Book Reviews 1911

Sherman. Like us, these chimpanzees categorize the world into functional classes, detect abstract perceptual relationships, generate general perfor- mance rules from single cases, and are aware of themselves and others as causal agents. Given the degree of cognitive and genotypic similarity between the two species, one can appreciate Savage-Rumbaugh's bemusement at their continu- ing taxonomic separation into separate families.

Important differences in natural communication and symbol-using abilities between chimpanzee and human do exist, and Savage-Rumbaugh de- scribes and discusses them in the context of past and future ape language research at both the beginning and concluding chapters of her book. The final chapters also include a description of the singularly impressive accomplishments of Kanzi, a pigmy chimpanzee who, unlike Austin and Sher- man, has seemingly acquired linguistic skills spon- taneously in a child-like fashion.

Much of the theoretical framework around which Savage-Rumbaugh builds her model of symbol usage by apes comes from human develop- mental psycholinguistics and child psychology. Interestingly, the ape language research in its turn has made important contributions to the develop- ment of language intervention strategies with linguistically retarded children and adolescents. The success of both the ape language project and language intervention research is due in large part to Savage-Rumbaugh's rejection of the traditional demarcation between cognition and social psycho- logy. Ecologically oriented psychologists (i.e of the Gibsonian persuasion) should also find the social- cognition aspects of this work interesting because of Savage-Rumbaugh's practice of operationally defining many supposedly cognitive phenomena in terms of observable interactional processes between individuals rather than as internalized structures.

ROGER K. R. THOMPSON Department of Psychology, Franklin & Marshall College, Lancaster, P.A 17604, U.S.A.

Beyond Birding: Field Projects for Inquisitive Birders. By THOMAS C. GRUBB, JR. Pacific Grove, California: Boxwood Press (1986). Pp. vi i+ 195. Price $9.95 (paperback).

Beyond Birding, primarily directed to college, high school and amateur students of ornithology, ani- mal behaviour, and ecology, provides straightfor- ward explanations of concepts that are often difficult for beginning ornithologists. The intent of

the book is two-fold; to introduce methods of analytical ornithology to already inquisitive birders, and to provide several study projects for use by students.

The preface addresses the dichotomy which laces the science of ornithology at all levels, the descrip- tive versus analytical approach to research. The first chapter effectively bridges this gap by describ- ing the initial stages of scientific inquiry, from making observations and identifying patterns, to posing questions about why such patterns occur. A brief discussion of the components and processes of the scientific method is then presented.

The second chapter introduces descriptive and analytical statistics and the formation of hypoth- eses and predictions, making a clear distinction between testable and non-testable hypotheses. The succeeding 20 chapters provide intriguing ideas for analytical projects, each chapter beginning with a brief, often colourful introduction of the phenome- non to be studied and a statement of an hypothesis to be tested. The author provides information on gathering and setting up equipment (including addresses of where to obtain useful items), suggests data collection procedures, provides sample data sheets, suggests appropriate statistical analyses, and guides the student in data interpretation. Many of the detailed methods are field tested; this will undoubtedly save the reader considerable time. The chapters close with suggestions of additional hypotheses to test, using different species or varia- tions of the detailed study, and citations of related scientific papers.

Some of the hypotheses posed are essentially descriptive in nature, for example, 'woodpeckers have a preferred tree height for their holes', 'individual distance is determined by the reach of a perched bird', or 'hummingbirds select nectar on the basis of sugar concentration'. Several hypoth- eses, however, lead into a discussion of adaptive advantages of certain behaviour patterns, for example, ospreys use hovering flight 'because it increases the chances of catching prey', or 'birds should choose food types giving them the best ratio of energy intake to handling time'. Eighteen of the 20 exercises examine behavioural questions; two are ecological in nature, dealing with species abun- dance and species ranges.

The appendices introduce non-parametric statis- tical tests most often used in behaviourat studies of this nature: the chi-squared test, median test and Spearman rank correlation test. Here the author defines null and alternative hypotheses, and per- forms sample computations. A primary omission is a clear statement of the assumptions of statistical tests, especially the assumption of independence; this important point is too often overlooked in the

1912 Animal Behaviour , 35, 6

design of behavioural and ecological experiments, and warrants stronger emphasis.

