An award-winning biologist takes us on the dramatic expeditions that unearthed the history of life on our planet.   Just 150 years ago, most of our world was an unexplored wilderness. Our sense of its age was vague and vastly off the mark, and much of the knowledge of our own species’ history was a set of fantastic myths and fairy tales. In the tradition of The Microbe Hunters and Gods , Graves , and Scholars , Sean Carroll leads a rousing voyage that recounts the most important discoveries in two centuries of natural history: from Darwin’s trip around the world to Charles Walcott’s discovery of pre-Cambrian life in the Grand Canyon; from Louis and Mary Leakey’s investigation of our deepest past in East Africa to the trailblazers in modern laboratories who have located a time clock in our DNA. "These scientific adventurers inspire the author—and will do the same for experts and novices alike—with their fearless dedication to getting at the truth, as far as it can be known. A stirring introduction to the wonder of evolutionary biology." -- Kirkus Review , 12/15/08 SEAN CARROLL is a professor of molecular biology and genetics and an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the University of Wisconsin and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He is also the author of The Making of the Fittest and Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo . PREFACE A Mixture of Spirit and Deed Not so long ago, most of the world was an unexplored wilderness. The animals, plants, and people that inhabited the lands beyond Europe were unknown, at least as far as the Western world was concerned. The rivers and jungles of the Amazon, the Badlands of Pata - gonia and of the American West, the tropical forests of Indonesia, the savannah and center of Africa, the vast interior of Central Asia, the polar regions, and the many chains of islands that dot the oceans were complete mysteries.      And, while our knowledge of the world’s living inhabitants was slim, our grasp of our planet’s past was nonexistent. Fossils had been known for millennia, but they were seen in the light of local mythologies about dragons and other imagined creatures, not in the light of natural science.      Our sense of the time scale of life on earth? Vague and vastly off the mark.      And our picture of our own species’ history? A set of fantastic myths and fairy tales.      The explorations of the previously unseen parts of the world and the unearthing of the history of life and our origins are some of the greatest achievements in human history. This book tells the stories of some of the most dramatic adventures and important discoveries in two centuries of natural history— from the epic journeys of pioneering naturalists to the expeditions making headlines today — and how they inspired and have expanded one of the greatest ideas of modern science: evolution.      We will encounter many amazing creatures of the past and present, but the most remarkable creatures in these stories are the men and women. They are, without exception, remarkable people who have experienced and accomplished extraordinary things. They have lived the kinds of lives that Twain extolled— they walked where no others had walked, saw what no one else had seen, and thought what no one else had thought.      The people in these stories followed their dreams— to travel to faraway lands, to see wild and exotic places, to collect beautiful, rare, or strange animals, or to find the remains of extinct beasts or human ancestors. Very few started out with any notion of great achievement or fame. Several lacked formal education or training. Rather, they were driven by a passion to explore nature, and they were willing, sometimes eager, to take great risks to pursue their dreams. Many faced the perils of traveling long distances by sea. Some confronted the extreme climates of deserts, jungles, or the Arctic. Many left behind skeptical and anxious loved ones, and a few endured years of unimaginable loneliness.      Their triumphs were much more than survival and the collecting of specimens from around the world. A few pioneers, provoked by a riot of diversity beyond their wildest imaginations, were transformed from collectors into scientists. They posed and pondered the most fundamental questions about Nature. Their answers sparked a revolution that changed, profoundly and forever, our perception of the living world and our place within it.      Unlike their privileged countrymen back in the universities, churches, and drawing rooms of Europe, most of whom believed that the origins of living things was a matter outside the realm of natural science, these explorers asked not just what existed, but wondered how and why these creatures came to be. Unlike their teachers, who pursued a natural theology that interpreted everything in Nature as part of the design of a Creator — peaceful, harmonious, stable, and unchanging — this new cadre of naturali