The Accidental Species: Misunderstandings of Human Evolution
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The Accidental Species: Misunderstandings of Human Evolution Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

Henry Gee (Author), Martin Dew (Narrator), Audible Studios (Publisher)
4.3 4.3 out of 5 stars 200 ratings
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The idea of a missing link between humanity and our animal ancestors predates evolution and popular science and actually has religious roots in the deist concept of the Great Chain of Being. Yet, the metaphor has lodged itself in the contemporary imagination, and new fossil discoveries are often hailed in headlines as revealing the elusive transitional step, the moment when we stopped being "animal" and started being "human". In The Accidental Species, Henry Gee, longtime paleontology editor at Nature, takes aim at this misleading notion, arguing that it reflects a profound misunderstanding of how evolution works and, when applied to the evolution of our own species, supports mistaken ideas about our own place in the universe.

Gee presents a robust and stark challenge to our tendency to see ourselves as the acme of creation. Far from being a quirk of religious fundamentalism, human exceptionalism, Gee argues, is an error that also infects scientific thought. Touring the many features of human beings that have recurrently been used to distinguish us from the rest of the animal world, Gee shows that our evolutionary outcome is one possibility among many, one that owes more to chance than to an organized progression to supremacy.

He starts with bipedality, which he shows could have arisen entirely by accident, as a by-product of sexual selection, moves on to technology, large brain size, intelligence, language, and, finally, sentience. He reveals each of these attributes to be alive and well throughout the animal world - they are not, indeed, unique to our species. The Accidental Species combines Gee’s firsthand experience on the editorial side of many incredible paleontological findings with healthy skepticism and humor to create a book that aims to overturn popular thinking on human evolution - the key is not what’s missing, but how we’re linked.

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  1. Listening Length
    8 hours and 58 minutes
  2. Author
    Henry Gee
  3. Narrator
    Martin Dew
  4. Audible release date
    February 25, 2014
  5. Language
    English
  6. Publisher
    Audible Studios
  7. ASIN
    B00INHCP5K
  8. Version
    Unabridged
  9. Program Type
    Audiobook
  10. See all details
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Product details

Listening Length 8 hours and 58 minutes
Author Henry Gee
Narrator Martin Dew
Whispersync for Voice Ready
Audible.com Release Date February 25, 2014
Publisher Audible Studios
Program Type Audiobook
Version Unabridged
Language English
ASIN B00INHCP5K
Best Sellers Rank #181,049 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals)
#31 in Paleontology (Audible Books & Originals)
#237 in Paleontology (Books)
#245 in Evolution (Audible Books & Originals)

Customer reviews

4.3 out of 5 stars
4.3 out of 5
200 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Ian Liberman
5.0 out of 5 stars An Evolution Book that is Appealing to All
Reviewed in the United States on November 10, 2013
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I spend much of my time reading cosmology and physics books, so I have been aware for awhile that I need to delve into the area of Evolution, where I have been quite deficient in learning the basics. I just needed the right author, with right book, who could provide the concepts explained with humor and a level of understanding that would appeal to a novice like myself. I found Henry Gee`s The Accidental Species. I had no idea that Darwin never mentioned the word Evolution, in his book, The Origin of the Species, or that there was an amazing discovery in 2004 of a meter high hominin, in the cave of Flores, that they eventually nicknamed The Hobbit after the Tolkien creature because of his size. These are some of the amazing facts and anecdotes, that you will find, laced with humor and wit throughout the book. We learn, in the book, about controversies regarding the accuracy of fossils and the discussions about whether our genetic origins came from Africa or not. I do not want to provide any more spoilers, so please get the best book on the market relating to evolution. If you are a novice or just want be more informed as a scientist then this is the book for you. I have read the book and I am now waiting for the movie.
21 people found this helpful
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Matthew Rapaport
4.0 out of 5 stars Good summary of human evolution. Not so good on our similarity to other animals
Reviewed in the United States on January 11, 2024
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This is a book that does well in some parts and not so well in others. Broadly, it is a book about evolution, the evolution of modern humans, and the biological, social, and psychological parallels between modern humans and the higher animals.

The first part is the good part. Given the present scientific paradigm, no teleological (purposeful and established [ordained] before the fact) endpoint to evolution exists. Evolution is what it is: random genetic changes that happen to be of or take some advantage of some changing environmental condition. Gee argues convincingly that the appearance of humans as we know them on Earth now might have come out differently, arisen from different earlier stocks, or perhaps not come to exist on the planet at all. He also notes that the paleontological record is too sparse for us to reliably assemble the story of even our present form from the last handful of millions of years. This includes the marvelous addition of genetic analysis to the paleontological tool kit. Marvelous as genetics is, back past a few hundred thousand years, its samples are even rarer than fossils.

In roughly the second part of the book, Gee compares modern humans to animals to show that none of our supposedly unique qualities (gait, brain size, tools, language–he barely mentions writing–and self-consciousness) are entirely unique to humans. Here, I think he tries to be too clever by half, suggesting the slime trails of voles, or the smell of urine to a dog, are communication with some comparable quality to human communication, which also happens to include such passive forms of signaling if more subtle than slime or urine. Some animals even possess rudimentary language communicated through gestures (bees) and often sound, as do we.

