Publishers Weekly
07/15/2024
Godfrey-Smith (Metazoa), a philosophy of science professor at the University of Sydney, presents a cerebral meditation on “the history of how life has changed the Earth.” He explains how three billion years ago, microorganisms called cyanobacteria started photosynthesizing, pumping oxygen into the atmosphere and paving the way for complex organisms. Ancient algae “crept onto land sometime around 450 million years ago,” Godfrey-Smith writes, describing how the emergence of forests with large root systems some 40 million years later reshaped terrain by holding together riverbanks and redirecting currents. Arguing that animals are “causes rather than evolutionary products” of their environment, Godfrey-Smith describes how some octopuses dig tunnels 50 centimeters deep and how male bowerbirds build vertical nestlike structures to impress potential mates. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to follow the author’s train of thought in the latter half of the book, which is aimed at answering, “What are minds doing here?” To “guide action,” is the author’s answer, but the broadness of that response leads to meandering discussions on the materialist view of the mind, the origin of consciousness, the relationship between written language and time, and the ethics of farming livestock. There’s no question Godfrey-Smith is an erudite and profound thinker, but he’s not always successful in organizing his ideas in ways that readers will understand. This doesn’t quite fulfill its lofty ambitions. Agent: Sarah Chalfant, Wylie Agency. (Sept.)
From the Publisher
"[Godfrey-Smith] is possessed of a prodigious curiosity . . . His delight in the natural world is infectious, and Living on Earth brims with intriguing and endearing novelties . . . It is best read, I think, as an ethical exemplar: a model of the sort of attitude that we ought to adopt in our dealings with nonhuman life . . . [Godfrey-Smith's] luscious and amazed language befits the treasures that we have been vouchsafed and that we have so badly betrayed." —Becca Rothfeld, The Washington Post
"[Living on Earth] beautifully describes how birds, octopuses, and even fish can lead lives full of 'richness,' in which past events give meaning to future ones . . . Godfrey-Smith doesn’t just want to understand [a] way of looking at the world. He wants us to feel it, and to experience ourselves within it." —Joshua Rothman, The New Yorker
"Living on Earth is consistently rewarding, packed with insights and invitations to reflect, and blessed with some exquisite writing . . . Godfrey-Smith insists on identifying with nature instead of standing outside as steward: and on 'gratitude and a sense of kinship' with the process that delivered our species into the world." —Philip Ball, The Guardian
"Godfrey-Smith does not use the word miracle in the title of his ambitious new book, Living on Earth, but there is scarcely a page that does not recount one. His subject is the astounding creativity of life, not just to evolve ever-new forms, but to continually remake the planet that hosts it." —Richard Schiffman, Undark
"A thoughtful meditation on how the actions of organisms, even the most primitive (ticks, snails), have generated the world humans have inherited . . . [Full of] enlightening insights into the natural world and our often perilous relationship to it." —Kirkus Reviews
"Godfrey-Smith finds a purpose for philosophy and ethics in the discussion of biology . . . Attention-grabbing . . . Particularly poignant are his musings on human relationships with animals." —Booklist
"Godfrey-Smith charts the evolution of plants and animals, showing how each break from the 'tree of life' reflects the changing environment and eventually also shapes it . . . In this clever, compassionate and often deeply moving book, he encourages us to consider not just how we got here, but where we choose to go next." —Elle Hunt, New Scientist
"Elegant . . . Eye-opening . . . Delightful." —Veronika Meduna, New Zealand Listener
"Living on Earth is a hugely important book. The final installment in Peter Godfrey-Smith's essential trilogy, it give us a sweeping, careful, and courageous exploration of a natural world suffused with life, with minds, and perhaps with consciousness too. Godfrey-Smith writes with grace, humility, and wisdom about a dizzying array of topics, from the distant past to the far future, from the deep ocean to the frontiers of technology. The picture he paints reaffirms our continuity with the natural world, and impresses on us the urgency of the choices we now face.” —Anil Seth, director of the Centre for Consciousness Science at the University of Sussex and author of Being You: A New Science of Consciousness
"Only Peter Godfrey-Smith could write this book. It offers a vast, kaleidoscopic, and immensely thought-provoking overview of the development of life on Earth, with special attention to humanity's place in the bigger picture. We are often told that human beings are part of the natural world, but rarely is the mutual influence between people and the rest of our shared ecosystem spelled out with such care." —Sean Carroll, professor at Johns Hopkins University and author of Quanta and Fields
“In Living on Earth, Peter Godfrey-Smith once again combines vivid and compelling descriptions of the natural world, unexpectedly fascinating scientific results, and philosophical arguments that are exceptionally clear and accessible as well as deep and profound. This book offers lucid and thoughtful discussions of the urgent ethical questions about our relationships to other animals.” —Alison Gopnik, professor at the University of California, Berkeley and author of The Gardener and the Carpenter
"Strap in as Peter Godfrey-Smith takes us on a dazzling exploration of the planet's diverse tenants, all of whom sculpted the environment we'd later inherit and transform. An essential read for understanding the legacy of the spot we're standing in right now, and its future." —David Eagleman, neuroscientist at Stanford University and author of Incognito and Livewired
"Peter Godfrey-Smith not only reviews science, he probes it. In his hands this always yields rich new insights on the nature of life." —Michael S. Gazzaniga, professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara and author of The Consciousness Instinct
Kirkus Reviews
2024-06-21
A scientist muses on how living creatures constructed today’s Earth.
Godfrey-Smith, professor of the history and philosophy of science at the University of Sydney and author ofOther Minds andMetazoa, writes that this is the third book in a series. Not straightforward natural history, it’s a thoughtful meditation on how the actions of organisms, even the most primitive (ticks, snails), have generated the world humans have inherited. At the same time, “the portion of Earth occupied by wild nature, its place in the whole, shrinks and recedes.” Life, present for 3.7 of the 4.5 billion years of Earth’s existence, has engineered our planet no less than volcanism and plate tectonics. In the first half of the book, Godfrey-Smith delivers a steady stream of examples of nonhuman life going about its business. Even bacteria learn, communicate, migrate, and build. As evolution proceeds, minds enter the picture. “What are mindsdoing here?” is a question that preoccupies the author throughout the book. “Minds—through perceptions, thoughts, plans, and intentions—guide action,” he writes. “Actions serve the interests of organisms, and whether this is intended or not, actions can also transform the world.” The second half of the book involves humans, with a heavy emphasis on that perennial favorite, consciousness, which, like so many human accomplishments—e.g., tools, language, engineering—turns out to be well distributed across the animal kingdom. The author ends with a plea to preserve the wild nature that we are now destroying—not from what seems an aesthetic admiration of its beauty, “but a sense of kinship and gratitude.” This is not a history of life. For that, readers should consult David Quammen’sThe Tangled Tree, followed by Godfrey-Smith’s previous two books (although he insists that’s not necessary).
Enlightening insights into the natural world and our often perilous relationship to it.
