Science of Discworld III: Darwin's Watch
-
- $15.99
Publisher Description
Roundworld is in trouble again, and this time it looks fatal. Having created it in the first place, the wizards of Unseen Univeristy feel vaguely responsible for its safety. They know the creatures who lived there escaped the impending Big Freeze by inventing the space elevator - they even intervened to rid the planet of a plague of elves, who attempted to divert humanity onto a different time track. But now it's all gone wrong - Victorian England has stagnated and the pace of progress would embarrass a limping snail. Unless something drastic is done, there won't be time for anyone to invent spaceflight and the human race will be turned into ice-pops.
Why, though, did history come adrift? Was it Sir Arthur Nightingale's dismal book about natural selection? Or was it the devastating response by an obscure country vicar called Charles Darwin, whose bestselling Theology of Species made it impossible to refute the divine design of living creatures? Either way, it's no easy task to change history, as the wizards discover to their cost. Can the God of Evolution come to humanity's aid and ensure Darwin writes a very different book? And who stopped him writing it in the first place?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The third Science of Discworld volume takes readers on an adventure across alternate timelines and behind the evolution of evolution. Ever since the wizards of Discworld's Unseen University accidentally created "Roundworld" aka Earth they've been trying to ensure humanity's survival, with mixed results. In Roundworld's Victorian England, Charles Darwin's "Theology of Species," and its support for the idea that life on Earth could only have risen from a godly designer's hand, has slowed scientific progress to a crawl. Outside interference has sent Roundworld down "a different leg of the Trousers of Time," and unless the wizards can put it back where it belongs, humans won't survive the next extinction event. The story alternates chapters with wry and illuminating essays on scientific progress and the history of evolution theory. The late Pratchett, creator of the wildly popular Discworld novels, and his coauthors offer fascinating insight into Darwin, his world, and how Victorian life shaped his theory of evolution. Even technophobic readers will enjoy this cheerful, accessible look at the less-than-linear path of scientific discovery, where the most comfortable answer is usually not the best.
