This is a good book, but at times it's murky. It takes time to grasp some concepts. The xamples help tremendously, the explanations don't. Interesting topics are covered. They take it up to Mayr alot!

'Sex and Death' is a pretty ambitious book, being almost a survey of the specific, hot topics in modern philosophy of biology. Tackling such issues as the nitty-gritty, purely philosophical issues of gene selection vs. selection of the organism, the definition and nature of the concept of 'species', and "Life on Earth: the Big Picture", the authors have done a nice job of using a breathtaking array of references, from Dawkins to Gould, Lewontin to Mayr, Alexander to E.O. Wilson, etc.

Unfortunately, keeping all of this succinct makes for a somewhat dry presentation. I agree with the previous reviewer in that often the authors' presentation of concepts are difficult to grasp for those not already familiar with the topics; when more concrete examples are made, the point is much easier to take. Still, this is a minor complaint given the scope and rigor of the analysis presented.

If you're into the accessibility of a Stephen Jay Gould or Richard Dawkins, this book will be a challenge to read. In fact, it reminds me much more of Elliot Sober, one of the more famous Philosophers of Biology cited in this book. As 'an Introduction to Philosophy of Biology', 'Sex and Death' is more accessible than the work of Sober, and it is a well-organized and presented survey of the philosophy of biology, assuming that the reader has already had a fairly ample exposure to the subject. For the uninitiated, it would be better to bone up on Darwin, Gould, Dawkins, Lewontin, Mayr, and Wilson before trying to tackle this book; *frequent* references to these authors are made,and a close familiarity with their ideas is presupposed.

All I can do is concur. In all cases you should skip this book, but especially you should skip it if you have any regard whatsoever for the English language. If you are interested in Ligeti (whether or not you're a musician), you should read instead GYORGY LIGETI (20TH-CENTURY COMPOSERS) By Richard Toop.

I'd rate this higher just because I find the subject so fascinating were not two very good alternatives available: Richard Toop's "Gyorgy Ligeti (20th-Century Composers)" and "Ligeti In Conversation". There is no need at all to suffer through "Gyorgy Ligeti: Contemporary Composer"'s extremely affected and nonsensical mauling of the English language, its banal observations, its specious reasoning.

In my opinion Gyorgi Ligeti is one of the Greatest composers of the 20th century and this book is a fine introduction on him, it was first published in 1983 but was updated in 1997.

After a short introduction there is an interview with the composer and in part two the author traces Ligetis career and his development as a Composer.

If you have not heard Ligetis music check out the great Sony edition of his works, for those who know him and want to know more about the man and the composer, this is a good book to start with, it is not long, about 180 pages so there is not room for a detailed analysis af his works but it covers the basics well enough and has some notation samples of some his major works. The book ends with a list of Ligetis Works and Recordings.

Another good book by Paul Griffiths is his Modern Music.