Non-Fiction Review: Wild Sex: The Science Behind Mating in the Animal Kingdom

 

Title: Wild Sex: The Science Behind Mating in the Animal Kingdom

Author: Dr. Carin Bondar

Publisher: Pegasus Books, 2016. 365 pages.

Source: Library

Not a children's book! 

Publisher's Summary:

Birds do it, bees do it — every member of the animal kingdom does it, from fruit flies to blue whales. But if you think humans have a tough time dating, try having to do it while being hunted down by predators, against a backdrop of unpredictable and life-threatening conditions. The animal kingdom is a wild place – and it’s got mating habits to match. The sex lives of our animal cousins are fiendishly difficult, infinitely varied, often incredibly violent — and absolutely fascinating.

In Wild Sex, Dr. Carin Bondar takes readers on an enthralling tour of the animal kingdom as she explores the diverse world of sex in the wild. She looks at the evolution of sexual organs (and how they’ve shaped social hierarchies), tactics of seduction, and the mechanics of sex. She investigates a wide range of topics, from whether animals experience pleasure from sex to what happens when females hold the reproductive power. Along the way, she encounters razor-sharp penises, murderous carnal cannibals, and spontaneous chemical warfare in an epic battle between the sexes.

The resulting book is titillating, exhilarating, amusing, petrifying, alluring — and absolutely guaranteed to make you think about sex in a whole new way.  

My Review: 

Well, there I was, sorting books at the library, and I found myself holding this book. I had to take it home and see what it had to say, especially given those obviously smitten polar bears on the cover. Besides, I've stumbled on interesting tidbits about amour among various creatures over the years, and wanted to see what I could learn, and if there was anything more unnerving than banana slugs, who mate for hours--sometimes with both parties serving as both male and female--and can get stuck so that they have to gnaw off their male parts in order to separate. It doesn't get any weirder than that, right? (Note: it does). All of which is to say, I had some idea what I was getting into with this book.

And did it deliver? I would have to say: yes, but. The book is jammed with interesting facts about all aspects of mating in many different species. But I at times felt like I was reading a whole lot of one or two paragraph "oh wow" pieces, not a single coherent work that was building to a greater understanding of something. And yet (how many other hands do I have?), in the end, the book does leave the reader with a greater understanding of the biological side of sex.

I think it also raises, but doesn't explore, the question of whether the human relationship to sex is unique (and possibly what sets us aside from other animals). It seems easy to say that we are the only animals who indulge in sex for fun, not for biology. But Dr. Bondar cites many cases where animals seem to do likewise--even though she then provides plausible evolutionary reasons for the behavior, which force me to ask if it's really for fun. Part of the problem is that she falls into the trap of referring to evolutionary forces as though they were deliberate choices, and vice versa.

At times in the middle of the book I felt it was a little less substantial than I would like, but in the end, it certainly left me with food for thought.

Recommendation: 

For adults (older teens at the youngest due to graphic descriptions of all kinds of sex) who are curious about the evolutionary history and biological efficacy of sexuality.

FTC Disclosure: I checked Wild Sex: The Science Behind Mating in the Animal Kingdom out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising." 

Book Review: Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History

Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History, by Stephen Jay Gould.  347 pages, including notes and index.
Published by W.W. Norton, 1989

 Summary:
This non-fiction work is a combination of history and science, recounting both the discovery and interpretation of the 530-million-year-old creatures in the shale, as well as the significance of these followers of the "Cambrian Explosion" when the variety of life took off.  He covers both the personalities and discoveries of the major players in unraveling the mysteries of the Burgess Shale creatures, and also the ways in which their discoveries changed our understanding of evolution.

Review:
Gould's subtitle might make one wonder about the connection between such early creatures and, say, Washington crossing the Delaware, but that's because we tend to think of history as human history.  The history Gould is considering is the history of all life, and really it's about the nature of evolution. 

The book tells two stories, then: the human history of discovering, misinterpreting, and re-interpreting the fossils from high on the side of a mountain in the Canadian Rockies--and the scientific history of how life on earth got from the weird creatures depicted on the cover to, well, us.  The two threads are seamlessly intertwined, and the one helps illuminate the other, so that my improved understanding of paleontology helped me to understand the interpretations made by scientists along the way, and their journey to understand helps me grok the process of evolution.

I won't try to reconstruct Gould's argument or purpose.  Suffice to say that I cam away from the book with a better understanding of both earth's history and the evolutionary process, as well as some interesting anecdotal history about paleontologists.  Also with food for thought, as Gould asserts--and fairly convincingly supports the assertion--that the element of chance in evolution (something like chaos, I think) means that the emergence of mammals as the top animals, let alone of humans, was highly unlikely, rather than the inevitable result of a constant development toward the "best" design. (Since evolution is about survival and reproduction, it doesn't necessarily support the "best"--only the "good enough".)

The book is intended for a lay audience, but Gould does assume a certain familiarity with the basic concepts, though he does a good refresher on the key points.  I found the paleontology about as complex and in-depth as I'd want to go, and did find my eyes glazing from time to time.  Not surprisingly (I am an English Lit-and-history type, after all!) I found the human stories more accessible and engaging.  His analysis of why Charles Wolcott, the original (1909) excavator of the fossils, went so far wrong is a fascinating study of our human ability to see what we are looking for.

Gould is an excellent writer of science for the normal person, and I can recommend the book to anyone wanting a better understanding of the origins of life and evolution.
Four stars (I'm dinging him a bit for losing me in some of the technical stuff. which might not be fair, but there it is).

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For fun: the reason I read this book is that this summer, on our vacation trip to the Canadian Rockies, we hiked up past the Wolcott quarry and did a little searching on our own hook for the fossils.  You can't enter the quarry, but there are lots of lower-quality fossils in the shale either side of the trail below it.  The visit required a 12-mile hike with 3000' of elevation gain (and loss again, which is what hurt most), but added great views to scientific interest.

The Wolcott Quarry

My best fossil.  I have no idea what it was.

The view from the Wapta Highline Trail just below the quarry.

Full Disclosure: I bought Wonderful Life at the Visitor's Center in Banff National Park, and received nothing whatsoever from the author or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed in this review are my own and no one else's.  They also reflect my understanding of the subject matter and any errors therein are mine and not Mr. Gould's.