Francis Crick, who died at the age of eighty-eight in 2004, will be bracketed with Galileo, Darwin, and Einstein as one of the great scientists of all time. Between 1953 and 1966 he made and led a revolution in biology by discovering, quite literally, the secret of life: the digital cipher at the heart of heredity that distinguishes living from non-living things -- the genetic code. His own discoveries -- though he always worked with one other partner and did much of his thinking in conversation -- include not only the double helix but the whole mechanism of protein synthesis, the three-letter nature of the code, and much of the code itself.

Matt Ridley's biography traces Crick's life from middle-class mediocrity in the English Midlands, through a lackluster education and six years designing magnetic mines for the Royal Navy, to his leap into biology at the age of thirty-one. While at Cambridge, he suddenly began to display the unique visual imagination and intense tenacity of thought that would allow him to see the solutions to several great scientific conundrums -- and to see them long before most biologists had even conceived of the problems. Having set out to determine what makes living creatures alive and having succeeded, he immigrated at age sixty to California and turned his attention to the second question that had fascinated him since his youth: What makes conscious creatures conscious? Time ran out before he could find the answer.

Amazon.com Review
Francis Crick, who died at the age of eighty-eight in 2004, will be bracketed with Galileo, Darwin, and Einstein as one of the great scientists of all time. Between 1953 and 1966 he made and led a revolution in biology by discovering, quite literally, the secret of life: the digital cipher at the heart of heredity that distinguishes living from non-living things--the genetic code. His own discoveries--though he always worked with one other partner and did much of his thinking in conversation--include not only the double helix but the whole mechanism of protein synthesis, the three-letter nature of the code, and much of the code itself.

Matt Ridley's biography traces Crick's life from middle-class mediocrity in the English Midlands, through a lackluster education and six years designing magnetic mines for the Royal Navy, to his leap into biology at the age of thirty-one. While at Cambridge, he suddenly began to display the unique visual imagination and intense tenacity of thought that would allow him to see the solutions to several great scientific conundrums--and to see them long before most biologists had even conceived of the problems. Having set out to determine what makes living creatures alive and having succeeded, he immigrated at age sixty to California and turned his attention to the second question that had fascinated him since his youth: What makes conscious creatures conscious? Time ran out before he could find the answer.

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CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.5 based on 11 reviews)

good read

This is a very interesting and highly readable book, but a little gushing especially towards the end. I felt the author believed that because Crick's work on the double helix and the three-letter code was so very important, that everything Crick said or thought was equally remarkable. Some of his later ideas, such as directed panspermia, were not really scientific in the sense of being testable. If he were not one of the greats these ideas might have been dismissed as arm-waving.
October 09, 2008

A review of the title (bad)

While the author got Crick's name right, he dropped the ball on the rest of the title. Crick did not discover the genetic code. Marshall Nirenberg did. Crick and Watson figured out the structure of the DNA molecule. There is a difference between elucidating the structure of DNA and working out the code embodied in that structure. Hopefully the author makes the distinction in the text. I have not read the book. This is just a review of the title, which gets a "2", on the strength of spelling Crick's name right.
October 23, 2007

A Life Devoted to the Intellect

I was heartened to read in this book that Francis Crick steadfastly refused to accept honorary degrees and other such dubious signs of distinction that academics like to bestow on one another. Of course Crick received the Nobel prize, so it was easy for him to snub his nose at the honor-grubbing of his lesser colleagues. Still, his behavior in this area is exemplary, and reassuring.

While I got this glimpse of Crick's personality, I did not learn as much as I had hoped about DNA. That is due to my faulty background in science at least as much as to any fault in Ridley's prose. But Ridley did inspire me to get back to Watson's "Double Helix," and eventually, I hope, I will arrive at more of an insight into the intellectual revolution that was brought about by Crick and Watson.

As others have noted, the book - so full of names and places - cries out for photographs. There are none. And it cries out for an index, of which there is none. Please, Atlas Books, relax your purse strings a bit and provide such things for the second edition.
April 11, 2007

Finally!! A biography of the 20TH century's most important biologist

+++++

This book, by professor and author Matt Ridley, succinctly tells the life story of Dr. Francis Crick (1916 to 2004), perhaps best known for discovering, along with Dr. James Watson, the structure of DNA. (Ridley tells us that "I first met Francis Crick through my wife [a professor], who worked with him in 1985.")

Roughly, this book can be divided into five parts:

(1) Crick's early years
(2) His discovery, along with Watson, of the double helical structure of DNA
(3) Crick's discovery of the genetic code ("as great an achievement as the double helix")
(4) His interesting life after the double helix and the genetic code
(5) Crick's work in neuroscience and human consciousness

Besides Ridley's generally easy to read narrative, there are also included actual parts of letters and quotations by Crick and other influential others of that time. Ridley did not only rely only on other written sources to create his interesting and illuminating main narrative but also relied on interviews with Crick's second wife and his grown children.

