Dr. Geerat (Gary) Vermeij is one of the foremost evolutionary biologists of our time and has been blind since the age of four. Professionally, he is known for his ability to identify a shell and its provenance from its shape and texture. To Vermeij, scratches or chips on a shell are signs of having survived a struggle with a predator, what he calls the "ancient arms race". "Privileged Hands" is no ordinary autobiography, it is the story of Dr. Vermeij's challenges and triumphs, how he "sees", by moving his fingers across the surface of shells, gathering information unnoticed by the untrained eye, and what his insights reveal about the wonder of life on earth.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
This remarkable memoir by the great marine biologist Geerat Vermeij, who is perhaps the world's leading authority on marine mollusks and who has been blind since the age of three, resonates on several levels: it is, first of all, a profound and vivid exploration of the current state of evolutionary theory; secondly, an engaging memoir of scientific exploration carried out in exotic locales; and finally, an acute examination of what it means to be sightless. Vermeij's extraordinary life reads like that of one of the great early biological explorers, whose theories were all based on extensive fieldwork in remote spots. It is also an inspiring tale of a man who, thanks to a remarkably devoted and intelligent family and his own inexhaustible scientific curiosity, overcame his handicap to further the sum of human knowledge.
From Publishers Weekly
This gets off to a slow start: the beginning section is weighted down with labored accounts of each teacher, class and playmate of the author's childhood. However, readers should persevere: this is an absolutely delightful memoir, tracing the intellectual development and career of a distinguished and consummately likable evolutionary biologist. Vermeij was born in Holland; his parents emigrated to America in 1955, when he was nine, in part because they wanted the best possible education for their son, who was bright, gifted?and blind. Propelled by his sharp intellect, will and bountiful curiosity, Vermeij turned his childhood fascination with shells into a rewarding career. A critic of affirmative action, he maintains that he never wanted to be held to different standards than his classmates or colleagues, and has often battled prejudice about the abilities of the blind. He here recounts a rich life, filled with teaching, researching, writing books and papers and editing scientific journals. But it is clearly fieldwork that impassions him the most. He is in his element wading through tidal pools in his sneakers, accompanied by his wife or daughter or a research assistant, identifying by touch the species that inhabit the intertidal zone. Vermeij, who teaches at UC-Davis, offers an interesting exploration of the "cold war" between crabs and snails, a classic example of parallel evolution: the claws of the former become more massive and powerful as the shells of their prey thicken to repel predators. He makes evolution accessible, reminding us that we are caught up in its sweep no less than the fossilized brachiopods in his collection. Vermeij occasionally indulges in atrocious puns, but on the whole his prose is clean and direct, even lyrical at times, as when he writes of shell-seeking expeditions on tropical shores. His autobiography will offer untold encouragement to those facing the challenge of a physical disability.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A life of thinking, learning, and significant contributions,
This review is from: Privileged Hands: A Scientific Life (Hardcover)
Is this the story of a blind scientist? No! This is the story of a great scientist who happens to be blind, but who is certainly not without a vision of the world around him. Dr. Vermeij chronicles his life and development as a scientific thinker and worker. He draws the reader in as he tells what it's like to work one's way through the ranks and halls of academia, and how he had to simultaneously overcome prejudices and preconceptions others hold about what it means to be blind. He also tells of an ongoing life centered on the accumulation of knowledge, contemplation of those ideas, and the generation of important contributions to his field. The account of his development as a scientific thinker and worker was a great read, but the perspective he provides on life without sight is outstanding. I'd rate the book 5 stars for myself, and 4 stars for a more general audience: five stars for myself because, as an invertebrate zoologist, I felt a strong connection to the topics and experiences described; and 4 starts for a non-scientific audience. It's clear that this book was written prior to the end of his career, and I hope to see another installment on Dr. Vermeij's life in another decade or two.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Why do scientists do what they do?,
This review is from: Privileged Hands: A Scientific Life (Paperback)
This book, autobiographical though it may be, is really about all scientists, particularly those of us who study natural history. Why do we do it? What motivates us, inspires us, even drives us? Geerat Vermeij chronicles his own voyage of discovery, along the way offering some hints, and not a little insight, into just exactly why anyone would choose to "do" natural history.
I bought several copies of this book to give to friends and family, including my non-scientist wife. It explains why I do what I do much more elegantly than I have ever been able to. I highly recommend this book. Read it if you want to know what makes natural historians tick. Give it to someone you wish to understand you a bit better. Incidentally, Vermeij also happens to be blind. But that is, at best, a leitmotif in this story.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An Inspirational Memoir Written By A Great Scientist,
By
This review is from: Privileged Hands: A Scientific Life (Paperback)
I wish Geerat Vermeij's "Privileged Hands: A Scientific Life" would earn the wide readership it deserves. Surely Vermeij's remarkable life is one which should resonate strongly with many readers, especially those accustomed to reading tales of poverty and woe told with ample literary grace and skill by writers as diverse as Mary Karr and Frank McCourt. Like Karr and McCourt, Vermeij is a splendid writer too, and yet in many respects, his own life story seems far more remarkable, if not as mesmerizing as theirs. Despite seemingly insurmountable odds, Vermeij clung to his childhood fascination with mollusk shells, had a successful graduate career at Yale University, and is now a prominent evolutionary biologist. Presently a professor of geology at the University of California, Davis, Geerat Vermeij's major scientific contributions range from advancing our understanding of molluscan shell architecture to his idea of escalation, in which he recognizes that the history of life on Earth - at least during the past half billion years or so - has been a coevolutionary arms race between predators and prey. Without a doubt, "Privileged Hands: A Scientific Life" is the finest recent personal saga on science told by one of the world's greatest scientists. It is also a poignant personal odyssey on blindness, made remarkable by Vermeij's determination to overcome what would be in others a crippling disability; instead, he has turned it into an important asset for his brilliant scientific research.
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