
Improbable Destinies
Fate, Chance, and the Future of Evolution
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $20.25
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Marc Cashman
About this listen
A major new work overturning our assumptions about how evolution works.
Earth's natural history is full of fascinating instances of convergence: phenomena like eyes and wings and tree-climbing lizards that have evolved independently, multiple times. But evolutionary biologists also point out many examples of contingency, cases where the tiniest change - a random mutation or an ancient butterfly sneeze - caused evolution to take a completely different course. What role does each force really play in the constantly changing natural world? Are the plants and animals that exist today, and we humans ourselves, inevitabilities or evolutionary freaks? And what does that say about life on other planets?
Jonathan Losos reveals what the latest breakthroughs in evolutionary biology can tell us about one of the greatest ongoing debates in science. He takes us around the globe to meet the researchers who are solving the deepest mysteries of life on Earth through their work in experimental evolutionary science. Losos himself is one of the leaders in this exciting new field, and he illustrates how experiments with guppies, fruit flies, bacteria, foxes, and field mice, along with his own work with anole lizards on Caribbean islands, are rewinding the tape of life to reveal just how rapid and predictable evolution can be.
Improbable Destinies will change the way we think and talk about evolution. Losos' insights into natural selection and evolutionary change have far-reaching applications for protecting ecosystems, securing our food supply, and fighting off harmful viruses and bacteria. This compelling narrative offers a new understanding of ourselves and our role in the natural world and the cosmos.
©2017 Jonathan B. Losos (P)2017 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Rise and Reign of the Mammals
- A New History, from the Shadow of the Dinosaurs to Us
- By: Steve Brusatte
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 13 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We humans are the inheritors of a dynasty that has reigned over the planet for nearly 66 million years, through fiery cataclysm and ice ages: the mammals. Our lineage includes saber-toothed tigers, woolly mammoths, armadillos the size of a car, cave bears three times the weight of a grizzly, clever scurriers that outlasted Tyrannosaurus rex, and even other types of humans, like Neanderthals.
-
-
Fantastic Book
- By Peter Jensen on 09-08-22
By: Steve Brusatte
-
Metazoa
- Animal Life and the Birth of the Mind
- By: Peter Godfrey-Smith
- Narrated by: Mitch Riley, Peter Godfrey-Smith
- Length: 9 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dip below the ocean’s surface and you are soon confronted by forms of life that could not seem more foreign to our own: sea sponges, soft corals, and serpulid worms, whose rooted bodies, intricate geometry, and flower-like appendages are more reminiscent of plant life or even architecture than anything recognizably animal. Yet these creatures are our cousins. As fellow members of the animal kingdom — the Metazoa— they can teach us much about the evolutionary origins of not only our bodies, but also our minds.
-
-
Philosophy Meets Biology
- By aaron on 01-22-21
-
Transformer
- The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
- By: Nick Lane
- Narrated by: Richard Trinder
- Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For decades, biology has been dominated by the study of genetic information. Information is important, but it is only part of what makes us alive. Our inheritance also includes our living metabolic network, a flame passed from generation to generation, right back to the origin of life. In Transformer, biochemist Nick Lane reveals a scientific renaissance that is hiding in plain sight-how the same simple chemistry gives rise to life and causes our demise.
-
-
You need lot of chemistry to get it
- By 11104 on 09-05-22
By: Nick Lane
-
The Cat's Meow
- How Cats Evolved from the Savanna to Your Sofa
- By: Jonathan B. Losos
- Narrated by: Jonathan B. Losos
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The domestic cat—your cat—has, from its evolutionary origins in Africa, been transformed in comparatively little time into one of the most successful and diverse species on the planet. Jonathan Losos, writing as both a scientist and a cat lover, explores how researchers today are unraveling the secrets of the cat, past and present, using all the tools of modern technology, from GPS tracking (you’d be amazed where those backyard cats roam) and genomics (what is your so-called Siamese cat . . . really?) to forensic archaeology.
