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An Appetite For Wonder: The Making of a Scientist
Richard Dawkins
€ 16.99
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Description for An Appetite For Wonder: The Making of a Scientist
Paperback. Born to parents who were enthusiastic naturalists, and linked through his wider family to a clutch of accomplished scientists, the author was bound to have biology in his genes. But what were the influences that shaped his life? This book tells his personal journey. Num Pages: 320 pages, 3 x 8 page picture sections. BIC Classification: BGTA; PDZ; PSAJ. Category: (G) General (US: Trade). Dimension: 198 x 127 x 22. Weight in Grams: 296.
Born to parents who were enthusiastic naturalists, and linked through his wider family to a clutch of accomplished scientists, Richard Dawkins was bound to have biology in his genes. But what were the influences that shaped his life? And who inspired him to become the pioneering scientist and public thinker now famous (and infamous to some) around the world?
In An Appetite for Wonder we join him on a personal journey from an enchanting childhood in colonial Africa, through the eccentricities of boarding school in England, to his studies at the University of Oxford’s dynamic Zoology Department, which sparked his radical new vision of Darwinism, The Selfish Gene. Through Dawkins’s honest self-reflection, touching reminiscences and witty anecdotes, we are finally able to understand the private influences that shaped the public man who, more than anyone else in his generation, explained our own origins.
Product Details
Publisher
Black Swan
Format
Paperback
Publication date
2014
Condition
New
Number of Pages
352
Place of Publication
London, United Kingdom
ISBN
9780552779050
SKU
V9780552779050
Shipping Time
Usually ships in 5 to 9 working days
Ref
99-99
About Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins first catapulted to fame with his iconic work The Selfish Gene, which he followed with a string of bestselling books: The Extended Phenotype, The Blind Watchmaker, River Out of Eden, Climbing Mount Improbable, Unweaving the Rainbow, The Ancestor’s Tale, The God Delusion, The Greatest Show on Earth, The Magic of Reality, and a collection of his shorter writings, A Devil’s Chaplain. Dawkins is a Fellow of both the Royal Society and the Royal Society of Literature. He is the recipient of numerous honours and awards, including the Royal Society of Literature Award (1987), the Michael Faraday Award of the Royal Society (1990), the International Cosmos Prize for Achievement in Human Science (1997), the Kistler Prize (2001), the Shakespeare Prize (2005), the Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science (2006), the Galaxy British Book Awards Author of the Year Award (2007), the Deschner Prize (2007) and the Nierenberg Prize for Science in the Public Interest (2009). He retired from his position as the Charles Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University in 2008 and remains a fellow of New College. In 2012, scientists studying fish in Sri Lanka created Dawkinsia as a new genus name, in recognition of his contribution to the public understanding of evolutionary science. In the same year, Richard Dawkins appeared in the BBC Four television series Beautiful Minds, revealing how he came to write The Selfish Gene and speaking about some of the events covered in his latest book, An Appetite for Wonder. In 2013, Dawkins was voted the world’s top thinker in Prospect magazine’s poll of 10,000 readers from over 100 countries.
Reviews for An Appetite For Wonder: The Making of a Scientist
Most geeks cannot write; this one can... Equipped with an undoubted gift for expression, Dawkins the writer comes with a unique pedigree
Richard Fortey
Guardian
This eloquent, witty and instructive book reveals the true Richard Dawkins. It's a great read.
A.C. Grayling
Throughout and as usual, Dawkins's writing is graceful, sparkling with anecdotes and wit
Eugenie Scott, Nature
Dawkins is a fascinating man and as a writer he is nothing less than essential... he is a man who has influenced or changed the way people think. His story needs to be read.
Simon Barnes, The Times
Richard Dawkins's memoirs are, like their author, honest, perceptive, sometimes ingenuous, always rational and deeply humane.
Matt Ridley
Lyrical... [Dawkins's] appetite for wonder is beguiling
Evening Standard
Enjoyable from start to finish, this exceptionally accessible book will appeal to science lovers, lovers of autobiographies—and, of course, all of Dawkins’s fans, atheists and theists alike.
Library Journal starred review
Well-written, captivating, and filled with fascinating anecdotes
Publishers Weekly
Richard Dawkins is a hero of mine, so being able to read about how he became the man and the thinker he is, was a particular delight for me. How his life formed from an inchoate, primordial soup and then never wavered from sound, scientific principles made for a huge page turning experience; he’s also a great writer, so that helps. Some people get their kicks from Superman’s origin story, or Batman’s origin story… or Jesus’. But for me, it was Richard Dawkins.
Bill Maher
Skepticism and atheism do not arrive from revelation or authority. In our culture it's a slow thoughtful process. But, in the beginning there was Dawkins, moving that process along for many of us, with information and inspiration. For the modern skeptical/atheist movement, in the beginning
there was Dawkins and he was wicked good. Appetite for Wonder shows us this beginning.
Penn Jillette, author of God No! and Every Day is an Atheist Holiday
Richard Fortey
Guardian
This eloquent, witty and instructive book reveals the true Richard Dawkins. It's a great read.
A.C. Grayling
Throughout and as usual, Dawkins's writing is graceful, sparkling with anecdotes and wit
Eugenie Scott, Nature
Dawkins is a fascinating man and as a writer he is nothing less than essential... he is a man who has influenced or changed the way people think. His story needs to be read.
Simon Barnes, The Times
Richard Dawkins's memoirs are, like their author, honest, perceptive, sometimes ingenuous, always rational and deeply humane.
Matt Ridley
Lyrical... [Dawkins's] appetite for wonder is beguiling
Evening Standard
Enjoyable from start to finish, this exceptionally accessible book will appeal to science lovers, lovers of autobiographies—and, of course, all of Dawkins’s fans, atheists and theists alike.
Library Journal starred review
Well-written, captivating, and filled with fascinating anecdotes
Publishers Weekly
Richard Dawkins is a hero of mine, so being able to read about how he became the man and the thinker he is, was a particular delight for me. How his life formed from an inchoate, primordial soup and then never wavered from sound, scientific principles made for a huge page turning experience; he’s also a great writer, so that helps. Some people get their kicks from Superman’s origin story, or Batman’s origin story… or Jesus’. But for me, it was Richard Dawkins.
Bill Maher
Skepticism and atheism do not arrive from revelation or authority. In our culture it's a slow thoughtful process. But, in the beginning there was Dawkins, moving that process along for many of us, with information and inspiration. For the modern skeptical/atheist movement, in the beginning
there was Dawkins and he was wicked good. Appetite for Wonder shows us this beginning.
Penn Jillette, author of God No! and Every Day is an Atheist Holiday