This book provides a comprehensive treatment of the chemical nature of the Earth's early
surface environment and how that led to the origin of life. This includes a detailed discussion
of the likely process by which life emerged using as much quantitative information as possible.
The emergence of life and the prior surface conditions of the Earth have implications for the
evolution of Earth's surface environment over the following 2-2.5 billion years. The last part
of the book discusses how these changes took place and the evidence from the geologic record
that supports this particular version of early and evolving conditions.