-
-
interesting and fun
- By Jylene Livengood on 06-02-24
-
A Brief History of Earth
- Four Billion Years in Eight Chapters
- By: Andrew H. Knoll
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 4 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Drawing on his decades of field research and up-to-the-minute understanding of the latest science, renowned geologist Andrew H. Knoll delivers a rigorous yet accessible biography of Earth, charting our home planet's epic 4.6 billion-year story. Placing 21st-century climate change in deep context, A Brief History of Earth is an indispensable look at where we’ve been and where we’re going.
-
-
Very chilling and well thought out
- By Colin Bump on 05-21-21
By: Andrew H. Knoll
-
Inheritors of the Earth
- How Nature Is Thriving in an Age of Extinction
- By: Chris D. Thomas
- Narrated by: Bob Reed
- Length: 9 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's accepted wisdom today that human beings have permanently damaged the natural world, causing extinction, deforestation, pollution, and of course climate change. But in Inheritors of the Earth, biologist Chris Thomas shows that this obscures a more hopeful truth - we're also helping nature grow and change. Human cities and mass agriculture have created new places for enterprising animals and plants to live, and our activities have stimulated evolutionary change in virtually every population of living species.
-
-
Biology at its Best
- By Fred on 02-17-25
By: Chris D. Thomas
-
The Rise and Reign of the Mammals
- A New History, from the Shadow of the Dinosaurs to Us
- By: Steve Brusatte
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 13 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We humans are the inheritors of a dynasty that has reigned over the planet for nearly 66 million years, through fiery cataclysm and ice ages: the mammals. Our lineage includes saber-toothed tigers, woolly mammoths, armadillos the size of a car, cave bears three times the weight of a grizzly, clever scurriers that outlasted Tyrannosaurus rex, and even other types of humans, like Neanderthals.
-
-
Fantastic Book
- By Peter Jensen on 09-08-22
By: Steve Brusatte
-
Metazoa
- Animal Life and the Birth of the Mind
- By: Peter Godfrey-Smith
- Narrated by: Mitch Riley, Peter Godfrey-Smith
- Length: 9 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dip below the ocean’s surface and you are soon confronted by forms of life that could not seem more foreign to our own: sea sponges, soft corals, and serpulid worms, whose rooted bodies, intricate geometry, and flower-like appendages are more reminiscent of plant life or even architecture than anything recognizably animal. Yet these creatures are our cousins. As fellow members of the animal kingdom — the Metazoa— they can teach us much about the evolutionary origins of not only our bodies, but also our minds.
-
-
Philosophy Meets Biology
- By aaron on 01-22-21
-
Transformer
- The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
- By: Nick Lane
- Narrated by: Richard Trinder
- Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For decades, biology has been dominated by the study of genetic information. Information is important, but it is only part of what makes us alive. Our inheritance also includes our living metabolic network, a flame passed from generation to generation, right back to the origin of life. In Transformer, biochemist Nick Lane reveals a scientific renaissance that is hiding in plain sight-how the same simple chemistry gives rise to life and causes our demise.
-
-
You need lot of chemistry to get it
- By 11104 on 09-05-22
By: Nick Lane
-
The Cat's Meow
- How Cats Evolved from the Savanna to Your Sofa
- By: Jonathan B. Losos
- Narrated by: Jonathan B. Losos
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The domestic cat—your cat—has, from its evolutionary origins in Africa, been transformed in comparatively little time into one of the most successful and diverse species on the planet. Jonathan Losos, writing as both a scientist and a cat lover, explores how researchers today are unraveling the secrets of the cat, past and present, using all the tools of modern technology, from GPS tracking (you’d be amazed where those backyard cats roam) and genomics (what is your so-called Siamese cat . . . really?) to forensic archaeology.
