Buch, Englisch, 570 Seiten, laminated boards, Format (B × H): 204 mm x 258 mm, Gewicht: 1384 g
From Matter to Man
Buch, Englisch, 570 Seiten, laminated boards, Format (B × H): 204 mm x 258 mm, Gewicht: 1384 g
ISBN: 978-0-19-850546-4
Verlag: Oxford University Press
In this book the authors describe the long journey from formless inanimate matter to man, while explaining the nature and the logic of the physical-chemical processes involved, and stressing the limitations of reductionist analyses of these processes as complexity increases and novel properties emerge. In particular the authors develop the idea that it was chemical change of the environment that allowed evolution of life to occur and that this evolution required successive addition of new message systems and information codes connected, compatible, and cooperative with previous extant systems. To do this the authors analyse the relationship between chemical element content and speciation both in inanimate and living systems in terms of fundamental units and variables, or composite (derived) units and variables. Through such analyses the authors conclude that chemical speciation is very much a matter of chemical cooperativity (order versus disorder) while biological speciation requires cooperative flow of chemicals and energy (organisation versus disorder). They argue that chance mutations of DNA are far too simple to provide a basis for evolution and biological diversity, though it is a representation of such diversity. It is the survival strength of systems of molecular machinery which separate and generate living species. In the final chapter they analyse the effect of man's activities on the present global and local ecosystems and speculate on the possible nature of the emergent properties to be expected from an ever-increasing complexity of information-based modern societies.
Autoren/Hrsg.
Fachgebiete
- Naturwissenschaften Biowissenschaften Biowissenschaften Evolutionsbiologie
- Naturwissenschaften Chemie Chemie Allgemein Toxikologie, Gefahrstoffe, Sicherheit in der Chemie
- Naturwissenschaften Chemie Chemie Allgemein Chemische Labormethoden, Stöchiometrie
- Naturwissenschaften Biowissenschaften Biochemie (nichtmedizinisch)
- Naturwissenschaften Chemie Chemie Allgemein Chemometrik, Chemoinformatik
- Naturwissenschaften Biowissenschaften Tierkunde / Zoologie Tierphysiologie
- Naturwissenschaften Chemie Chemie Allgemein Pharmazeutische Chemie, Medizinische Chemie
Weitere Infos & Material
- Preface
- Units of Energy and Work and the Values of Some Physical Constants
- Acknowledgements
- 1: The Development of Man's Ideas Concerning Nature
- 2: Forces and Related Energies
- 3: Electrons in Atoms and their Energetics
- 4: Ordering and Stability of Atom and Component Associations
- 5: The Balance Between Order and Disorder
- 6: Dilute Solutions and Order-Disorder Balance
- 7: Systems with Boundaries: Compartments
- 8: Change and Its Control
- 9: The Evolution of Earth
- 10: The Principles of the Chemistry of Living Systems
- 11: Early Life: Anaerobic Prokaryotes
- 12: The Development of Anaerobic Organisation: From Prokaryotes to Eukaryotes
- 13: The Coming of Dioxygen: Unicellular Organisms
- 14: The Coming of Multicellular Organisms
- 15: The Evolution of Man and His Chemistry
- 16: Survey and Conclusions
- Further Reading
- Index
