Customer Reviews

Slanted Truths: Essays on Gaia, Symbiosis and Evolution

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No scientist of our times has more right than Lynn Margulis to crow about her once-ridiculed but now-vindicated discoveries, such as the cell symbiosis hypothesis. Yet, for all her enthusiasm in promoting her now widely respected triumphs and her new, still-to-be-tested hypotheses, Margulis does not gloat. She is gracious with her opponents and generous in sharing credit with her grad students and other collaborators. One of the volume's most attractive features is that it summarizes the development to date of the views of James Lovelock and herself, on their widely debated and very influential Gaia hypothesis. We are treated to numerous fascinating anecdotes about the making of such a controversial theory, and about its reception (not always very polite, let alone friendly) by the community of "objective" scientists. The real gems of the book, however, are two autobiographical pieces by Margulis, "Sunday with J. Robert Oppenheimer" and "The Red Shoe Dilemma," and a third article "Big Trouble in Biology." In the first, we witness the encounter between the precocious sixteen year old future scientist Margulis and the recently deposed titan of atomic physics and "father of the atomic bomb" at his home in Princeton. The second piece offers Margulis's retrospective on what it meant to be a woman during our times who tried to be a great scientist, as well as a great wife and mother. Her spare use of words throws sharply into relief the realities still facing young women who would make a career in the sciences. Every one of those young women should read this book, and especially "The Red Shoe Dilemma." For any critics of the excesses of late-twentieth century reductionism in the life sciences, "Big Trouble in Biology" will be a call to arms, albeit a very thoughtful and provocative one. Lynn Margulis is no anti-science crackpot; nor is she a latter-day vitalist. But from one of the most successful practitioners in the methodology of reductionism, this heart-felt call for LOOKING at whole, living organisms and marvelling at their living qualities is a challenge that demands serious attention.

I came upon this book while doing some research into the Gaia hypothesis and found it interesting, especially the autobiographical essays. However, I still think the Gaia hypothesis is a little extreme when formulated as if organisms have a reason to sacrifice their individual survival for the benefit of "Gaia" as a whole. When this anti-natural selection aspect is removed, Gaia says only that organisms have effects on their environment and can evolve feedback systems, which isn't really anything new. It was a fascinating and revolutionary idea - and I do respect it for "thinking outside the box", so to speak - but I just don't see it working out. And attacking reductionism never got anybody anywhere...sometimes things must be understood at their most fundamental level.

"Don't judge a book by its cover" is a common saying, but what if the cover itself is racist? The title "Slanted Truths" implies that an expose of perfidy awaits the reader, while the face of a South East Asian statue indicates the race of the perpetrators.

Until the cover art is changed I will not buy this book and I urge others to do likewise.