-
-
interesting and fun
- By Jylene Livengood on 06-02-24
-
A Brief History of Earth
- Four Billion Years in Eight Chapters
- By: Andrew H. Knoll
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 4 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Drawing on his decades of field research and up-to-the-minute understanding of the latest science, renowned geologist Andrew H. Knoll delivers a rigorous yet accessible biography of Earth, charting our home planet's epic 4.6 billion-year story. Placing 21st-century climate change in deep context, A Brief History of Earth is an indispensable look at where we’ve been and where we’re going.
-
-
Very chilling and well thought out
- By Colin Bump on 05-21-21
By: Andrew H. Knoll
-
Inheritors of the Earth
- How Nature Is Thriving in an Age of Extinction
- By: Chris D. Thomas
- Narrated by: Bob Reed
- Length: 9 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's accepted wisdom today that human beings have permanently damaged the natural world, causing extinction, deforestation, pollution, and of course climate change. But in Inheritors of the Earth, biologist Chris Thomas shows that this obscures a more hopeful truth - we're also helping nature grow and change. Human cities and mass agriculture have created new places for enterprising animals and plants to live, and our activities have stimulated evolutionary change in virtually every population of living species.
-
-
Biology at its Best
- By Fred on 02-17-25
By: Chris D. Thomas
-
Darwin Comes to Town
- How the Urban Jungle Drives Evolution
- By: Menno Schilthuizen
- Narrated by: Chris Nayak
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Menno Schilthuizen is one of a growing number of “urban ecologists” studying how our manmade environments are accelerating and changing the evolution of the animals and plants around us. In Darwin Comes to Town, he takes us around the world for an up-close look at just how stunningly flexible and swift-moving natural selection can be.
-
-
Interesting Overview
- By metasynergy on 06-11-19
-
The History of White People
- By: Nell Irvin Painter
- Narrated by: Allyson Johnson
- Length: 14 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A mind-expanding and myth-destroying exploration of notions of white race—not merely a skin color but also a signal of power, prestige, and beauty to be withheld and granted selectively. Ever since the Enlightenment, race theory and its inevitable partner, racism, have followed a crooked road, constructed by dominant peoples to justify their domination of others. Filling a huge gap in historical literature that long focused on the non-white, eminent historian Nell Irvin Painter guides us through more than two thousand years of Western civilization, tracing not only the invention of the idea of race but also the frequent worship of “whiteness” for economic, social, scientific, and political ends.
-
-
Destroys the myth that race is about skin color
- By Emily L. on 08-25-14
-
The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs
- A New History of a Lost World
- By: Steve Brusatte
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this stunning narrative spanning more than 200 million years, Steve Brusatte, a young American paleontologist who has emerged as one of the foremost stars of the field - discovering 10 new species and leading groundbreaking scientific studies and fieldwork - masterfully tells the complete, surprising, and new history of the dinosaurs, drawing on cutting-edge science to dramatically bring to life their lost world and illuminate their enigmatic origins, spectacular flourishing, astonishing diversity, cataclysmic extinction, and startling living legacy.
-
-
"The Rise of the Scientists Who Study Dinosaurs"
- By Daniel Powell on 09-16-18
By: Steve Brusatte
-
Superlative
- The Biology of Extremes
- By: Matthew D. LaPlante
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The world's largest land mammal could help us end cancer. The fastest bird is showing us how to solve a century-old engineering mystery. The oldest tree is giving us insights into climate change. The loudest whale is offering clues about the impact of solar storms. For a long time, scientists ignored superlative life forms as outliers. Increasingly, though, researchers are coming to see great value in studying plants and animals that exist on the outermost edges of the bell curve.
