Ecology and Evolution of Darwin's Finches [Paperback]

Peter R. Grant (Author), Jonathan Weiner (Foreword)

Book Description

Series: Princeton Science Library | Publication Date: December 7, 1999

After his famous visit to the Galápagos Islands, Darwin speculated that "one might fancy that, from an original paucity of birds in this archipelago, one species had been taken and modified for different ends." This book is the classic account of how much we have since learned about the evolution of these remarkable birds. Based upon over a decade's research, Grant shows how interspecific competition and natural selection act strongly enough on contemporary populations to produce observable and measurable evolutionary change. In this new edition, Grant outlines new discoveries made in the thirteen years since the book's publication. Ecology and Evolution of Darwin's Finches is an extraordinary account of evolution in action.

Editorial Reviews

Review

There is poetic justice in science: this classic modern study of natural selection in operation, by Peter Grant, has been carried out with Darwin's own Galápagos finches, the birds that will forever be associated with his concept of natural selection.... If you somehow fell into the minority who didn't read the first edition, here is your chance to reform!
(Jared Diamond, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning "Guns, Germs and Steel" )

From the Inside Flap

"There is poetic justice in science: this classic modern study of natural selection in operation, by Peter Grant, has been carried out with Darwin's own Galápagos finches, the birds that will forever be associated with his concept of natural selection.... If you somehow fell into the minority who didn't read the first edition, here is your chance to reform!"--Jared Diamond, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Guns, Germs and Steel

"[This] is the best long-term, fine-scale study of speciation ever conducted. . . . The science Peter Grant presents here is more interesting and important than ever."--From the foreword by Jonathan Weiner

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 512 pages
• Publisher: Princeton University Press (December 7, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0691048665
• ISBN-13: 978-0691048666
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,005,369 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing edition...but a classic nonetheless!, April 3, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Ecology and Evolution of Darwin's Finches (Paperback)

As this book illustrates, there is no doubting the significance of Peter and Rosemary Grant's contributions to the field of evolutionary biology. The new edition is an instant "must have" for all current students of evolutionary biology by virtue of being a reprint of a genuine classic in the field. However, I was extremely disappointed to find the Grant's research of the intervening years between editions to be only briefly and incompletely addressed in the afterward. The more recent research of Peter Grant and colleagues is as interesting and significant as the earlier work covered in the first edition and deserved to be either fully incorporated into the original chapters or addressed as an entirely new series of chapters. One can only hope that the insufficient treatment of the last 14 years of research is a consequence of the Grants being hard at work on Ecology and Evolution of Darwin's Finches Volume 2!