- ISBN13: 9780805371468
- Condition: USED – VERY GOOD
- Notes:
Product Description
Neil Campbell and Jane Reece’s BIOLOGY remains unsurpassed as the most successful majors biology textbook in the world. This text has invited more than 4 million students into the study of this dynamic and essential discipline.The authors have restructured each chapter around a conceptual framework of five or six big ideas. An Overview draws students in and sets the stage for the rest of the chapter, each numbered Concept Head announces the beginning of a new concept, and Concept Check questions at the end of each chapter encourage students to assess their mastery of a given concept. New Inquiry Figures focus students on the experimental process, and new Research Method Figures illustrate important techniques in biology. Each chapter ends with a Scientific Inquiry Question that asks students to apply scientific investigation skills to the content of the chapter. … More >>
Deceiving description, book was torn and highlighted all over, but description said it was in good condition, price did not match description..
Rating: 2 / 5
This certainly is the definitive word for biology students. The 7th edition reads faster, with more clarity and interest, than the previous edition by far. Does this warrant the outrageous price ? Doubtful, but since public schools (i.e taxpayers) are footing the bill for the most part, the publishers do this with relative impunity. This latest edition has stunning photos and graphics, and these add greatly to the text’s readability. The chapters are short and concise, and the review questions and self-test items are excellent. The CD Rom that accompanies the text is also excellent and highly recommended. The optional study guide is not however, as it has a thoroughly mediocre quality and superfluous nature. Of even greater offense is the “pay per view” website that is offered for additional resources. After paying $100 for a text, and then be expected to pay more for Web assistance is unabashedly mercenary. However the objective reader will find Campbell & Reece’s greatest flaw in its blatant bias concerning the theory of evolution. The ‘theory’ is not treated as such, but as an obvious fact, with no contrary points of view to any of the controverisal aspects of the theory included whatsoever. This is no small matter. Campbell and Reece simply assume that the spontaneous generation of life indeed occurred at some time in the Earth’s past (though this has never been demonstrated experimentally–ever) and that DNA and RNA rose via the random chance of fortuitous collisions of molecules over time, (again, with no experimental evidence to justify these claims), the serious reader must earnestly question why the theory is presented in each chapter with an almost obsessive fervor.
Rating: 3 / 5
I ordered this book and paid for expidited shipping. It never came. Amamzon refuse a timely refund, and the actuall seller never returned my emails. This is worst expirience I’v eever had with an Internet purchase. Will never use Amazon again.
Rating: 1 / 5
This is by far the best that Campbell & Co. have produced. The text reads easily and with great clarity. The difference of this 7th edition over previous editions is significant, and nearly worth the price. However, paying nearly $150 for a text is ridiculous. The publishers obviously think they can command such a premium because this text is so closely linked with the current American public high school’s Biology Advanced Placement test. In short, they feel they have taxpayers over a barrel on this and can ‘get away with it’. Shameful. Also, Campbell and Reece are radical evolutionists. Do not expect balance or ‘both sides of the argument’ presented on any of the more controversial aspects of Darwin’s theory. There is no debate as far as they are concerned. Though ‘spontaneous generation’ was disproven by Louis Pasteur and Francisco Redi over 150 years ago, Campbell and Reece cling to this notion with strange, obsessive passion that borders on the bizarre. Their arrogance on this important issue strongly detracts from what is an outstanding, and otherwise balanced resourse. Why not address some contrary points of view to Darwinian evolution and even (gasp!) admit many of the more infamous errors by overly enthusiastic biologists in the past (e.g. the “Nebraska Man” of the Scopes Monkey Trial was actually only two teeth; the “Piltdown Man” was a hoax that was taught as fact in American universities for nearly 40 years, etc…). Such arrogance quickly leads to blindness, and has no place in real science. But, in spite of these confusing departures from real science (science being that which is both observable and testable), the text has some outstanding qualities that make it one of the premier sources in the field.
Rating: 3 / 5
Vitalism is a profoundly science-ejected concept, though many CAM or ‘natural health’ cabals falsely claim that vitalism survives scientific scrutiny.
I quote:
“[historically] the new discipline of organic chemistry was first built on a foundation of vitalism, the belief in a life force outside the jurisdiction of physical and chemical laws. Chemists began to chip away at the foundation of vitalism when they learned to synthesize organic compounds in their laboratories [...e.g.] Wohler [...] made urea [...] Kolbe [...made] acetic acid [...] the foundation of vitalism finally crumbled after several more decades [...when] Miller [...] helped bring the abiotic (nonliving) synthesis of organic compounds into the context of evolution [...] the[se] pioneers of organic chemistry helped shift the mainstream of biological thought from vitalism to mechanism, the view that natural phenomena, including the processes of life, are governed by physical and chemical laws [...] the same rules of chemistry apply to inorganic and organic molecules alike. The foundation of organic chemistry is not some intangible life force, but the unique chemical versatility of the element carbon [p.059].”
-r.c.
Rating: 5 / 5