-
-
Fascinating survey of amazing biology
- By Nerd's-eye view on 12-06-19
-
Immune
- A Journey into the Mysterious System That Keeps You Alive
- By: Philipp Dettmer
- Narrated by: Steve Taylor
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
You wake up and feel a tickle in your throat. Your head hurts. You’re mildly annoyed as you get the kids ready for school and dress for work yourself. Meanwhile, an epic war is being fought, just below your skin. Millions are fighting and dying for you to be able to complain as you head out the door. So what, exactly, is your immune system? In Immune, Philipp Dettmer, the brains behind the most popular science channel on YouTube, takes listeners on a journey through the fortress of the human body and its defenses.
-
-
Steve Taylor for the win
- By Bay Area Engineer on 11-02-21
By: Philipp Dettmer
-
The Equations of Life
- How Physics Shapes Evolution
- By: Charles S. Cockell
- Narrated by: Ian Porter
- Length: 11 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Equations of Life, biologist Charles S. Cockell makes the forceful argument that the laws of physics narrowly constrain how life can evolve, making evolution's outcomes predictable. If we were to find something very much like a lady bug eating something very much like an aphid on a distant planet, we shouldn't be surprised. The forms of life are guided by a limited set of rules, and, as a result, there is a narrow set of solutions to the challenges of existence.
-
-
Too many equations, not enough insights
- By Alec Drumm on 09-24-18
-
World of Wonders
- In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments
- By: Aimee Nezhukumatathil
- Narrated by: Aimee Nezhukumatathil
- Length: 3 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From beloved, award-winning poet Aimee Nezhukumatathil comes a debut work of nonfiction - a collection of essays about the natural world, and the way its inhabitants can teach, support, and inspire us.
-
-
Interesting approach to a nonfiction book...
- By Fact addict on 01-25-21
-
Earth-Shattering
- Violent Supernovas, Galactic Explosions, Biological Mayhem, Nuclear Meltdowns, and Other Hazards to Life in Our Universe
- By: Bob Berman
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 9 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Earth-Shattering, astronomy writer Bob Berman guides us through an epic, all-inclusive investigation into these instances of violence both mammoth and microscopic. From the sudden creation of dazzling "new stars" to the furiously explosive birth of our moon, from the uncomfortable truth about ultra-high-energy cosmic rays bombarding us to the incredible ways in which humanity has harnessed cataclysmic energy for its gain, Berman masterfully synthesizes some of our worst fears into an astonishing portrait of the universe.
-
-
Another great berman book
- By johnathan on 06-19-23
By: Bob Berman
-
Nobody's Normal
- How Culture Created the Stigma of Mental Illness
- By: Roy Richard Grinker
- Narrated by: Lyle Blaker
- Length: 14 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A compassionate and captivating examination of evolving attitudes toward mental illness throughout history and the fight to end the stigma. For centuries, scientists and society cast moral judgments on anyone deemed mentally ill, confining many to asylums. In Nobody’s Normal, anthropologist Roy Richard Grinker chronicles the progress and setbacks in the struggle against mental-illness stigma - from the 18th century, through America’s major wars, and into today’s high-tech economy.
-
-
Very informative
- By Monisha on 09-26-22
-
The Bird Way
- A New Look at How Birds Talk, Work, Play, Parent, and Think
- By: Jennifer Ackerman
- Narrated by: Jennifer Ackerman
- Length: 11 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
"There is the mammal way and there is the bird way." But the bird way is much more than a unique pattern of brain wiring, and lately, scientists have taken a new look at bird behaviors they have, for years, dismissed as anomalies or mysteries - what they are finding is upending the traditional view of how birds conduct their lives, how they communicate, forage, court, breed, survive. They are also revealing the remarkable intelligence underlying these activities, abilities we once considered uniquely our own.
-
-
Good Work but it doesn’t scale
- By Stanley Lippman on 07-02-20
-
Some Assembly Required
- Decoding Four Billion Years of Life, from Ancient Fossils to DNA
- By: Neil Shubin
- Narrated by: Marc Cashman
- Length: 7 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Over billions of years, ancient fish evolved to walk on land, reptiles transformed into birds that fly, and apelike primates evolved into humans that walk on two legs, talk, and write. For more than a century, paleontologists have traveled the globe to find fossils that show how such changes have happened.
