Naturalist

Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: An engaging and well-written account of the famous biologist's intellectual development from his early to his mature years and most important achievements. Nice discussions of some of his most interesting and important ideas punctuate this history. For example, there's a good section on the origin and development of his ecological ideas and the theory of island biogeography. Wilson is always a cautious but careful writer and thinker, but in a couple of the sections, he gets at least a little bit speculative and is all the more entertaining for it. For example, his discussion of the innateness of our fear of spiders and snakes is entertaining (Wilson himself is very phobic about spiders). Equally entertaining is the section where he discusses people's preference for a particular type of environment or ecology (subalpine or montane foothills parkland or partially wooded savannah with some lakes). Wilson attributes this to it being the environment where we originally evolved. Overall it counts as one of the best scientific biographies I've ever read.

Rating:
Summary: A mind in conlfict, a world of achievement.
Review: Edward O. Wilson, a two-time Pulitzer Price winning author and one of the vanguards of the controversial field of study called socio-biology is a man who lives with deep contradictions. Wilson, who spent a lifetime studying Ants and has found his subjects and the process very intellectually rewarding is short of reconciling his faith with his scientific method. Witness this paragraph from p. 45 - early on in the book Wilson outlines his struggle:

"Science became the new light and way. But what of religion? What of the Grail, and the revelations of purest ray serene that gives wholeness and meaning to life? There must be a scientific explanation for religion, moral precepts, the rites of passage, and teh craving for immortality. Religion, I knew from personal experience, is a perpetual fountainhead of human emotion. It cannot be compartamentlaized as the manifestation of some separate world. From the beginning I never could accept that science and religion are separate domains, with fundamentally different questions and answers. Religion had to be explained as a material process, from the bottom up, atoms to genes to the human spirit. It had to be embraced by the single grand naturalistic image of man."

Clearly the book is not based on or driven by this initial need to reconcile the spiritual with the material. However, Wilson does take you on a journey that few can act as our guide. From early childhood (those formative years the instilled that sense of wonder), his years in experiementation and as Harvard faculty to his controversial (he claims unfair) work that included socio-biology. He takes us through the twists and turns of life as a scientist - far removed from our work a day world - yet not exempt from work a day trials and tribulations.

The issues that he attempts to wrestle with here in "The Naturalist" are far too complex to be dealt with fully in this book but it is a fair try and is a wonderful read. Two Pulitzer Prizes are testaments to his skill as a writer and the controversy that follows him are a testament to his skill as a scientist. Wilson must be engaged in if but only to get a glimpse of a the complexity of our little world yet not lose that sense of wonder.

Miguel Llora

Rating:
Summary: You will look at the world differently
Review: even if you got C's in biology after reading this biography of a warm and gentle man who states somewhere that most of us go through a bug period, but that he never outgrew his. From the quest for rare species, bringing him to remote places of the world, to the excitement of research and philosophical disagreements at Harvard, to the pervasive intent to save the world's diversity. But mostly it's enjoyable because of his writing which is analytical and sensitive and inspires one to marvel at the anthill just outside the doorstep.

Rating:
Summary: An inspiration for young scientists
Review: How far have city-bred enterprises removed us from our natural heritage? E.O. Wilson, author of so many wonderful ideas and books, has here revealed himself as a human being of immense strength and courtly self-awareness. Sharing with us so many aspects of his personal life and scientific endeavors, Wilson shows how a bit of dedication can overcome obstacles most of us find daunting. Raised in the rural South, losing the sight of one eye, his struggles to gain a place as a scientist are inspiring. More importantly, he makes clear how much remains to be done by the upcoming generations in determining our true place in the natural order. This work is a clarion call for aspiring young scientists to enter research, following paths similar to his own.

The editorial reviews here focus overmuch on the sociobiology 'controversy'. Sociobiology is a major thesis in examining humanity's place in nature. Rejecting this idea out of hand continues to impair understanding of how important an idea sociobiology is, although he spends little time on it in this book. Much of his work has focussed on animal behaviour from ants through mammals. People remain resistant to the idea that we are somehow associated with 'the beasts', but Wilson demonstrates the continuity of behaviour patterns throughout the animal kingdom. Until we address that issue honestly, which is a major aspect of Wilson's work, we will never understand who we truly are. His studies stress that until we achieve that understanding, we will continue to unwittingly intrude on our own environment. The loss of species threatens our own existence.

