Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body Paperback – January 6, 2009

This is the most enjoyable book I've read on evolution since Gould's fine Wonderful Life. Shubin not only combines great skills in paleontology and anatomy with an insatiable curiosity, but he also has a rare gift at writing as well. The book looks at aspects of human anatomy and senses--hands, smell, hearing, vision, etc--and traces them back--way back! Some of this, of course, has been done before, but Shubin writes with a flair, a clarity, and a precision that brings it all into a new focus. There is also an emphasis on DNA, in particular recent DNA experiments that combined with the paleontology and anatomy makes a very compelling case.

Shubin starts off with the search for a link between fish and land animals that took him to the Canadian Arctic and culminated in the discovery of Tiktaalik--a fish with a flattened head and flippers that made it look rather like a very primitive alligator in ways. The author then shows the evolution of necks and limbs. He does the same with some of the organs such as smell and vision, and shows their evolution as well.

The book is perhaps at its best in its discussion of the role of DNA in evolution. It is now known that it is possible to turn on a gene that is responsible for the development of an eye, for example. So you can create a fruitfly with an eye almost anywhere you want--such as on a leg--and many of these are functional, although in a primitive way. But it gets even more interesting. Suppose you take a gene from a mouse that controls the development of an eye, and implant it into a fruitfly, what happens? You get a fruitfly eye, not a mouse eye. This says a lot about the basic building blocks of life.

The book does have one major flaw. At 200 pages it's way too short! If the writing were dry or stiff, 200 pages would be sufficient, but with Shubin's thoroughly enjoyable writing and choice of subjects, I would have preferred 600 pages.

Shubin does an excellent job of explaining the link between his two jobs: teaching human anatomy and studying fossil fish. He explains what evolutionary science, i.e. paleontology, comparative anatomy, genetics, embryology and developmental biology have to tell us about the human body, and how it came to be the way it is. Examples include the evolutionary history of limb bones in fossil tetrapods, developmental control genes found in almost all animals today, the evolutionary history of mammalian teeth, the origin of basic "body-plans," genetic comparisons of genes important for our senses of smell and vision, and the history of the mammalian inner ear. He presents some of the evidence each field has to contribute, explains how the findings of the various fields support each other, and relates it all to his own personal research experience. Shubin does this in a way that should be accessible and interesting to most readers. The book is very readable, especially the earlier chapters. Shubin's message is positively pro-evolution rather than attacking Creationism in a negative way.

I didn't want to be able to pass a college course on paleontology, just pick up some interesting information, and this was a great book for me. I started browsing it because I liked the title, but the writing style really drew me in. Shubin is engaging, funny, and informative. He gives enough science background so you can understand the discussions, AND NO MORE. This book left me with a deep appreciation for the wonder of the modern human body. Great information for the casual reader!

"What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express and admirable! In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world! The paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so."

- Shakespeare's Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, Act II, Scene II

In "Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body" author Neil Shubin, a biologist and paleontologist at the University of Chicago and the Field Museum, deftly answers Hamlet's '...what is this quintessence of dust?' query - the short answer is a highly modified fish!

How human 'form and moving,' along with 'noble in reason,' can be inferred from our deep-time ancestors is exciting science, eloquently explored in Shubin's lucid, engaging and accessible prose. Throughout his career Shubin's trendsetting approach split research between anatomical, biological, embryological and paleontological pursuits - all in an effort to understand the evolutionary and developmental mechanisms that transformed proto-limbs into fins, legs, wings, and in 'the paragon of animals,' hands (excuse the anthrochauvinism).

Shubin's innovative approach (integrative biology) was revolutionary in the late 1990s and fundamentally guided the development of evo-devo (evolutionary development), by bucking the trend toward increasing specialization encountered in many scientific disciplines. The insights generated by Shubin's multi-disciplinary approach helped identify which genes changed as lobe-finned fish transitioned into amphibians.

Today Shubin works in a crowded field, but continues to make spectacular discoveries. Peer-reviewed papers routinely depend on hypothesis synthesized from data provided by fossils, genes and embryos. Recently an experiment utilizing embryonic mice switched the mouse Prx1 gene regulatory element with the Prx1 region from a bat - although these species are separated by millions of years of evolution the resulting transgenic mice displayed abnormally long forelimbs.

In 2006 Shubin and his colleagues caught the world's attention with Tiktaalik roseae. This 370 million year old (mid Devonian) 'fishibian' exhibited many tetrapod limb features in its robust fins, including some wrist bones. While Tiktaalik roseae was being exhumed from the frozen artic - at a location predicted by geological, paleontological, and evolutionary theory - fellow researchers back in Chicago uncovered vital clues about the transition from ocean to terra firma by studying the genes that shape the fins of sharks and paddlefish.

"Your Inner Fish" weaves these and other discoveries into a brilliant anatomy lecture. Shubin deconstructs our eyes, ears, noses and hands to demonstrate the common ancestry shared by all extant (or extinct) animals. He also explains how networks of genes that initially express simple traits can expand through mechanisms such as gene duplication and genetic drift, creating networks that can build complex and novel structures such as jaws and heads (in vertebrates) evolved from primordial gill arches.

Quirky evolutionary relics - ranging from hiccups to hernias - are also explored. Thank your 'fish and tadpole past' for hiccups. Men painfully recapitulate the torturous path taken by the testacles during embryonic development whenever they develop a hernia later in life.

Throughout "Your Inner Fish" Shubin articulates how science works. Although creationism and Intelligent Design are refreshingly omitted, this book guts the pretensions and conceits prattled by latter-day lungfish pushing religious agendas in lieu of research and superstition instead of science.

This is a wonderful and insightful book. Highly recommended - excellent companion volumes include Relics of Eden: The Powerful Evidence of Evolution in Human DNA (reviewed seperately) by Daniel J. Fairbanks, Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters by Donald R. Prothero, At the Water's Edge: Fish with Fingers, Whales with Legs, and How Life Came Ashore but Then Went Back to Sea by Carl Zimmer, and The Age of Everything: How Science Explores the Past by Matthew Hedman. For a more detailed technical discussion of early tetrapod evolution try Gaining Ground: The Origin and Early Evolution of Tetrapods by Jennifer A. Clack