Gaia Theory

  (out of 5 stars)

Microbiologist Lynn Margulis presents an argument on behalf of symbiogenesis and Gaia Hypothesis in her book Symbiotic Planet. I had high expectations given Margulis's role in the establishment of the origins of mitochondria in cells. I was profoundly disappointed by the muddled, moody, and downright terrible treatment of her field of work found here.

Margulis starts the book with discussion of the nature of symbiosis and her own personal involvement in microbiological research. A few chapters in, it is difficult to determine if Margulis was trying to present a popular science book or an opinionated memoir. Neither was successfully presented.

Throughout the book, the author makes assertions about the nature of biology and symbiosis which are often described with 'my view' or 'in my opinion'. I'm not asking her to claim such hypothesis are indeed proven fact (although, at times, she does make such assertions), but the presentation, which only rarely includes descriptions of how such theories were validated through research, left me questioning whether Margulis had enough coffee on the morning she wrote the passage. Sometimes she just seems to lose interest in her current subject and changes course in mid-paragraph.

One telling moment in the book is when she is discussing Mendel's work. One sentence sums up the lack of professional presentation and effort that seems to have ruled her production of this book:

According to a brilliant unpublished manuscript by an amateur historian of science whose name I can't remember from Nassau Island in the Bahamas, Mendel saw no evidence at all that species change and evolve (20).

Seriously?!? Margulis is a widely-respected professional biologist who has contributed enormously to cutting-edge science, and she's quoting an unnamed amateur unpublished source to support her point? This appeared on page 20, at which point I was already questioning Margulis' ability to argue and present evidence. The rest of the book was not much better.

Highly disappointing treatment of a highly interesting subject by a well-respected key participant in 20th Century biology. I am really very suprised that this book was this bad. Maybe I just caught this read on a bad day (not likely), but I cannot recommend this book to anyone except the rare reader who has a personal interest in Margulis's theories and mindset. Two very generous stars.

  (out of 5 stars)

I picked up this book hoping that its subtitle, 'Evolution Beyond Natural Selection' would offer an interesting abstration of neo-Darwinian theory. In some ways, it certainly did so, but the results are a strange mix of solid science, sour grapes, and wishful cheerleading.

Make no mistake, the book is a relatively easy read, is well-written, and contains a ton of reference to good science, scientists, and some of the latest arguments on all sides of evolutionary thought. The backbone of the book, its discussion of symbiosis, is fascinating and would offer enlightenment to any reader unfamiliar with it. Ryan does an outstanding job conveying the importance of symbiotic relationships throughout most of the book, and I have no doubt of its importance as a primary driver of evolutionary diversity.

He hits at neo-Darwinists repeatedly, although generally backed up by some science. He uses Darwin's last 2 points (the gradual shift of the genome through small changes) to hammer away at neo-Darwinian theories, and offers some solid proof that Darwin was wrong to deny that evolution could be nearly spontaneous and dramatic. However, somewhere around halfway, I began to have some doubts about where this was heading. He had mentioned Lovelock and Gaia Theory, mostly in passing to that point, but had not quite dove head first into the fray. But his insistence throughout on emphasizing the positive aspects of symbiosis as key to evolution led to the utter decline of his narrative into an argument in favor of altruistic behavoir as something other than the widely accepted selfish gene theory. That's ok by itself, alternative theories offer guides toward better understanding, but the last 3 chapters are quite bizarre compared to the rest of the book. Ryan steps into near-metaphysical conjectures about altruism, social acceptance, and several times cherry-picks bits of good science to argue his points. Several alternative theories to selfish genes are thrown out, almost in a scattershot approach, kind of a last ditch effort to convince the reader that the neo-Darwinians are wrong, or at best, misleading.

I'm open to some of the alternative theories Ryan offers, clearly what we know about evolution is not the full picture and the role of symbiosis has been largely undervalued in popular science books, but by the time I'd read the first 80% of the book, I'd drawn a conclusion based on his presented evidence that the selfish gene theory could explain almost everything he claimed Darwinians could not explain. A few times he even props up stale straw men just to knock them down with a less-than-stellar argument in favor of his view.

At the end of the read, it was worth the time despite its weaknesses, and it should be an excellent introduction to the role of symbiosis in evolution and in daily life. Just consider how little direct evidence he offers for his secondary thesis that selfish gene theory fails to explain some of the things he offers, and I personally ignored his insistence in using Gaia as his platform for discussion. Altruism is a big one and Ryan's treatment of it really soured this book a bit at the end given that he had fallen down into subjective speculation rather than solid science. Take note of his leap-of-faith trick in refering to the 3-million year old footprints of (I believe it was Australopithecus africanus) in his discussions of social altruism. Overall, three and one-half stars.