The major advantage of this book is its honesty. Wilson pulls few punches and reviews his own prejudices and how he overcame them. He demonstrates how important this self assessment is to scientists and the public alike. The growth of understanding of genetics has impacted all biology. Wilson relates candidly his own grudging acceptance of the new ideas genetic research have given us. He's to be commended for both his candor and flexibility.

Rating:
Summary: An inspiration for young scientists
Review: How far have city-bred enterprises removed us from our natural heritage? E.O. Wilson, author of so many wonderful ideas and books, has here revealed himself as a human being of immense strength and courtly self-awareness. Sharing with us so many aspects of his personal life and scientific endeavors, Wilson shows how a bit of dedication can overcome obstacles most of us find daunting. Raised in the rural South, losing the sight of one eye, his struggles to gain a place as a scientist are inspiring. More importantly, he makes clear how much remains to be done by the upcoming generations in determining our true place in the natural order. This work is a clarion call for aspiring young scientists to enter research, following paths similar to his own.

The editorial reviews here focus overmuch on the sociobiology 'controversy'. Sociobiology is a major thesis in examining humanity's place in nature. Rejecting this idea out of hand continues to impair understanding of how important an idea sociobiology is, although he spends little time on it in this book. Much of his work has focussed on animal behaviour from ants through mammals. People remain resistant to the idea that we are somehow associated with 'the beasts', but Wilson demonstrates the continuity of behaviour patterns throughout the animal kingdom. Until we address that issue honestly, which is a major aspect of Wilson's work, we will never understand who we truly are. His studies stress that until we achieve that understanding, we will continue to unwittingly intrude on our own environment. The loss of species threatens our own existence.

The major advantage of this book is its honesty. Wilson pulls few punches and reviews his own prejudices and how he overcame them. He demonstrates how important this self assessment is to scientists and the public alike. The growth of understanding of genetics has impacted all biology. Wilson relates candidly his own grudging acceptance of the new ideas genetic research have given us. He's to be commended for both his candor and flexibility.

Rating:
Summary: Better Late Than Never
Review: I had always thought a scientist of the calibre of Dr. E. O. Wilson was perhaps out of my league; I'd partly read his Diversity of Life and perhaps got the most out of it by jumping around and reading what interested me. His other famous books seemed too specialized for me, basically a lover of fiction or action stories. However, I saw recently that Wilson had endorsed the book jacket of "Nabokov's Butterflies", one of my favorite writers, whose biography "Nabokov's Blues" was a great read last year. "Naturalist" is a word often spurned by modern scientists, I'm told; its sometimes another word for generalist-- whom "real" scientists often don't take seriously. Nabokov had been one (and not often taken seriously); it interested me that Wilson would use that term to describe his own journey into professional science. What Wilson explains so well here, in his own story, is that it is growing up with a FASCINATION with nature, first perhaps as only a hobby, that based on this "fascination for life", great scientists are sometimes born. Wilson makes the point, echoed by another commentator above, that all of us with a fascination for nature are not so different and perhaps science has not done itself a service by make its field seem so rarified and only for that highly educated PhD. FIRST perhaps comes the youthful fascination with things that then leads to the productive scientist. I know when I was a kid I enjoyed reading the biographies of John Audobon and other naturalists. E. O. Wilson was not well known at the time. But, any youth, parent or teacher who wants to get a proper perspective on what seems to make great scientists, that is, the ongoing fascination with life itself and what makes it tick, will find great support in this biography of, yes, a famous Harvard professor, but also a person not so different from you and me. An autobiography worth reading.

Rating:
Summary: _Little House in the Big Woods_ for Adults
Review: Reading this book at age 16 made me feel the same way reading _Little House in the Big Woods_ did at age 9. Something about it is very warm and comforting. It's also an excellent introduction to Wilson's other works. This was the first of his books I read; later I read _Consilience_, _The Diversity of Life_, _On Human Nature_, _Biophilia_, and _In Search of Nature_. Like all his books, it's wonderful.