Gee is right that many animals possess nascent capabilities that resemble some of what humans do, though none I know of developed any form of writing. But he goes too far when he asserts that there are no qualitative differences between the abstractions of nuclear physics or moral philosophy and the chattering of birds and barking dogs. We cannot know, he tells us, what gospels the crows are telling one another. With regard to the last quality he covers, self-consciousness, which he admits is ultimately the source of religion and art (abstractions and their reflection in language in general), he is, in the end, an eliminative materialist on mind, a position that only writes off and does not explain such things as art, religion, and abstractions generally.

Agreeing with Gee that the evolution of humans as we find them was not foreordained, we need not agree with him that nothing different-in-kind has emerged from the process. But since this difference manifests in art and religion, we cannot be entirely sure, as Gee unhesitatingly declares himself to be, that the endpoint (a being who could express himself in art, religion, philosophy, etc.) was not, by some unspecified ordination, teleologically driven even if it needn’t have emerged through exactly the path it happened to take. Gee’s very good first part and not-so-well-argued last part must leave that question entirely up in the air.
2 people found this helpful
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Jack Todoverto
5.0 out of 5 stars Thought provoking Inter
Reviewed in the United States on March 17, 2024
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Interesting text relating to how humans regard themselves. Possibly randomness of evolution does not support what we have learned and thought of ourselves.
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W. Benesch
5.0 out of 5 stars Must read for Human Evolution?!?
Reviewed in the United States on November 25, 2014
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The key to understanding H. sapiens is the process of natural selection and throw out the term evolution. The search for "missing links" is futile as each hominid species is unique and should be considered as such rather than placed in a questionable chart of who was the ancestor modern humans. It is remarkable how much of Darwin's early theories continue to hold up. Gee clearly cites our attempt to justify human superiority as a product of progressive evolutionary traits is pure myth. Viruses are far more advanced in their ability to adapt and spread than humans will ever be. Humans are not the only species to use "language," "tools," or technology puts us in our place as just another unique species on the planet with the one exception, we may be the one to destroy our host. One of the best books on the nature of human evolution and exceptionally thought provoking. Would love to make this required reading for all students of biology at the college if not the high school level.
7 people found this helpful
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Pindizzy
3.0 out of 5 stars Too cute by half
Reviewed in the United States on July 15, 2023
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Uses a lot of lame wit to push what sounds a lot like of preaching to push his narrative. plenty of facts and factoids, but even more unsupported speculation. Or so it seems to me.
One person found this helpful
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jsims9817
4.0 out of 5 stars An interesting read provided you set aside the author’s thesis.
Reviewed in the United States on October 7, 2018
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This book is loaded with super informative tidbits that made the book an entertaining read. I didn’t agree with the overall point of the book (that homo sapiens aren’t all that special). But it was obvious that he had an incredible amount of knowledge and reading this book gave an excellent window into the blurry world of anthropology.

Would 100% recommend.
6 people found this helpful
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A.H. Derman
5.0 out of 5 stars The Intentional Masterpiece
Reviewed in the United States on April 7, 2014
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This book is a wonderful way to broaden your outlook and marvel at the world around you. If you are not quite familiar with Darwin or anthropology, but you've come to realize how special you aren't in the scheme if things, this work is top shelf. However, it is not a treatise on evolution, a textbook or an exhaustive work on evolution.
However, GEE writes thoughtfully and passionately, and his philo-science outlook is very much like Carl Sagan. A must-read for everyone who likes brain food.
2 people found this helpful
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S Edentatus
4.0 out of 5 stars A good read for those with patience
Reviewed in the United States on March 3, 2014
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The first half of the book provides background. That part was not a particularly interesting read. I felt like I was slogging through it. The last half made up for it as the author provided data and his rational for his ideas. I was able to see how his thesis might explain things I've noted in human relationships.
2 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Mycket bra. 5/5
Reviewed in Sweden on April 17, 2023
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Mycket bra. 5/5
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Peter Clack
5.0 out of 5 stars Most of what we were told, is wrong
Reviewed in Australia on November 2, 2023
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Henry Gee challenges all the assumptions of the rise of humans. This story is not told in some fossil history, because fossils are astonishingly rare. There is no clear pathway for evolution and no way of knowing. Most of the great theories of anthropology and paleontology amount to guesswork. Are humans the winners in a game of hit and miss? Or are they just another roll of the dice. Gee shines his light into a hidden world of the past and reveals just how much we don't know, and can't know. Perhaps Henry Gee will open doors to a grander vision of humans who survived somehow in a world that noone can ever really understand. I love seeing great theories toppled like collapsing mud brick walls in an earth tremor.
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Pittaro Biagio
5.0 out of 5 stars Un saggio liberatorio.
Reviewed in Italy on October 28, 2016
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Si tratta di un saggio di riflessione epistemologica sulla evoluzione della specie homo sapiens e delle altre specie di ominini.Libera definitivamente la mente del lettore dalle incrostazioni teleologiche che,nonostate tutto,continuano ad impedire non solo ai profani,ma anche agli studiosi di vedere la continuità natura uomo e l'accidentalità della nostra specie.
One person found this helpful
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Malavika
5.0 out of 5 stars nice job my friend
Reviewed in India on April 20, 2016
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Incredibly engaging, compelling retrospective on paleoanthropology. Also oddly funny
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A.Bennett
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent
Reviewed in France on April 15, 2016
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I really enjoyed this book; wasn't sure I would because it deals with a subject that is relatively abstruse and not in my normal reading selection. I have read other books by Henry Gee and much appreciate his writing skill and knowledge. I recommend it of course.
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