The Family Circus

Rating:
Summary: Facinating, If Controversial, Reading
Review: This treatise is a must-read for anyone truly interested in the origins of man. While I understand the need for covert distribution to an otherwise jaded scientific review audience, it still came as a surprise to me that Professor Hawking would embark on such a monumental work under a pseudonym.

Against the backdrop of the Big Bang-initiated universe we find ourselves dwarfed by 'Keane's' laser-focus arguments concerning bacterial spontaneous generation and their link to a modern cartoon character boy. The intervening billion years is naturally where the bulk of the story takes place -- and where the controversy of course ensues.

I was particularly drawn to the extensive sections elucidating the age-old theory of 'spontaneous evolution.' Our subject here, Billy, is made the focal point of a lengthy examination of a fairly ordinary bacterial vegetation, existing on the underside of a rock. By pure chance that rock is shaken loose of its footings and careens wildly down a hill (perhaps a metaphor, perhaps reality -- we don't reallly know, do we?) toward the now-familiar volcanic fissure. Billy spontaneously 'evolves' legs, arms, a brain and hair to leap nimbly out of danger's catastrophic grasp.

Taken as a whole, this semi-scientific tome works on a variety of levels; it is both incredibly educational and incredibly visionary in its embrace of seemingly insane theories. Only the most conservative, backward, low-brow readers will find fault with the obvious explanations of our 'true history.'