As I was reading this book, I came across surprisingly many things I did not know. (I say surprisingly because I have read quite a bit on the discovery of DNA's structure but admit that I knew very little about Francis Crick the man.) As I was reading this book, I got the impression that Crick was quite a remarkable person. This impression lasted until I read the last few pages of chapter ten.

Ridley could have not written these last few pages and only written that Crick was extraordinary in every way. But he chose not too instead giving us details of some of Crick's bizarre beliefs. (Some of these beliefs may get some readers upset.)

Finally, I had only one major problem with this book--it lacks illustrations. There is a photograph on the book's cover (displayed above by Amazon), a frontispiece famous photograph, a line diagram, and a chart or table. That's it!! I understand that Ridley was trying to keep his book brief but a few more illustrations especially when he started talking about DNA, transfer RNA, messenger RNA, etc. would have been helpful as well as instructive.

A minor problem is that this book has no index. True the book is brief but this is deceiving since Ridley packs a lot into each page. Thus, while an index is not absolutely needed, it would have been helpful.

In conclusion, this is an amazing book that presents the fascinating biography of the twentieth century's most important biologist!!!

(first published 2006; prologue; 13 chapters; epilogue; main narrative 210 pages; sources and acknowledgements)

+++++

February 06, 2007

The laughing giant

If anything typified Francis Crick's work style, it was his quest for cooperation. The "Watson-Crick" team has so dominated the literature of DNA research, that a view of Crick as an individual is a rare sight. Matt Ridley has admirably filled in that lack with this view of the Nobel Laureate's life. In a brief, but insightful, and superbly written account, the biographer has filled in many details of a scientist, a theoriser and, most significantly, a man of unquenchable curiosity.

If any one term can typify Crick's personality, it was his outgoing nature. One of the more famous sentences in science writing is Jim Watson's announcement that he'd never seen Crick in "a modest mood". Although the remark irritated Crick, it did summarise many aspects of his nature in both work and personal relationships. Crick was immensely curious about nearly everything, and once he'd tackled a problem stayed doggingly with it. He was dismissive of "fuzzy logic", demanding much from his associates and co-workers - and demanding it constantly. As Ridley frequently points out, while this may have irritated many, the results were rewarding. Ridley subtitles the book "The Discoverer of the Genetic Code" due to Crick's persistance, even "bootlegging" time to accomplish the joint find through a model Crick built. Crick later went on to work on the "purpose" of DNA and its relation to protein production, something fundamental to life.

Ridley traces Crick's early life and his career during WWII. He was a late arrival in academia, standing out among his fellows both in physical stature and age. He enjoyed the banter with professors and fellow students, although his braying laugh left some disaffected. The proper people perceived the strength of his mind, however, and encouraged his pursuits, although sometimes on a short leash. Some of that outgoing nature likely brought about his first marriage, and just as likely was the cause of its later dissolution. It certainly led to his second wife, Odile, but this time cemented the match for decades.

Crick's noteriety derived from the DNA discovery brought numerous offers for positions, but it was the British Internal Revenue policies that led him to the United States. There, he launched many new investigations. Among these was life's origins, a topic that had long fascinated him. Crick had difficulty with the notion that life simply emerged from chemical reactions. He suggested that life on Earth had been "seeded" in bacterial form by distant alien civilisations intent on preserving their genetic formulas. A later collaboration with Christof Koch resulted in "The Astonishing Hypothesis", a work on human consciousness.

Ridley spends a chapter on "the book"; James Watson's highly personalised account of the DNA discovery. It was an irritant to Crick, not only because he was dealt with frankly by "Honest Jim" [which was the book's original title!], but because while Crick may have been informal in his lifestyle, he considered anything "frivolous" dealing with science was inappropriate. Watson's final publication, "The Double Helix" was a smash hit, prompting other scientists to explain their work in personal terms. What Watson did for himself was left for Ridley to produce for Francis Crick. Both men were giants in many ways, and Ridley elevates Crick to the heights generally reserved for names like Galileo or Darwin. The assessment is neither misplaced or overblown. Francis Crick will be difficult to replace. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]
December 17, 2006

SIMILAR PRODUCTS

What Mad Pursuit: A Personal View of Scientific Discovery
by Francis Crick

In Search of Memory: The Emergence of a New Science of Mind
by Eric R. Kandel

The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA
by James D. Watson

Of Molecules and Men (Great Minds Series)
by Francis Crick

The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature
by Matt Ridley