stand up for REAL science

When writing about science for the general public, it is to vital use the simplest language possible. It is also helpful to make frequent use of analogies to relate scientific concepts to objects or situations that can be easily envisioned by the reader.

Your Inner Fish, by Neil Shubin, is a book that delivers on both counts. The book is full of analogies that help the reader to better understand complex biological phenomena.

My favorite analogy involves recipes:

All animals are the same but different. Like a cake recipe passed down from generation to generation--with enhancements to the cake in each--the recipe that builds our bodies has been passed down, and modified, for eons. We may not look much like sea anemones and jellyfish, but the recipe that builds us is a more intricate version of the one that builds them."

Your Inner Fish, p. 115

Just as a family cake recipe is passed down and modified over many generations, the various genetic recipes that build animal bodies are essentially modifications of an ancient set of basic ingredients. Certain ingredients may have been added or subtracted over time, the amounts of each ingredient may vary significantly, and the order in which the ingredients are mixed may have even changed. However, even with these differences, the basic ingredients are still the same and the recipes all share an obvious common ancestry.

Another helpful analogy explains how paleontologists interpret the relationships between existing and fossil species:

Tiktaalik is a wonderful intermediate between fish and their land-living descendants, but the odds of it being our exact ancestor are very remote. It is more like a cousin of our ancestor. No sane paleontologist would ever claim that he or she had discovered "The Ancestor." Think about it this way: What is the chance that while walking through any random cemetery on our planet I would discover an actual ancestor of mine? Diminishingly small. What I would discover is that all of the people buried in these cemeteries--no matter whether that cemetery is in China, Botswana, or Italy--are related to me to different degrees.

Your Inner Fish, p. 180

This book is such an easy read that I was able to finish it in less than 24 hours, and I am a notoriously slow reader. I actually wished that it was longer!

Earlier, I encouraged readers to "Embrace Your Inner Fish." Now that I have read the book, I have a better suggestion: let Your Inner Fish embrace you.