The Hidden Life of Life
eBook - PDF

The Hidden Life of Life

A Walk through the Reaches of Time

  1. English
  2. PDF
  3. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

The Hidden Life of Life

A Walk through the Reaches of Time

About this book

An iconoclast and best-selling author of both nonfiction and fiction, Elizabeth Marshall Thomas has spent a lifetime observing, thinking, and writing about the cultures of animals such as lions, wolves, dogs, deer, and humans. In this compulsively readable book, she provides a plainspoken, big-picture look at the commonality of life on our planet, from the littlest microbes to the largest lizards.

Inspired by the idea of symbiosis in evolution—that all living things evolve in a series of cooperative relationships—Thomas takes readers on a journey through the progression of life. Along the way she shares the universal likenesses, experiences, and environments of "Gaia's creatures," from amoebas in plant soil to the pets we love, from proud primates to Homo sapiens hunter-gatherers on the African savanna. Fervently rejecting "anthropodenial," the notion that nonhuman life does not share characteristics with humans, Thomas instead shows that paramecia can learn, plants can communicate, humans aren't really as special as we think we are—and that it doesn't take a scientist to marvel at the smallest inhabitants of the natural world and their connections to all living things.

A unique voice on anthropology and animal behavior, Thomas challenges scientific convention and the jargon that prevents us all from understanding all living things better. This joyfully written book is a fascinating look at the challenges and behaviors shared by creatures from bacteria to larvae to parasitic fungi, a potted hyacinth to the author herself, and all those in between.

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Yes, you can access The Hidden Life of Life by Elizabeth Marshall Thomas in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Biological Sciences & Ecology. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. COVER front
  2. Series Page
  3. Copyright Page
  4. Table of Contents
  5. Chapter 1: About This Book
  6. Chapter 2: Our Bedroom
  7. Chapter 3: Microbes
  8. Chapter 4: Protists
  9. Chapter 5: Fungi
  10. Chapter 6: Animals
  11. Chapter 7: Dry Land
  12. Chapter 8: Lichens
  13. Chapter 9: Plants
  14. Chapter 10: Arthropods on Land
  15. Chapter 11: Vertebrates
  16. Chapter 12: Amphibians
  17. Chapter 13: Proto-Mammals
  18. Chapter 14: Dinosaurs
  19. Chapter 15: Pterosaurs
  20. Chapter 16: Crocodiles
  21. Chapter 17: Birds
  22. Chapter 18: Mammals
  23. Chapter 19: From Monkeys to the Missing Link
  24. Chapter 20: The Line to Homo Sapiens
  25. Chapter 21: Neandertals
  26. Chapter 22: Why Do We Look the Way We Look?
  27. Chapter 23: The San, Formerly Known as Bushmen
  28. Chapter 24: Gaia’s Rule One: Find a Source of Energy
  29. Chapter 25: Gaia’s Rule Two: Protect Yourself
  30. Chapter 26: Gaia’s Rule Three: Reproduce
  31. Chapter 27: The Present
  32. Chapter 28: The Future
  33. Coda
  34. Acknowledgments