Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body

Neil Shubin

Jan 2008 · Penguin Random House Audio · Narrated by Marc Cashman

About this audiobook

Why do we look the way we do? What does the human hand have in common with the wing of a fly? Are breasts, sweat glands, and scales connected in some way? To better understand the inner workings of our bodies and to trace the origins of many of today’s most common diseases, we have to turn to unexpected sources: worms, flies, and even fish.

Neil Shubin, a leading paleontologist and professor of anatomy who discovered Tiktaalik–the “missing link” that made headlines around the world in April 2006–tells the story of evolution by tracing the organs of the human body back millions of years, long before the first creatures walked the earth. By examining fossils and DNA, Shubin shows us that our hands actually resemble fish fins, our head is organized like that of a long-extinct jawless fish, and major parts of our genome look and function like those of worms and bacteria.

Shubin makes us see ourselves and our world in a completely new light. YOUR INNER FISH is science writing at its finest–enlightening, accessible, and told with irresistible enthusiasm.

Ratings and reviews

I really enjoyed this book and Mark Cashman was great. I'm only giving 4 stars because I found some parts hard to follow, not because the concepts were too complex, but I'm the type that needs to reread sections sometimes and Shubin's writing style created that situation couple of times per chapter. With that personal caveat, this was a magnificent, sweeping look into the evolution of life on earth through the lens of the human body and explains how everything from our body plan to our physiology to our microbiology is an inheritance from ancient and not so ancient ancestors. Shubin makes relatively complex concepts like phylogeny and illustrates them in a simple manner that everyone can understand. If you're a novice or have had a lifelong interest in biology and evolution, this book is for everyone.

Love this book. I give this away as a gift to anyone interested in biology but it's just as easy to read for anyone with no science background and very engaging without slipping into hyperbole.

Aborda de forma muy básica lo que se conoce sobre el origen de la vida hasta nuestros días, faltó profundización.

About the author

Neil Shubin is the author of The Universe Within and the bestselling Your Inner Fish, which was chosen by the National Academy of Sciences as the best book of the year in 2009. Trained at Columbia, Harvard, and the University of California, Berkeley, Shubin is the associate dean of biological sciences at the University of Chicago. In 2011 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences. Neil Shubin is available for select readings and lectures. To inquire about a possible appearance, please contact the Penguin Random House Speakers Bureau at [e-mail] or visit prhspeakers.com.

Marc Cashman was named one of the “Best Voices of the Year” by AudioFile magazine. His voice can be heard on radio, television, film, and video games. Marc also instructs voice actors through his classes, The Cashman Cache of Voice-Acting Techniques, in Los Angeles.