The author's writing style is appropriate for the intended audience. The book is tess systematic than a college textbook, is very readable and at times refreshingly poetic. This book would be extremely useful for teachers supervising undergraduate research projects. For more advanced students, I would suggest stronger emphasis on the impor- tance of addressing alternative explanations.

SUSAN KNIGHT Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, U.S.A.

Evolutionary Biology. 2nd edn. By DOUGLAS J. FUTUYMA. Sunderland, Massachusetts: Sinauer (1986). Pp. xii + 600. Price $32.00.

The field of evolution is expanding rapidly, so it is a delight to see the second and expanded edition of this fine textbook. It opens with a brief and illuminating history of the ideas of evolutionary biology, which serves to put the discipline and its methods into perspective. Creationism is men- tioned and disposed of in a single short paragraph in which readers are referred to the rebutting literature. It would have been better if there had been at least a summary of the standard creatio- nists' objections and their rebuttals. Even students with no objection to evolution have become cur- ious about the creationists and their odd views of science, but most do not have the time or gumption to read one or more of the books cited. For this reason I also wish that Futuyma had summarized briefly the diversity of critical evidence for evolu- tion.

Five chapters lucidly and tastefully give an excellent idea of our current knowledge of micro- evolution. Three more chapters deal with the difficult conceptual problems of speciation, adap- tation and reconstruction of phylogenies from living species. The topics are handled quite well, with three exceptions: Futuyma's bias against non- allopatric speciation is quite manifest. There was a relatively perfunctory treatment of the very diffi- cult species concept problem in plants and other organisms with reticulate evolution. The tack of treatment of hybridization and reticulate evolution in the section on phylogeny reconstruction is more a weakness of the field than of this book; it is a very difficult problem. Finally, I wish that he had entitled chapter 10 'inferring' not 'determining' phylogeny because phylogenies are estimated sta- tistically rather than deduced from exercises in pure reason.

Historical evolution is summarized next. This

ought to have been covered earlier; postponing the palaeontology is not too successful with students because they are unfamiliar with organisms and would prefer to hear the evidence for evolution before starting out on an extended explanation of its mechanisms. Many of the exciting new ideas and data in theoretical palaeontology are presented, such as rates of speciation and extinction, possible causes of evolutionary trends and mass extinctions. I wish more of the fossil record were presented so that students would know the strengths, as well as the weaknesses, of the evidence and theoretical arguments. The brevity makes it easier to assess population genetics than palaeontological argu- ments.

In many ways, chapter 14 is the most interesting; it contains much that is controversial and really new in our concepts of evolution of form and species diversity. Here, many of the threads which are found in the earlier chapters are pulled together. Variable rates of evolution, directional biases and constraints, and the proposed differ- ences between microevolution and macroevolution are discussed. The discussions are reasonably even- handed, but I wish that more space had been devoted to each topic.

Four chapters were not well integrated with the rest of the book: biogeography, molecular evolu- tion, evolution of species interactions, and evolu- tion of humans. This really reflects the fact that the subjects are not well integrated by anyone. For example, we get a good idea of the fascinating new findings in molecular biology which can potentially affect the evolution of DNA and its associated machinery, but it is still too early to know their relevance to the evolution of form, function and adaptation. Ideas on the evolution of species interactions are fascinating, but might have been better integrated with earlier chapters on palaeon- tology and evolutionary novelties. The book does not reveal the current and vigorous cross-fertiliza- tion of ideas between these formerly isolated fields.

Readers of Animal Behaviour will be disap- pointed at the minimal discussion of the evolution of behaviour, behaviour relative to concepts of phenotypic plasticity, behaviour genetics and major questions in behavioural ecology, which attempt to predict the outcome of evolution.

These criticisms are minor, and reflect more the rapidity of the adaptive radiation within the field of evolution than any shortcomings on Futuyma's part. His book continues to be the best available.

JOHN A. ENDLER

Department of Biological Sciences, University of California, Santa Barbara, California 93106, U.S.A.