Ever closer… 3 Jun 200922 Jun 2018 Now it has a pretty cover… More here. Administrative Book Species and systematics Species concept
Book Announcing a new book of mine 21 Nov 2009 I know, this is getting tedious, but at least I haven’t published as many books as Neil Levy… Ashgate have put up a page announcing an anthology I edited on Intelligent Design and Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. It’s due in August next year. Read More
Evolution The ontology of biology 2 – How to derive an ontology in biology 11 Nov 200818 Sep 2017 There have been several attempts to produce an ontology of biology and the life sciences in general. One of the more outstanding was Joseph Woodger’s 1937 The Axiomatic Method in Biology, which was based on Russell’s and Whitehead’s Principia and the theory of types. In this, Woodger attempted to develop… Read More
Evolution Verne Grant died 24 Aug 200718 Sep 2017 I’m very late to this, but one of the significant figures in the synthesis, Verne Grant, died in May. Grant’s book The Origin of Adaptations (1963) was one that influenced a lot of theorising about evolution. His essay on species concepts in 1957 pointed out that botanical notions of species… Read More
The cover is more than “pretty”; it is a work of art – suitable for framing. I am especially impressed with the subtitle: A History of the Idea. It is perfect and so much stronger than The History of an Idea, which I suspect was suggested/considered. _Quill & Quire: Canada’s Magazine of Book News and Reviews_ regularly includes an article entitled “Cover to Cover “which tells the story of the “evolution ” of the design for the cover of a particular book. Is there a story about the cover of _Species_?
Your curtains are based on Haeckel’s Kunstformen der Natur? Where can I get some? I explicitly claim there is only one species “concept”, but many “conceptions” or “definitions”; so that was always my subtitle. But I was disappointed I wasn’t allowed to use “The Origins of Species Concepts” as the main title for the PhD it comes from. Basically I sent them the Haeckel image and permissions, and they designed it. I can’t even reject the awful use of Helvetica… but I love the colours and layout.
Cool. At least it will look pretty as it’s sitting on my coffee table for a period of years waiting to be read. 😛
John, just visited PayPal. You should have a small token of my esteem in your accounts. When you have advance author’s copies of this work, could you please publicize? I would pay for an autographed copy + shipping from your side of the world. I urge others to do the same, as I urged over at PZ Mwahaha’s. Regards….Scott
“Oh, and “Idea” is a pun on eidos, the Greek term for “species”…” I’m glad you cleared the air — I didn’t think it quite proper to inquire regarding a pun, even a good one.
I get, I think, 5 copies as author. Unfortunately they are all assigned to academic friends who helped (advisors, mentors, that sort of thing). But I will happily sign any copies sent to me or handed to me at a conference. Alas, UCP won’t be sending me on a signing tour or anything… 🙂 I don’t know when the paperback is out, but I hope it won’t be too long. By foregoing my royalties we kept the costs of the hardback down to a manageable amount. I have seen monographs like mine at $115US recently.
Ugh, foregoing royalties is tough. In my case, I’m getting nothing but royalties for 50 Voices of Disbelief. Foregoing any advance kept the costs down. As of today, I have no income whatsoever except for whatever royalties I do get (and some bank interest on savings deposits and the occasional paltry Telstra dividend or whatever), so hopefully the book will sell a few copies. Writing (or editing) books for academic publishers isn’t a great way of getting rich, I’m afraid, however the deal is cut.
No, we discussed that not having an advance would keep the costs down. I was actually offered (and accepted) a straight 10 per cent royalties. This is a bit different for me because in the past I’ve only ever made money from books I’ve done from advances. Even the book I co-wrote for Greenwood Press gave me a small advance: a hundred or a couple of hundred dollars, or something. The royalties from the four novels I wrote for Byron Preiss were set very low, as is typical with media tie-in contracts, and then the whole Byron Preiss operation went bankrupt after Byron’s tragic death, which means I never got US$3000 that I was still owed at the time. However, I did get a fair bit in advances in the early 2000s. Hey, I almost made enough from writing to support myself for a year or so … that year being, alas, 2003. Trying to make a living as a freelance writer is a bit like trying to make a living by giving singing lessons to snakes. I can think of lots of ways to expand that analogy … although I must add that the Wiley-Blackwell folks have been very good to deal with, and I hope to work with them on some of the future projects that I have in mind. With luck, they’ll have a best-seller on their hands and everyone will be happy.