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mention
mention
This is an ambitious book covering the history and development of ideas from a very wide range of topics pertaining to how we (humans) got here. Bryson starts all the way with the big bang, to the formation of the cosmos, the solar system and the planet, abiogenesis, evolution, and finally human prehistory. The book spices up a relatively high-level discussion of the relevant scientific topics with the lives and idiosyncrasies of the scientists who made the critical discoveries. I admire the book for its scope, but an unfortunate side effect is that the book doesn’t get a chance to dive in to any one topic in a satisfying manner. Instead we get an overview of many topics and ideas which is fun sometimes unless you’re already familiar with the topics (e.g. Darwin’s beagle voyages, Watson&Crick’s DNA discovery, spread of humans from Africa, etc.). I personally somehow found the book a little tedious by the end and I was happy when it was over. Marking read, phew. 3/5 - it was okay. I suspect someone less familiar with many of the topics who is content with a broad but shallow overview and willing to hear a lot about the lives of scientists who made the relevant discoveries could enjoy it much more. 3/5
— Andrej Karpathy
2016-08-07 on goodreads.com