charles_darwin

Annotated Bibliography
Dawkins, Richard. The Blind Watchmaker. New York: W. W. Norton, 1996
(first published 1986). Discusses the significance of Darwin and
Wallace’s theory. Written for a popular audience, argues that the
theory of evolution proves that the universe does not have a designer.
———. The Selfish Gene. New York: Oxford University Press, 1976.
Groundbreaking study of the importance of genes in evolution. Argues
that the desire by genes to preserve themselves is the driving force in
evolutionary change.
Dembski, William A. The Design Inference: Evaluating Change Through Small
Probabilities. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Argues
that the complexity of biochemical systems suggests that it is
extremely unlikely that such systems developed by small changes; a
simpler explanation is that complex biological systems were designed
by an intelligence.
Himmelfarb, Gertrude. Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution. London:
Chatto and Windus, 1959. Discusses the historical and social context
of Darwin’s research, and the writing and reception of The Origin of
Species. Good introduction to the social and philosophical impact of
Darwin’s work.
Johnson, Philip E. Darwin on Trial. Washington, DC: Regnery Gateway,
1991. Examines the flaws in logic in the theory of evolution and
argues that these problems fatally undermine the theory. Very readable
critique.
Jones, Steve. Darwin’s Ghost: The Origin of Species Updated. New York: Ballantine
Books, 2000. First published as Almost Like a Whale (1999).
Jones uses twentieth-century examples to explain the major ideas of
The Origin of Species.
Kohn, David, ed. The Darwinian Heritage. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 1985. Wide-ranging and scholarly group of essays discussing
the impact of Darwin’s work. Deals with the development of
Darwin’s ideas, Darwin as a Victorian, and the reception of Darwin’s
theory of natural selection.
Pinker, Steven. How the Mind Works. New York: W. W. Norton, 1997. Good,
readable, and scholarly introduction to evolutionary psychology, the
study of evolution, and the development of the brain. Pinker discusses
a wide range of topics from the difficulties of building a robot to
human attitudes to happiness.
Tattersall, Ian, Eric Delson, and John Van Couvering, eds. Encyclopedia of
Human Evolution and Prehistory. New York: Garland, 1988. Comprehensive
encyclopedia on the evolution of humankind. Covers a very
wide range of subjects from evolutionary theory to primate paleontology.
Quite technical but an excellent resource.
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