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| Prologue | |
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| Acknowledgments | |
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| Darwin's Dilemma | |
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| Breakthrough to the Ancient Past | |
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| The Nature of Geologic Time | |
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| The "Schoolbook" History of Life | |
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| Darwin's Dilemma | |
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| Denouement | |
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| Birth of a New Field of Science | |
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| The Floodgates Crack Open | |
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| Famous Figures Enter the Field | |
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| A Youngster Joins the Fray | |
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| The Floodgates Open Full Bore | |
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| The Oldest Fossils and What They Mean | |
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| "Trust but Verify" | |
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| "Real World Problems" in the Search for Early Life | |
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| Questions and Answers about the Oldest Records of Life | |
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| The Oldest Fossils Known | |
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| How Did Life Begin? | |
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| The Basics of Biology | |
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| The Universals of Life | |
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| How Did Monomers of CHON Arise on the Lifeless Earth? | |
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| Organic Monomers beyond the Earth | |
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| How Did Monomers Become Linked into Polymers? | |
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| From Monomers to Polymers toward Life | |
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| Metabolic Memories of the Earliest Cells | |
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| How Did Cells Begin? | |
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| The Essentials of Life | |
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| Life's Earliest Way to Make a Living | |
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| Air and Light: A New Source of Glucose | |
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| Why Do We Breathe Oxygen? | |
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| The Four-Stage Development of Modern Metabolism | |
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| So Far, So Fast, So Early? | |
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| How Old Is the Modern Ecosystem? | |
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| When Did Life Begin? | |
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| How Did Evolution Proceed So Far, So Fast, So Early? | |
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| Paleobiology: Fossils, Geology, and Geochemistry | |
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| Isotopic Evidence of Ancient Metabolisms | |
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| Paleobiology: Direct Evidence of Early Evolution | |
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| Stromatolites: Earth's First High-Rise Condos | |
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| Nature Is Not Compartmentalized | |
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| Stromatolites: Earth's First High-Rise Condos | |
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| Stromatolites of the Geologic Past | |
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| What Are Stromatolites Good For? | |
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| Cyanobacteria: Earth's Oldest "Living Fossils" | |
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| Modes and Tempos in the Evolution of Life | |
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| The Status Quo Evolution of Cyanobacteria | |
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| Evolution's Most Successful Ecologic Generalists | |
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| Cells Like Ours Arise at Last | |
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| Life Like Us Has Cells Like Ours | |
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| DNA and Development: Keys to Eukaryotic Success | |
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| How Old Are the Eukaryotes? | |
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| Eukaryotes Perfect the Art of Cloning | |
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| Sex: A New Lifestyle Brings Major Change | |
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| The Wax and Wane of Precambrian Acritarchs | |
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| Prelude to the Phanerozoic | |
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| Solution to Darwin's Dilemma | |
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| The Adventure of Science | |
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| Take-Home Lessons | |
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| Solution to Darwin's Dilemma | |
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| Epilogue: Extraordinary Claims! Extraordinary Evidence? | |
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| Fossils, Foibles, and Frauds | |
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| The Goal Is to "Get It Right" | |
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| "Man, a Witness of the Deluge" | |
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| Beringer's Lying Stones | |
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| Theories on the Nature of Fossils | |
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| Unearthing a Rosetta Stone | |
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| The Hunt for Life on Mars | |
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| Hints of Ancient Martian Life? | |
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| NASA Stages a Press Conference | |
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| Meteorites from Mars | |
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| Search for the Smoking Gun | |
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| Lessons from the Hunt | |
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| Glossary | |
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| Further Reading | |
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| Index of Geologic Units and General and Species | |
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| Subject Index | |