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A review by drifterontherun
Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive by Carl Zimmer
3.0
What does it mean to be alive?
That's the question, embedded in this book's subtitle, that sold me on reading this. But I'm not sure that Carl Zimmer — whose day job is as a science writer for The New York Times — really ever answers the questions. What "Life's Edge" does instead is to turn the question back on the reader.
"So you think life begins at conception, anti-abortion advocates? Well, then what about Physarum — a single-celled yellow slime that grows remarkably fast and shows the ability to remember where it's been? What about viruses? What about skin cells? What about ..."
The fact is, most of the examples Zimmer cites — one in each chapter, at least — I can't even remember. Several scientific names are batted around, and Zimmer makes an effort to boil a number of complicated concepts down, all in an effort to say that, yes, life is hard to define. Anyone who draws a line showing where life begins likely doesn't know what they're talking about — so why be so absolutist about it?
I agree, but I was hoping for something a little bit more ... absolute, I suppose. Or maybe a deeper dive into the ways life has been depicted in culture throughout time. There's a bit of that, but Zimmer largely sticks to the science.
That isn't a surprise, and I have only myself to blame for wanting more of a philosophical — rather than a purely scientific — look at existence.
That's the question, embedded in this book's subtitle, that sold me on reading this. But I'm not sure that Carl Zimmer — whose day job is as a science writer for The New York Times — really ever answers the questions. What "Life's Edge" does instead is to turn the question back on the reader.
"So you think life begins at conception, anti-abortion advocates? Well, then what about Physarum — a single-celled yellow slime that grows remarkably fast and shows the ability to remember where it's been? What about viruses? What about skin cells? What about ..."
The fact is, most of the examples Zimmer cites — one in each chapter, at least — I can't even remember. Several scientific names are batted around, and Zimmer makes an effort to boil a number of complicated concepts down, all in an effort to say that, yes, life is hard to define. Anyone who draws a line showing where life begins likely doesn't know what they're talking about — so why be so absolutist about it?
I agree, but I was hoping for something a little bit more ... absolute, I suppose. Or maybe a deeper dive into the ways life has been depicted in culture throughout time. There's a bit of that, but Zimmer largely sticks to the science.
That isn't a surprise, and I have only myself to blame for wanting more of a philosophical — rather than a purely scientific — look at existence.