* Richard Dawkins - Evolutionary Biology and the New Atheism (22 books)

RICHARD DAWKINS (b. 1941) is a British evolutionary biologist, ethologist, and popular-science writer who emphasized the gene as the driving force of evolution, and has generated significant controversy with his enthusiastic advocacy of atheism and criticism of creationism and intelligent design.

In his first book, THE SELFISH GENE (1976), Dawkins tried to rectify what he maintained was a widespread misunderstanding of Darwinism.  He argued that natural selection takes place at the genetic rather than species or individual level, as was often assumed.  Genes, he maintained, use the bodies of living things to further their own survival.  He also introduced the concept of “memes,” the cultural equivalent of genes.  Ideas and concepts, from fashion to music, take on a life of their own within society and, by propagating and mutating from mind to mind, affect the progress of human evolution.  The book was notable not just because of what it espoused but also because of its approachable style, which made it accessible to a popular audience.

More books followed, including THE EXTENDED PHENOTYPE (1982), which introduced the influential concept that the phenotypic effects of a gene are not necessarily limited to an organism's body, but can stretch far into the environment; THE BLIND WATCHMAKER (1986), which won the Royal Society of Literature Award in 1987; and RIVER OUT OF EDEN (1995).  Dawkins particularly sought to address a growing misapprehension of what exactly Darwinian natural selection entailed in CLIMBING MOUNT IMPROBABLE (1996).  Stressing the gradual nature of response to selective pressures, Dawkins took care to point out that intricate structures such as the eye do not manifest randomly but instead successively increase in sophistication.

In the UNWEAVING THE RAINBOW (1998), Dawkins contended that evolutionary theory is aesthetically superior to supernatural explanations of the world.  THE ANCESTOR’S TALE (2004), structured after Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, traces the human branch of the phylogenetic tree back to points where it converges with the evolution of other species.  Further publications included THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH (2009), a tribute to, and vehement defense of, the theory of evolution by natural selection; THE MAGIC OF REALITY (2011), a book for young readers that juxtaposes the scientific understanding of various phenomena with mythologies that purport to explain them; OUTGROWING GOD: A BEGINNER’S GUIDE (2019); and the collection BOOKS DO FURNISH A LIFE (2021), a collection of essays on "reading and writing science" (2021).  He also edited THE OXFORD BOOK OF MODERN SCIENCE WRITING (2008).

Though much of Dawkins’s oeuvre generated debate for asserting the supremacy of science over religion in explaining the world, nothing matched the response to the polemical THE GOD DELUSION (2006).  The book relentlessly points out the logical fallacies in religious belief and ultimately concludes that the laws of probability preclude the existence of an omnipotent creator.  Along with fellow atheists Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, and Daniel C. Dennett, he embarked on a campaign of lectures and public debates proselytizing and defending a secular worldview.

In the memoir AN APPETITE FOR WONDER (2013), Dawkins chronicled his life up to the publication of The Selfish Gene.  A second volume of memoirs, BRIEF CANDLE IN THE DARK (2015), recorded episodes from the latter part of his career.

His most recent work, FLIGHTS OF FANCY (2022), is a book about flying – all the different ways of defying gravity that have been discovered by humans over the centuries and by other animals over the millions of years.


In addition to more than 100 unitemized articles (see file listing), the following books are in ePub format unless otherwise noted:

* A Devil's Chaplain (HM, 2003)
* An Appetite for Wonder: The Making of a Scientist (Ecco, 2013)
* The Ancestor's Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution, 2e (HMH, 2016)
* The Blind Watchmaker (Penguin, 2006)
* The Blind Watchmaker (Norton, 1996)
* Books Do Furnish a Life: Reading and Writing Science (Bantam, 2021)
* Brief Candle in the Dark: My Life in Science (Ecco, 2015)
* Climbing Mount Improbable (Norton, 1997)
* The Extended Phenotype: The Long Reach of the Gene, rev'd (Oxford, 2016)
* Flights of Fancy: Defying Gravity by Design & Evolution (Head of Zeus, 2021)
* The Four Horsemen [with Hitchens et al.] (Random House, 2019) – ePub + PDF
* The God Delusion (HM, 2006) – PDF
* The God Delusion [10th Anniversary Edition] (Black Swan, 2016)
* The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution (Free Press, 2009)
* The Magic of Reality: How We Know What’s Really True (Free Press, 2012)
* The Magic of Reality [Illustrated by D. McKean] (Free Press, 2011) – PDF
* Outgrowing God: A Beginner's Guide (Random House, 2019)
* River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life (Basic Books, 1995)
* Science in the Soul: Selected Writings (Random House, 2017)
* The Selfish Gene [40th Anniversary edition] (Oxford, 2016) – ePub + PDF
* Unweaving the Rainbow: Science, Delusion & the Appetite for Wonder (HM, 2000)

== EDITOR ==

* New Statesman (19 December 2011) [guest ed.] – PDF
* The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing (Oxford, 2008) – PDF


SEE ALSO:

* Christopher Hitchens - Essays, Nonfiction and Debates (30 books)
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