Chapter 2 Summary and Analysis

It is tough to explain how things have developed from simple early beginnings to complex life, says the author, and he goes on to suggest that Darwin's idea of "survival of the fittest" might be better called "survival of the stable", because the world is full of things that last long enough to be the same for a while, such as salt crystals, mountains, and more. Also, things in our natural world tend to fall together into the most stable patterns, such as water molecules floating in space making round shapes. However, when smashed down by gravity and air, these round shapes become flat like a lake. Dawkins explains how chains of atoms in our blood link up to form amino acids that make up protein molecules that twist around into even bigger twisty tree-like molecules called hemoglobin. Millions of them...