From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb,
a masterful, timely, and fully authorized biography of the great and
hugely influential Harvard biologist and naturalist E. O. Wilson
Few
biologists in the long history of that science have been as productive,
as ground-breaking and as controversial as the Alabama-born Edward
Osborne Wilson. At 91 years of age he may be the most eminent American
scientist in any field. Fascinated from an early age by the natural
world in general and ants in particular, his field work on them and on
all social insects has vastly expanded our knowledge of their many
species and fascinating ways of being. This work led to his 1975 book Sociobiology,
which created an intellectual firestorm from his contention that all
animal behavior, including that of humans, is governed by the laws of
evolution and genetics. Subsequently Wilson has become a leading voice
on the crucial importance to all life of biodiversity and has worked
tirelessly to synthesize the fields of science and the humanities in a
fruitful way.
Richard Rhodes is himself a towering figure in the
field of science writing and he has had complete and unfettered access
to Wilson, his associates, and his papers in writing this book. The
result is one of the most accomplished and anticipated and urgently
needed scientific biographies in years.
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