Twenty-four shapely essays, most drawn from American Scientist, by
paleoichthyologist Thomson (Living Fossil, 1991), president of the
Academy of Natural Sciences. Thomson divides his pieces into three
groups. The first assemblage, "The Uses of Diversity," devoted to
natural history, includes the title essay on the loons that haunt
New Hampshire lakes where Thomson vacations each summer. Other
pieces ponder, in a benign, literate voice, the "lost" Benjamin
Franklin tree, an extremely rare plant extinct in the wild; the
degradation of the modern urban landscape and the roots of this
despoiling in the farming techniques of the first European
settlers; studies of horsemanship, shark locomotion, and the neural
crest (a developmental feature in embryonic vertebrates); and a
celebration of that delightful, neglected 18th-century British
natural historian, writer, and country parson, Gilbert White. Part
Two, "On Becoming a Scientist," digs deeper: Here, Thomson not only
shares charming autobiographical reminiscences of boyish scientific
enthusiasms but pushes hard for better scientific publishing
(urging "everyone to write fewer and more significant works"). The
final section, "The Future of Evolution," explores the multiple
meanings of that overworked term; sings a paean to university
research museums; puzzles over why paleontology (dinosaurs
excepted) has fallen out of favor; and gingerly pushes the idea
that variations in evolution may be directed rather than strictly
random. Suffused with the sense of wonder that unites the wide-eyed
child and the white-haired Nobel laureate: an uncommonly good
collection. (Kirkus Reviews)
The great Piltdown fraud, the mystery of how a shark swims with an
asymmetric tail, the debate over dinosaur extinction, the haunting
beauty of a loon on a northern lake-these are only a few of the
subjects discussed by Keith Stewart Thomson in this wide-ranging
book. At once instructive and entertaining, the book celebrates the
aesthetic, literary, and intellectual aspects of science and
conveys what is involved in being a scientist today-the excitement
of discovery and puzzle solving, the debate over what to read and
what to write, and the element of promotion that seems to be
necessary to stimulate research and funding. Keith Thomson, a
well-known biologist who writes a column for the distinguished
bi-monthly magazine American Scientist, here presents some of his
favorite essays from that periodical in a book of three parts, each
introduced by a new essay. In the first section, "The Uses of
Diversity," he ponders such questions as why we care passionately
and expensively about the dusky seaside sparrow and how and why we
rescued the flowering tree Franklinia from extinction. The second
section, "On Being a Scientist," includes an autobiographical
account of Thomson's life and his views on what makes being a
scientist special and interesting. The last section, "The Future of
Evolution," gives examples of how the study of evolution is
entering one of the most dramatic stages in its own development.
Thomson presents science as a great intellectual adventure-a search
of why things are as they are-most rewarding when it is accompanied
by an appreciation of the subtleties and aesthetic qualities of the
objects studied. His book will enable nonscientists to open their
minds to the pleasures of science and scientists to become more
articulate and passionate about what they do.
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