Ancestors in Our Genome: The New Science of Human Evolution

Eugene E Harris

Rating:
My review 2016-03-02

A very good description of the current state of science regarding our human and primate ancestors, from about 2 million years ago and to the present. Discusses the "out of Africa" hypothesis, the interaction between Homo sapiens and the Neanderthals, and the scientific theory and data behind it. Especially interesting for me was the description of the former battle between the fossil and the genetic approaches to paleontology, which has now basically been resolved in favour of genomes. However, the importance of fossils has been tremendously increased by the new methods for obtaining genome data from old bones. It nicely complements Karin Bojs recent book (in Swedish only, so far).