-
-
Interesting but thin. ANNOYING narration
- By MSB on 04-10-20
By: Neil Shubin
-
Symphony in C
- Carbon and the Evolution of (Almost) Everything
- By: Robert M. Hazen
- Narrated by: Paul Brion
- Length: 9 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An enchanting biography of the most resonant - and most necessary - chemical element on Earth. Carbon. It's in the fibers in your hair, the timbers in your walls, the food that you eat, and the air that you breathe. It's worth billions as a luxury and half a trillion as a necessity, but there are still mysteries yet to be solved about the element that can be both diamond and coal. Where does it come from, what does it do, and why, above all, does life need it?
-
-
There is a Caveat
- By Joseph L Contreras on 06-26-19
By: Robert M. Hazen
Critic reviews
"In a refreshingly accessible narrative, laced with piquant anecdotes, Losos underscores the human significance of science affecting not only how we interpret our own place on the planet but also how we envision life in distant galaxies. Wonderfully lucid; singularly engaging.” (Booklist starred review)
“A cheerful, delightfully lucid primer on evolution and the predictive possibilities within the field.” (Kirkus starred review)
Losos explains both the science and the underlying philosophy of the questions being asked in an accessible and engaging manner ... The book is as enjoyable as it is informative.” (Publishers Weekly)
What listeners say about Improbable Destinies
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anonymous User
- 05-17-23
Fantastic read and easy to follow
Lots of information that is easy to follow. Losos does a great job going into enough detail in each study for the reader to understand the intent, result, and significance. I don't think you need a background in biology to get all the great lessons from this book. Losos does a good job keeping it fun and I think the narrator has a voice to also keep people engaged.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anonymous User
- 11-26-20
This is a brilliantly told account of contingency and determinism, entertaining to both laypeople and evolutionary biologists!
In this book, the author explains complex biological phenomena in a way that is digestible to anyone, regardless of whether they are just interested in biology and evolution or whether they’re a professional evolutionary biologist. The author provides a comprehensive overview of the many breakthroughs that have occurred in evolutionary biology over the past half a century.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Michelle Atzin Lopez
- 07-31-23
Chance and Predictability
understands the chance in evolution as well as the predictability on it reading this book
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Tanya
- 12-09-18
Interesting read
Compelling and convincing argument for convergent evolution. The examples used are thought provoking and you will find yourself discussing them at cocktail parties. The book does get a little long toward the end, and while I did still want to hear about the experiments, I did not need to have the theme pointed out over and over.
Overall, I highly recommend this book and feel that as we continue to use DNA sequencing instead of phenotype to re-build phylogenetic trees, the theme of this book will become even more relevant.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Alan
- 08-06-24
Starts out great, gets very full halfway through
The first third or so is fascinating. Deep philosophical questions about evolutionary development of life on earth. The author offers points and counter points from respected evolutionary biologists and considers the randomness vs inevitability of evolution. Though, about halfway through, Los gets stuck in the weeds summarizing study after study on mundane examples of microevolution. after several hours of this, I had to put the title down.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anthony W. Shallin
- 07-08-18
Too much trivia.
The overall theme of this book is how individual events shape evolution. This is an interesting topic, but this book is too full of trivia to focus on the central idea. Long passages detail trips to islands to study the evolution of the local fauna, which should be interesting. Instead, we hear about who he met, what they wore and other trivia. I was unable to follow the biology because of all the extraneous details.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
8 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- David
- 04-15-19
Comprehensive, probably, but a bit dry
It’s a fine book, not particularly enthralling. It reads a bit like a laundry list. We can be grateful for the narrator who really brought some life to this book. I’m a biologist, i understood the jargon, but if i weren’t, I would have been lost. Not a go to book about evolution for me. And In the end, there was no particularly profound insight.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
4 people found this helpful