Rating:
Summary: A moving autobiography of a humanist naturalist
Review: Shakespeare wrote that "Some men are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them." Edward O. Wilson seems to be a combination of the last two. I would say that he was entirely the second, for it is only by the dint of his hard work and discipline that Wilson is as great a naturalist as he is, but he seems not to have sought greatness at all, but merely to have followed the calling of his heart; he rode the waves of fortune to unintentionally make himself into one of the greatest naturalists since Darwin. The similarity between them does not stop there: the ideas of Darwin were exceedingly controversial, and yet the man himself, in contrast to his bold ideas, was unassuming and reserved. The same could be said of Wilson.

And like the good evolutionary biologist that he is, Wilson's life, its unpredictable twists and turns, parallel the randomness of natural selection. A bumpy family life meant that he moved frequently, and that he was often alone: in response, he took refuge in the wild places and the natural history institutions of the places where he found himself, thus focussing and increasing his love of nature and the sciences. An accident of early life caused him to become very nearsighted, and so he turned to the study of the ants: and on this subject he is a recognized authority. Even his will and his discipline were not characteristics he himself sought out or developed; rather, they were traits which were instilled in him early on. Random chance gave him the tools by which he would become a great naturalist.

Wilson appears to be a man who knows not the word "problem," only "opportunity." The means by which he took advantage of his nearsightedness I have mentioned; he likewise learned to work with, instead of against, the unconscious muscle tremors which make dissection of very small objects difficult. Perhaps the greatest testimony to his ability to turn a problem into an opportunity is in this line: "Without a trace of irony I can say I have been blessed with brilliant enemies [...] I owe them a great debt, because they redoubled my energies and drove me in new directions." These words could be merely self-serving justifications for failure, if Wilson had not achieved in the eyes of others, or if he had not accomplished what he set out to do, which was to be as great a naturalist as he could be: that he did both reveals these sentiments to be the mature recognition of his hard work and dedication to the struggle in the face of adversity coming at him from unexpected directions.

I must say that when I came to this book, I did not accept Wilson's sociobiology, and I still do not see that it is supported by solid proof. It is all the more amazing to me, then, that I am thoroughly moved by this account of his life, in its discovery of the natural world and in the author's sense of wonder at life around him. The lauds which Wilson has received, I suspect, are nothing compared to the joy he gains through his work and his studies.

I don't know what Wilson reads in his spare time, but he has written a text with echoes of Wordsworth and Whitman: his life in nature is no mere analysis and dissection, but a glorious presentation of his wonder before the natural world. Wilson paraphrases Wordsworth's declaration that "the child is the father of the man" as "Most children have a bug period. I never outgrew mine." Wilson has followed his bliss into his adult life, and it has brought him fame and joy. The ultimate paragraphs of his book reveal that though he would change the focus of his studies, he would in no wise vary his field of study, nor the course of his life: he would be then, as he is now, a man who followed the dictates of his heart, who took the random events of his childhood and shaped them into a life that brought him great pleasure. It is fitting, then, that this book should do the same for the reader: out of his experiences, Wilson has created one of the most entertaining and moving autobiographies I have ever read.

Rating:
Summary: more for the specialist.
Review: This autobiography is more for the professional biological scientist, who should really enjoy the detailed description of the many field works of the author. Although his reflections on aggression, behaviourism (for him grossly overstated), and sociobiology are a worth-while reading.
He confesses that he became far too late an environmental activist.
I can only subscribe his fundamental truths: first, humanity is the product of biological evolution; second, the diversity of life is the craddle and greatest natural heritage of the human species; and third, philosophy and religion make little sense without taking into account these two first conceptions.
Another silver lining in his professional life: his struggle with colleagues, jealousy, slander, undermining of his position, covert attacks (Harvard is not a monastery).

Rating:
Summary: An inside look at a true scientist
Review: This book gives one a real sense of what the natural world is like through the eyes of a very influential naturalist. This book follows the life of E.O. Wilson from childhood to show how the outside world impacted his life. A great read!!