The Ptarmigan's Dilemma: An Exploration Into How Life Organizes and Supports Itself

In this thoughtful but overlong volume, part field memoir and part scientific overview, married naturalists John and Mary Theberges (Wolves and Wilderness) probe the relationship between evolution and ecology with the provocative questions that have driven much of their 30-year careers: ""How is life's marvelous self-organization accomplished? When and why might it fail?"" Distinguishing the twin aspects of natural selection-the pressure for survivability and the pressure (in males) to attract sexual attention from females-the duo show how it ""is not sufficient by itself to explain the existence of order."" Rather, order and complexity spring from the most basic laws of matter, apparent in ""sand ripples on a beach"" or ""chemical reactants""; the Theberges push the theory that ""phenotype plasticity"" at the most basic levels allow animals with identical genes to develop into separate subspecies, a process analogous to the differentiation of stem cells into various tissues (liver, skin, muscle). The duo also unpacks the ecological challenges for the human species (food shortage, pollution, overpopulation, etc.), warning that we may have passed the point of sustainability.