Book Review of Jerry Coyne's Excellent Defense of Darwin's Theory

With the 150 year anniversary of the Origin of Species, we have been deeply rewarded with a couple of first class books in defense of the biological sciences which has Darwin's elegant theory as the base of those sciences. It is unfortunate that books of these types are needed, but to those of us who find biology interesting at a novice's level, we get to be rewarded as excellent writing scientists such as Richard Dawkins and Jerry Coyne grace us with an interesting and passionate exposition of the evidence for evolution and the profound power it has in explaining so much of the natural world in which we live.

Jerry Coyne in his book, "Why Evolution is True", does an excellent job of looking at what Darwin proposed and when he proposed it. He points out persuasively that at the time, there was still much that was speculation on Darwin's part, and it is indeed remarkable just how much he got right. The author discusses the difference between a scientific theory and a theory in the popular language. Likening the theory of evolution to the "Germ Theory of Disease" or the "the Atomic Theory" provides a reasonable comparison for Darwin's "Theory of Evolution." A scientific theory goes far beyond the theory I had this year that the Vikings would win the Super Bowl.

Coyne does a really good job of outlining some interesting cases where the "Theory of Evolution" provided predictions that make sense only in the light of evolution, as well as retrodictions that can only be explained by evolution. He also provides examples from the fossil record which show consistent patterns of evolution and intermediation from one species to another. Coyne addresses common creationist arguments and persuasively shows that the underpinning for creationism and it's dressed up off-spring "intelligent design" is religious and unscientific because it is trying to prove an already accepted outcome.

One of the best parts of the book is when Coyne gets into vestigial features of animals that an intelligent designer would never create. The bodies of all animals only make sense when you retrofit previous features into the current life patterns of current species. Coyne uses interesting examples such as the human appendix, the location of the prostate gland, and the odd development of animals as embryos clearly belaying their past evolution.

Not as strident and caustic and Dawkin's book, it has great power by just how matter-of-fact Coyne is in showing the evidence and putting that evidence in context. He also shows why there is a need for his book, with the United States in particular, facing an intellectual onslaught from those who cling to bronze-age myths in the face of overwhelming reality.

Thanks to Professor Coyne for writing this book in the tradition of others who have preceded him in making the case such as Futuyma and Pennock. Coyne's and Dawkin's excellent books make a great set of overlapping, mutually supporting, but slightly different approaches for making the case for Darwin's elegant theory.