To see accurate pricing, please choose your delivery country.
 
 
United States
£ GBP
All Shops

British Wildlife

8 issues per year 84 pages per issue Subscription only

British Wildlife is the leading natural history magazine in the UK, providing essential reading for both enthusiast and professional naturalists and wildlife conservationists. Published eight times a year, British Wildlife bridges the gap between popular writing and scientific literature through a combination of long-form articles, regular columns and reports, book reviews and letters.

Subscriptions from £33 per year

Conservation Land Management

4 issues per year 44 pages per issue Subscription only

Conservation Land Management (CLM) is a quarterly magazine that is widely regarded as essential reading for all who are involved in land management for nature conservation, across the British Isles. CLM includes long-form articles, events listings, publication reviews, new product information and updates, reports of conferences and letters.

Subscriptions from £26 per year
Academic & Professional Books  Evolutionary Biology  Evolution

Freaks of Nature What Anomalies Tell Us About Development and Evolution

Popular Science
By: Mark S Blumberg(Author)
344 pages, 20 b/w illustrations
Freaks of Nature
Click to have a closer look
Select version
  • Freaks of Nature ISBN: 9780199736188 Paperback Aug 2010 Not in stock: Usually dispatched within 6 days
    £23.99
    #256770
  • Freaks of Nature ISBN: 9780195322828 Hardback Nov 2008 Not in stock: Usually dispatched within 2-4 weeks
    £49.99
    #256771
Selected version: £23.99
About this book Contents Customer reviews Biography Related titles

About this book

In most respects, Abigail and Brittany Hensel are normal American twins. Born and raised in a small town, they enjoy a close relationship, though each has her own tastes and personality. But the Hensels also share a body. Their two heads sit side-by-side on a single torso, with two arms and two legs. They have not only survived but have developed into athletic, graceful young women. And that, writes Mark S. Blumberg, opens an extraordinary window onto human development and evolution.

In Freaks of Nature, Blumberg turns a scientist's eye on the oddities of nature, showing how a subject once relegated to the sideshow can help explain some of the deepest complexities of biology. Why, for example, does a two-headed human so resemble a two-headed minnow? What we need to understand, Blumberg argues, is that anomalies are the natural products of development, and it is through developmental mechanisms that evolution works. Freaks of Nature induces a kind of intellectual vertigo as it upends our intuitive understanding of biology. What really is an anomaly? Why is a limbless human a "freak" but a limbless reptile-a snake-a successful variation?

What we see as deformities, Blumberg writes, are merely alternative paths for development, which challenge both the creature itself and our ability to fit it into our familiar categories. Rather than mere dead-ends, many anomalies prove surprisingly survivable-as in the case of the goat without forelimbs that learned to walk upright. Blumberg explains how such variations occur and points to the success of the Hensel sisters and the goat as examples of the extraordinary flexibility inherent in individual development.

In taking seriously a subject that has often been shunned as discomfiting and embarrassing, Mark Blumberg sheds new light on how individuals-and entire species-develop, survive, and evolve.

Contents

Introduction
1. A Parliament Of Monsters
2. Arresting Features
3. Do The Locomotion
4. Life And Limb
5. Anything Goes
Epilogue: Monstrous Behaviour

Customer Reviews

Biography

Mark S. Blumberg is Professor of Psychology, Starch Faculty Fellow, University of Iowa.

Popular Science
By: Mark S Blumberg(Author)
344 pages, 20 b/w illustrations
Media reviews

"This book offers a unique perspective, challenging our view of science, evolution, and social archetypes by examining the nature of malformations. It would be a worthwhile addition to the library of students and scholars alike."
Doody's Notes (Kerby C. Oberg, MD, PhD, Loma Linda University)

Current promotions
New and Forthcoming BooksNHBS Moth TrapBritish Wildlife MagazineBuyers Guides