Life Ascending
by Nick Lane, Ilona Hauser · first published 2009
70% recommend30% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Covers major evolutionary leaps in complexity, such as the origin of cells and sex, with chemistry-grounded explanations and a vivid account of hydrothermal vents. Suits readers of Nick Lane's style.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
“If Charles Darwin sprang from his grave, I would give him this fine book to bring him up to speed.” — Matt Ridley, author of [The Red Queen][1] [1]: http://openlibrary.org/works/OL2078895W/The_Red_Queen
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…Also has a couple of fascinating chapters on how the interaction of the mitochondrial genome with the nuclear genome influenced development of sexes and sex. http://amzn.com/0199205647 2. Nick Lane's Life Ascending: The Ten Great Inventions of Evolution - Covers very different material and again all fucking fascinating. It's amazing to see how things like sight have evolved over and over and over because they're…
on “Evolution’s Random Paths Lead to One Place” ↗…on a plane, a seasoned biologist happened to be sitting next to me. When I told that it's the first book of Nick Lane that I picked up, he said: "I'd rather suggest you to pick up Laine's other book, Life Ascending, and only then get back to The Vital Question." PS: FWIW, I've previously mentioned the above in an older thread, where an ex-biochemist chimed in to confirm the above advice: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18714115
on “Ask HN: What scientific phenomenon do you wish someone would explain better?” ↗…finished it and this article really seems like a continuation of some of his theories he talks about. I found about the book from HN, and have since bought every single other book by him, almost done with Life Ascending now, which is also amazing
on “In Newly Created Life-Form, a Major Mystery” ↗> pick up Laine's other book, Life Ascending, and then get back to The Vital Question As an ex-biochemist who has read both books, this is excellent advice.
on “What a Newfound Kingdom Means for the Tree of Life” ↗…Prediction, Action, and the Embodied Mind Impro Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China Invisible Cities Collapse of Complex Societies -- Favorites from this year: Death's End One Man's Meat Life Ascending: The Ten Great Inventions of Evolution A Primate's Memoir: A Neuroscientist's Unconventional Life Among the Baboons Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death and Brain Surgery Cosmicomics Why Quark Rhymes…
on “Ask HN: Books you plan to read in 2020?” ↗Thanks for the reference, I didn't know he had a more thorough book on this. I remember reading "Life Ascending" and being amazed at the descriptions of the hydrothermal vents.
on “Life Has Been Found Beneath Hydrothermal Vents for the First Time” ↗I’d suggest the book Life Ascending. It talks about how certain major jumps in complexity occurs. It directly addresses the “bumping in the ocean” you mention — according to the book the likely explanation was these initial reactions occurred…
on “Where the heck did all those structures inside complex cells come from?” ↗…on a plane, a seasoned biologist happened to be sitting next to me. When I said that it's the first book of Nick Lane that I picked up, he said: "I'd rather suggest you to pick up Laine's other book, Life Ascending, and then get back to The Vital Question." (Edit: Oops, bad me, just noticed that there's already discussion about the book's accessibility in this thread.)
on “What a Newfound Kingdom Means for the Tree of Life” ↗Sounds like the Origin of Life theory where the main place of action seemed to be the alkaline underwater vents: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2014-115 (also described in "Life Ascending" (2010) by Nick Lane)
on “Solar Storms May Have Been Key to Life on Earth” ↗Yes, Nick Lane discusses Wächtershäuser's work in the first chapter of his book "Life Ascending".
on “A biochemist’s view of life’s origin reframes cancer and aging” ↗Nick Lane covers this a little in the third chapter of his book Life Ascending: The Ten Great Inventions of Evolution. It might not be talking about the specific process OP was talking about but rather the Z Scheme of Photosynthesis
on “'artificial photosynthesis' claimed 10x more efficient” ↗Indeed, it's the classical Weismann's fallacy. From Nick Lane's 'Life Ascending': > The most popular idea, dating back to Weismann in the 1880s, is wrong, as he himself was quick to recognise. Weismann originally proposed that ageing and death rid populations of old worn-out individuals,…
on “Tracking Brain's "Wave of Death": New Insights into Neural End-of-Life” ↗I read 47 books so far: * Oxygen (Lane) * The Vital Question (Lane) * Mitochondria and the meaning of life (Lane) * Life Ascending (Lane) * Shoe Dog (Knight) * Heat (Buford) * Thinking Fast And Slow (Daniel K, 3rd time reading it) * Fluent Forever (Wyner) * Dark Money (Mayer) * Elon Musk (Vance) * The Black Swan (Taleb, 5th…
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2016?” ↗…after the first 100 pages or so, the book gets quite technical (necessarily so). Unless your biochemistry is reasonably good, it is suggested (by biochemists themselves[1]) to first read his other book, 'Life Ascending'[2], which lays out the ground work for the deep dive into "hydrothermal vents", a key topic in 'The Vital Question'. [1] As shared here on HN before: When I was reading the book on a plane, a seasoned…
on “A chemical clue to how life started on Earth” ↗which book was that ? Life Ascending?
on “First 'three person baby' born using new method” ↗