I’m a neuroscientist and I’m interested in “consciousness” so I started with the last chapter. A very difficult subject, and Nick Lane in my mind makes a good effort, but fails. To begin with, he doesn’t address a critical evolutionary issue: what is the value of consciousness? Nor does he deal with it in an evolutionary perspective. He covers a lot of territory, and gives due to a number of consciousness theories, but doesn’t come up with satisfying answers or speculation. He ends with a “feeling” theory — from Damasio, I think. If consciousness is mainly about having inner feelings (although I don’t think it is), what’s the survival value? I do agree strongly on one point: consciousness is a difficult subject, in part, because the people who write about consciousness don’t refer much to each other or other theories.

I found the first few chapters much more difficult. I also missed discussion on the evolutionary importance of the cell membrane.

Can’t decide whether I like the style or not.

I think this is a terrific book written at the popular level, and for people like me who know a fair amount of biology from personal study, but were not biology majors, it fits a real need. I can well imagine that a real scientist might find it irritating, but trust me when I say that for the rest of us to get on board with current ideas in evolution, this is precisely the type of book we need. I saw mentions of “Your Inner Fish” and “Why Evolution is True,” too, and along with “Only a Theory” and of course one of my all-time favorites, “At the Water’s Edge,” this is just the sort of literature required to help people who “believe in” evolution understand what it is they mean when they say that.

I just got “Power, Sex, Suicide” on the strength of how much I appreciated “Ascending,” and I haven’t gotten past the first chapter yet, but it strikes me that I might have gotten the same book twice. It seems to cover a lot of the same ground, but with a particular focus on just the mitochondria. Ah well. It’s not like I’m getting bored with the topic.

One more thing: I think this book helps round out one particular aspect of our understanding of evolution, and that’s biochemistry. Sean Carroll has dipped into this area, and other writers have made references to it, but along with evo-devo, it’s not a topic within evolutionary biology that has been very well explored in popular books yet, I think. Perhaps a better book is coming someday, but for the time being, I find “Ascending” to have real advantages for folks who wish to move beyond fossils and basic genomics.

I thought Shubin’s Your Inner Fish was excellent, but I’m not sure I’d recommend it to someone who hasn’t had high school biology yet. Same with Microcosm – great read, learned a lot about evolution and genetics, but written for someone who already knows a bit about DNA and chromosomes. Reading About Life helped me get through both of those.

My 15 year old daughter is taking AP Bio this Fall. I’d like her to read a book on evolution this Summer as preparation, both because her grasp of it is not good and to give her an intellectual foundation for the concepts that she will encounter. What are your thoughts on an approachable, readable primer that I can give to her to read that won’t have her moaning to me for the month of July because its too hard, unreadable, boring, all of the above?

Also, if anyone’s in London next week, Lane’s giving a talk this coming Monday at UCL.