I was going through my library and I stumbled upon an outdated version of "The Origin of Life" (1986) by Bernard Hagene and Charles Lenay.  I’m looking at the table of contents and thinking, "My have we’ve grown in the past 21 years!"

Contents:

[b:2e3531f05c]The Mystery of the Origin[/b:2e3531f05c]
  The mystery of the first Billion years (OK, that subtitle sounds alright)
  What is life?
  What methods should be used to understand the Origin of Life (Humm…)

[b:2e3531f05c]The Primitive Earth[/b:2e3531f05c]
    Stars as crucibles of Chemical Elements
    The Birth of Earth
[b:2e3531f05c]The Components of Life[/b:2e3531f05c]
  The Primitive soup (Didn’t we nix that one?)
  From Black Molecules to Chain Molecules
  Several Possible Scenarios
[b:2e3531f05c]Towards Life[/b:2e3531f05c]
  A membrane to protect the Internal Environment
  Like soap bubbles (ROFLMBO!  Yup!  That one went bye-bye!)
  An exciting scenerio: The Appearance of Life
  Looking at the Oldest Fossils (I think we’ve found some older fossils since 1985)
  Life: Russian Dolls?
  Divided opinions
[b:2e3531f05c]The enigma of Self-Reproduction[/b:2e3531f05c]
    Duplication
    Transcription of the Message
    A Beginning… and Evolution
    A beginning of duplication?
    A beginning of Transcription?
    A Clay Mold
[b:2e3531f05c]Does Life Exist Elsewhere?[/b:2e3531f05c]
    In the solar system?  (we’re still scratching our heads on that one.)
    In our Galaxy and Beyond?
    Listening to the sky (we’re still doing that one)
    The Domain of the Imaginary (Um… Yeah.  I guess.  What is that?)
[b:2e3531f05c]Explosion of Life[/b:2e3531f05c]
  Thousands or Billions of Specialized Cells
  Is the Origin of Complex cells a "Chimera"?
  What’s the difference between plants and animals?
  Earth Changes Its Atmosphere
  Successful Adaptations (Well, due to Global Warming, the Polar Bear isn’t adapting very well and is getting higher and higher on the endangered species list, not to mentioned other plants and animals.)
[b:2e3531f05c]The Question Remains Alive[/b:2e3531f05c]  (IT’S ALIVE!)

You know, maybe I should kill it (this book) and get a more updated version of this book just by looking at the content page alone.  Ya think?!  We have learned a lot in the last 21 years, haven’t we? I don’t think I want to use this for anything if maybe a look back at past scientific thought or something like that.

Mriana, from your post I couldn’t tell whether you were referring to your personal library or your public library.  If the former, OK. but if the latter, I’d suggest that you let it stay there.  Better to have outdated science than take the chance that the librarian might replace the book with a nice, up-to-date, contributed-at-no-cost copy of some “intelligent design” tract.  :evil:

Occam

No, it’s my personal library.    Sorry about that.  I think it’s time I got a new one.