Thirty-one sprightly and invaluable essays, in which the play of “little odd tidbits as illustrations of general theories” the author has raised to an art form.
In his tenth and final collection of Natural History columns (after The Lying Stones of Marrakech, 2000, etc.), Gould is back in his favorite terrain of posing and then poking at intellectual puzzles, in which he has embedded some humanistic concern or referent in order to gain some better understanding of a scientific theme. Gould has never been a lyrical exalter of science and nature, but a taskmaster who might popularize his essays—namely, keep them free of exclusionary jargon—even while he demands the unwavering attention of his readers to follow his scientific peregrinations. How else to appreciate the commonalities between ex–Red Sox first baseman Bill Bruckner's weary legs and a letter written by Jim Bowie shortly before he died at the Alamo (hint: it has something to do with canonical stories and the distortion of acts)? Gould is a delight when leveling his heavy guns at the fatuous (“the anachronistic fallacy of using a known present to misread a past circumstance”) and the confused: “science is an inquiry about the factual sate of the natural world, religion as a search for spiritual meaning and ethical values.” Ever the gadfly, though, he'll follow that with “Science does not deal in certainty, so ‘fact’ can only mean a proposition affirmed to such a high degree that it would be perverse to withhold one's provisional assent.” Gould's world is rich in quirks and contradictions, human foibles and natural diversity, the sublime and the bumptious, high grandeur and low comedy, whether he is addressing the Linnaen system of classification or the destruction of the World Trade Center.
No more Natural History columns, but the future will no doubt see much more from Gould, a self-described addict of the short form. These essays trail in his wake like mushrooms after a rain. (b&w illustrations)Pub Date: May 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60143-1
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Harmony
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2002
Categories: SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
Did you like this book?
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A Peabody Award–winning NPR science reporter chronicles the life of a turn-of-the-century scientist and how her quest led to significant revelations about the meaning of order, chaos, and her own existence.
Miller began doing research on David Starr Jordan (1851-1931) to understand how he had managed to carry on after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake destroyed his work. A taxonomist who is credited with discovering “a full fifth of fish known to man in his day,” Jordan had amassed an unparalleled collection of ichthyological specimens. Gathering up all the fish he could save, Jordan sewed the nameplates that had been on the destroyed jars directly onto the fish. His perseverance intrigued the author, who also discusses the struggles she underwent after her affair with a woman ended a heterosexual relationship. Born into an upstate New York farm family, Jordan attended Cornell and then became an itinerant scholar and field researcher until he landed at Indiana University, where his first ichthyological collection was destroyed by lightning. In between this catastrophe and others involving family members’ deaths, he reconstructed his collection. Later, he was appointed as the founding president of Stanford, where he evolved into a Machiavellian figure who trampled on colleagues and sang the praises of eugenics. Miller concludes that Jordan displayed the characteristics of someone who relied on “positive illusions” to rebound from disaster and that his stand on eugenics came from a belief in “a divine hierarchy from bacteria to humans that point[ed]…toward better.” Considering recent research that negates biological hierarchies, the author then suggests that Jordan’s beloved taxonomic category—fish—does not exist. Part biography, part science report, and part meditation on how the chaos that caused Miller’s existential misery could also bring self-acceptance and a loving wife, this unique book is an ingenious celebration of diversity and the mysterious order that underlies all existence.
A quirky wonder of a book.Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5011-6027-1
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
Categories: GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | NATURE | SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
Did you like this book?
Jahren transcends both memoir and science writing in this literary fusion of both genres.
GET IT
Award-winning scientist Jahren (Geology and Geophysics/Univ. of Hawaii) delivers a personal memoir and a paean to the natural world.
The author’s father was a physics and earth science teacher who encouraged her play in the laboratory, and her mother was a student of English literature who nurtured her love of reading. Both of these early influences engrossingly combine in this adroit story of a dedication to science. Jahren’s journey from struggling student to struggling scientist has the narrative tension of a novel and characters she imbues with real depth. The heroes in this tale are the plants that the author studies, and throughout, she employs her facility with words to engage her readers. We learn much along the way—e.g., how the willow tree clones itself, the courage of a seed’s first root, the symbiotic relationship between trees and fungi, and the airborne signals used by trees in their ongoing war against insects. Trees are of key interest to Jahren, and at times she waxes poetic: “Each beginning is the end of a waiting. We are each given exactly one chance to be. Each of us is both impossible and inevitable. Every replete tree was first a seed that waited.” The author draws many parallels between her subjects and herself. This is her story, after all, and we are engaged beyond expectation as she relates her struggle in building and running laboratory after laboratory at the universities that have employed her. Present throughout is her lab partner, a disaffected genius named Bill, whom she recruited when she was a graduate student at Berkeley and with whom she’s worked ever since. The author’s tenacity, hope, and gratitude are all evident as she and Bill chase the sweetness of discovery in the face of the harsh economic realities of the research scientist.
Jahren transcends both memoir and science writing in this literary fusion of both genres.Pub Date: April 5, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-101-87493-6
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2016
Categories: BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | NATURE | SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
Did you like this book?
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2023 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
