Take a photo of a barcode or cover
171 reviews for:
Woolly: The True Story of the Quest to Revive One of History's Most Iconic Extinct Creatures
Ben Mezrich
3.35 AVERAGE
171 reviews for:
Woolly: The True Story of the Quest to Revive One of History's Most Iconic Extinct Creatures
Ben Mezrich
3.35 AVERAGE
informative
What a silly idea. Honestly, it may be more feasible and relevant than it sounded, but the author made it all sound like a junior high science fair, only with more money involved.
Woolly is a book that tells the seemingly true story about individuals and scientists who are working towards the reseresctin of the Woolly Mammoth. I found the story line and easy to follow but overly glorified. The book highlighted on the personal lives of the Scientists presenting them in an unobtainable light. The book does go into DNA, RNA and how stem cells are vital for curing almients but then it expands in breadth and goes on to talking about a billionaire who wants to achieve in mortality and if aging and dying is natural. The book never explores this again and that topic seems to lack direction. I am underwhelmed with this book and would not recommend it to really anyone.
Definitely engaging and interesting, but the author made some very strange narrative choices for an nonfiction book. The book jumps all over in time and place. The author also often chooses to inject drama by, for example, burying scientific exposition in an action-packed sequence of downhill skiing. The strange narrative choices do slightly cover for the fact that the book is rather anticlimactic. The book just ends and (spoiler) there are no woolly mammoths yet. Furthermore, the scientists don't actually de-extinct anything in the time frame of the book.
Overall, it was an interesting read but you probably get more out of a different book choice.
Overall, it was an interesting read but you probably get more out of a different book choice.
informative
medium-paced
informative
medium-paced
There are so very many problems with this book. Where do I begin?! Oh, I know. All the invented dialogue. Choosing to write a book about a hugely controversial scientific techniques is a bold choice; choosing to invent dialogue and details the narrator could not possibly know is a frustrating addition. Not to mention that a non-fiction text does not ordinarily have a semi-omniscient narrator who can divulge the feelings of a number of people.
This leads me to the next problem. How is this book not a love letter to George Church? Seems to me that a number of scientists that are doing far more to "save the world" (annoyingly common phrase in the middle section of the book) are given much less attention in the text. Too many chapters begin with multiple quotes by Church as epigraphs.
The title is misleading because the book spends far too much time talking about Church as a person. This is especially true since the reader realizes it is a team of scientists in his lab who are doing the actual work of the so-called "quest." The author also writes 30% of the book before mentioning a woolly mammoth. I have no clue how Church's marriage or amino acid study diet are relevant to de-extinction?! I also think it in bad taste to write a section about the sexism Ting Wu faced then ignore her for the rest of the book. Is her story just filler?
On the subject of filler, does Ben Mezrich just add random anecdotes about the scientists to elongate the book? The reason for the drawn out customs scene is never given, nor the overly dramatic description of transporting elk. I still do not understand what the tics and mice on Nantucket have to do with the woolly mammoth? And a cat genome birthday party?
The largest problem I see with this book is the lack of any real discussion of the very questionable ethics of de-extinction. There is no mention of the hubris required to believe a scientist has the right to reintroduce a species into an ecosystem whose fragility becomes more pressing every day. There are scant sentences scattered throughout the book that point towards a discussion of ethics; there is no substantive interrogation of the very valid questions that are raised by genetic engineering.
Creating a woolly mammoth by splicing lab-created DNA into an elephant cell shares the same technology that could be employed to create "designer babies." Of course no discussion of privilege exists nor the eerie similarity to the Nazi desire for "an Aryan race." To assume scientific advances will benefit citizens is a naive approach to take as an author and actually makes me distrust Mezrich more than his invented dialogue and details. The "waiver" at the beginning is not enough for me. He valorizes the scientists in this book without questioning their stance on the implications their work creates for human lives. I had the misfortune of listening to the audio book. The narrator mirrors Mezrich's work by voicing this book as though it is the greatest possible text written. The enthusiasm for a book with so many faults is worse than ironic.
Mezrich writes that "when cloning an animal, miscarriages and mutant births occurred more often than normal." It does not take a biologist to realize that a womb is clearly rejecting synthetically made or altered embryos. Nor does it take a biologist to realize that creating a synthetic womb ignores the vital function of immune system transfer that occurs between human and embryo.
