The Emergence of Life on Earth: A Historical and Scientific Overview by Iris Fry, 2000.
Acquiring Genomes: A Theory of the Origins of Species by Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan, 2002.
Lateral DNA Transfer: Mechanisms and Consequences by Frederic Bushman, 2002.
Life Everywhere: The Maverick Science of Astrobiology by David Darling, 2001.
Monad to Man: The Concept of Progress in Evolutionary Biology, by Michael Ruse, 1996.
Stardust by John Gribbin with Mary Gribbin, The Penguin Press, September 2000.
Astronomical Origins of Life: Steps Towards Panspermia by F. Hoyle and N.C. Wickramasinghe, April 2000.
A Different Approach to Cosmology: from a Static Universe through the Big Bang towards Reality by Fred Hoyle, Geoffrey Burbidge and Jayant V. Narlikar, Cambridge University Press, April 2000.
Origin and Evolution of Viruses, Esteban Domingo, Robert Webster and John Holland, eds., 1999.
Tower of Babel: The Evidence Against the New Creationism by Robert T. Pennock, 1999.
Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science & Theology by William A. Dembski, 1999.
Dark Life: ...Extreme Organisms of Inner and Outer Space by Michael Ray Taylor, 1999.
Horizontal Gene Transfer, Michael Syvanen and Clarence I. Kado, eds., May 1999.
The Deep Hot Biosphere by Thomas Gold, Springer-Verlag New York, 1999.
Mathematics of Evolution by Fred Hoyle, Acorn Enterprises LLC, Memphis TN, 1999.
Planetary Dreams: The Quest to Discover Life Beyond Earth by Robert Shapiro, 1999.
Lamarck's Signature: ...Retrogenes... by Edward J. Steele, Robyn A. Lindley and Robert V. Blanden, 1998.
The Inflationary Universe: The Quest for a New Theory of Cosmic Origins by Alan H. Guth, 1997.
Mars: The Living Planet by Barry E. DiGregorio with Gilbert V. Levin and Patricia Ann Straat, 1997.
The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins, W.W. Norton and Company, 1987.
The Quark and the Jaguar by Murray Gell-Mann, W. H. Freeman and Company, 1994.
At Home in the Universe by Stuart Kauffman, Oxford University Press, 1995.
Gaia by James E. Lovelock, Oxford: Oxford University Press 1979.
The Outer Reaches of Life by John Postgate, Cambridge University Press, 1994.
Books about Entropy and Biology: a dozen short reviews, 1980-2000.
Seven more books by advocates of Intelligent Design, 1970s to 1990s.
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