E.O. Wilsons wars – The Boston Globe

Scientist, Richard Rhodess biography of Wilson, born in 1929, however, does not begin with those formative years. Instead, it depicts him on his hands and knees collecting and classifying ants, many previously unknown to science, in the jungles of New Guinea. Despite the oppressive heat and mosquitoes, hes an elated Indiana Jones of insect hunters.

As fascinating as this material is, its all been conveyed to much better effect in Wilsons 1994 autobiography, Naturalist. In fact, Rhodes relies almost entirely on quotations from that book, supplemented by letters Wilson wrote to his sweetheart and eventual wife, Irene Kelley. Oddly enough, Wilsons lively, vivid prose, at the heart of every chapter, consistently outshines that of the professional writer, whose best-known work is the prize-winning The Making of the Atomic Bomb.

Except for his bio-nerd leanings, Wilson led a typical Southern boyhood. He briefly attended a military school. At 14, he was born again at First Baptist Church of Pensacola, though a bit later he decided his faith lay more in science than Christianity. He loved to fish, at least until an accident with a pinfish left him blind in the right eye. Though skinny and underweight, he managed a brief flirtation with football.

In Wilsons autobiography, he claimed that perennial football power the University of Alabama had saved him. The truth is, this whiz-kid saved himself. When he first arrived on campus, he knocked on the biology department chairs door and showed him his large insect collection. He was given lab space and became a sort of departmental mascot.

Wilson would make Harvard, possessor of the largest ant collection in the world, his professional home. As a young assistant professor, he was almost lured away to Stanford by a visit from its dean and president! until Harvard matched the poachers offer and granted him tenure. In this first phase of his career, he concentrated on linking insect field work and classification to evolutionary theory. Looming on the horizon, though, lay a challenge from the hot new field of molecular biology. To his credit, Rhodes conveys useful background information on what Wilson termed the molecular wars.

When James Watson, co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, joined the Harvard faculty, the battle was on. Wilson remembers this brilliant but arrogant and rude man as the most unpleasant human being I have ever met. Watson, a Nobel Prize winner, harrumphed that Wilson was nothing but an old-fashioned stamp collector? (Ironically, Wilson previously had helped persuade the department to hire this adversary, despite his abrasive personality.) Eventually, in a win-win decision, evolutionary biology and molecular biology split into separate departments.

Wilsons focus on evolution, however, would prove troublesome in the wider public arena. His previous work on insect social behavior had been lauded, but his 1975 book, Sociobiology: The New Synthesis, provoked a firestorm. He was accused of giving a green light to eugenics, racism, and the socio-economic status quo. This time, Harvard geneticist Richard Lewontin led the charge. At a scientific conference in Washington, protesters doused him with ice water, chanting Wilson, youre all wet!

Rhodes implicitly sides with Wilson, arguing that the scientists effort to root all animal behavior, including that of humans, in genetics was misunderstood. But it seems to me that Wilsons theorizing in this classic nature-nurture debate clearly weights the scales toward something close to genetic determinism. Likewise, the author fails to subject Wilsons On Human Nature, in which the biologist explores the connections between genetic and cultural evolution, to tough-minded scrutiny.

An unabashed Wilson enthusiast, Rhodes reveals that he was the primary advocate for Wilson on the Pulitzer jury that recommended the general nonfiction prize go to The Ants, a comprehensive tome intended for scientists. (Wilson had won previously in the same category for On Human Nature his two awards an astonishing triumph for a scientist.)

Toward the end of the century, Wilson achieved renown in the newly ascendant field of ecology. He pleaded for conservation efforts to preserve wildlife habitats and halt the extinction of species. Millions upon millions of species, he warned, remained unidentified yet potentially lost forever. In Half-Earth he recommended setting aside half the worlds land to assure survival of our yet undiscovered genetic treasures.

In this effort, citizens were more likely to garland him with roses rather than drench him in cold water. Indiana Jones had become the Grand Old Man of ecological advocacy.

Researching this book, Rhodes conducted numerous interviews with Wilson, now in his 90s living outside Boston. Yet the effort hasnt yielded much, a few details but no major insights. The autobiographer has trumped the biographer. Naturalist was a pleasure, Scientist a disappointment.

Dan Cryer is author of the biography Being Alive and Having to Die: The Spiritual Odyssey of Forrest Church and the memoir Forgetting My Mother: A Blues from the Heartland.

Scientist: E.O. Wilson: A Life in Nature

Richard Rhodes

Doubleday, 288, $30

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E.O. Wilsons wars - The Boston Globe