Fortunately Church forgoes the idea of having an elephant carry a woolly mammoth embryo because in my mind, this is a kin to expecting a human to carry a gorilla. Why does Mezrich expect readers to accept this idea with little discussion of the ethics involved? Instead, we have a bizarre surface level defense of cloning dogs. The one mention of the catastrophic genocide that could occur to a species after genetic engineering interference is followed by a "but the people of Nantucket saw ..." That's right. The one time Mezrich introduces the idea that genetic engineering technology could be weaponized is followed by a "but" that negates the previous clause.
This book presumes a reader willing to believe scientists have the right to decide who and what exists and who and what does not. I have no interest in engaging a one-sided conversation with an author not willing to interrogate the very basic question of whether we should be fundamentally altering the DNA of another species, let alone of our own species.
The only reason I finished this book, and did not drop it sooner, was so that I could critique it without being accused of "not giving it a fair chance." I will not recommend this book. It is irresponsible, full of invented details, and ignores crucial questions raised by the very subject matter of the text. 1 out of 5 stars.
This leads me to the next problem. How is this book not a love letter to George Church? Seems to me that a number of scientists that are doing far more to "save the world" (annoyingly common phrase in the middle section of the book) are given much less attention in the text. Too many chapters begin with multiple quotes by Church as epigraphs.
The title is misleading because the book spends far too much time talking about Church as a person. This is especially true since the reader realizes it is a team of scientists in his lab who are doing the actual work of the so-called "quest." The author also writes 30% of the book before mentioning a woolly mammoth. I have no clue how Church's marriage or amino acid study diet are relevant to de-extinction?! I also think it in bad taste to write a section about the sexism Ting Wu faced then ignore her for the rest of the book. Is her story just filler?
On the subject of filler, does Ben Mezrich just add random anecdotes about the scientists to elongate the book? The reason for the drawn out customs scene is never given, nor the overly dramatic description of transporting elk. I still do not understand what the tics and mice on Nantucket have to do with the woolly mammoth? And a cat genome birthday party?
The largest problem I see with this book is the lack of any real discussion of the very questionable ethics of de-extinction. There is no mention of the hubris required to believe a scientist has the right to reintroduce a species into an ecosystem whose fragility becomes more pressing every day. There are scant sentences scattered throughout the book that point towards a discussion of ethics; there is no substantive interrogation of the very valid questions that are raised by genetic engineering.
Creating a woolly mammoth by splicing lab-created DNA into an elephant cell shares the same technology that could be employed to create "designer babies." Of course no discussion of privilege exists nor the eerie similarity to the Nazi desire for "an Aryan race." To assume scientific advances will benefit citizens is a naive approach to take as an author and actually makes me distrust Mezrich more than his invented dialogue and details. The "waiver" at the beginning is not enough for me. He valorizes the scientists in this book without questioning their stance on the implications their work creates for human lives. I had the misfortune of listening to the audio book. The narrator mirrors Mezrich's work by voicing this book as though it is the greatest possible text written. The enthusiasm for a book with so many faults is worse than ironic.
Mezrich writes that "when cloning an animal, miscarriages and mutant births occurred more often than normal." It does not take a biologist to realize that a womb is clearly rejecting synthetically made or altered embryos. Nor does it take a biologist to realize that creating a synthetic womb ignores the vital function of immune system transfer that occurs between human and embryo.
Fortunately Church forgoes the idea of having an elephant carry a woolly mammoth embryo because in my mind, this is a kin to expecting a human to carry a gorilla. Why does Mezrich expect readers to accept this idea with little discussion of the ethics involved? Instead, we have a bizarre surface level defense of cloning dogs. The one mention of the catastrophic genocide that could occur to a species after genetic engineering interference is followed by a "but the people of Nantucket saw ..." That's right. The one time Mezrich introduces the idea that genetic engineering technology could be weaponized is followed by a "but" that negates the previous clause.
This book presumes a reader willing to believe scientists have the right to decide who and what exists and who and what does not. I have no interest in engaging a one-sided conversation with an author not willing to interrogate the very basic question of whether we should be fundamentally altering the DNA of another species, let alone of our own species.
The only reason I finished this book, and did not drop it sooner, was so that I could critique it without being accused of "not giving it a fair chance." I will not recommend this book. It is irresponsible, full of invented details, and ignores crucial questions raised by the very subject matter of the text. 1 out of 5 stars.
informative
medium-paced
Fairly interesting, but it felt almost too breezy and speculative for me to take it very seriously. That said, it piqued my interest enough that I'm definitely curious to read more on de-extinction efforts, and I'd probably recommend this to someone who likes Michael Crichton.
informative
medium-paced
adventurous
informative
fast-paced
I'm back, yet again, to complain about authors who piece together dialogue that is not recorded. Other than that, however, I thought the book was engaging and informative.