Nature Revealed: Selected Writings, 1949-2006

Description

Two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Edward O. Wilson is one of the leading biologists and philosophical thinkers of our time. In this compelling collection, Wilson's observations range from the tiny glands of ants to the nature of the living universe. Many of the pieces are considered landmarks in evolutionary biology, ecology, and behavioral biology. Wilson explores topics as diverse as slavery in ants, the genetic basis of societal structure, the discovery of the taxon cycle, the original formulation of the theory of island biogeography, a critique of subspecies as a unit of classification, and the conservation of life's diversity. Each article is presented in its original form, dating from Wilson's first published article in 1949 to his most recent exploration of the natural world. Preceding each piece is a brief essay by Wilson that explains the context in which the article was written and provides insights into the scientist himself and the debates of the time. This collection enables us to share Wilson's various vantage points and to view the complexities of nature through his eyes. Wilson aficionados, along with readers discovering his work for the first time, will find in this collection a world of beauty, complexity, and challenge. Front cover Contents Preface PART I. ANTS AND SOCIOBIOLOGY 1. Richteri, the fire ant 2. Variation and adaptation in the imported fire ant 3. The origin and evolution of polymorphism in ants 4. Quantitative studies of liquid food transmission in ants 5. The beginnings of nomadic and group-predatory behavior in the ponerine ants 6. Source and possible nature of the odor trail of fire ants 7. Chemical communication among workers of the fire ant 8. Pheromones 9. The first Mesozoic ants 10. The ergonomics of caste in the social insects 11. The prospect for a unified sociobiology 12. Slavery in ants 13. Sociobiology: the new synthesis 14. Sociobiology at century's end 15. Human decency is animal 16. Behavioral discretization and the number of castes in an ant species 17. The organization of colony defense in the ant Pheidole dentata Mayr 18. The number of queens: an important trait in ant evolution 19. The ethical implications of human sociobiology 20. Caste and division oflabor in leaf-cutter ants 21. Precis of Genes, Mind, and Culture 22. The relation between caste ratios and division of labor in the ant genus Pheidole 23. The sociogenesis of insect colonies 24. Between-caste aversion as a basis for division oflabor in the ant Pheidole pubiventris 25. The earliest known ants: an analysis of the Cretaceous species and an inference concerning their social organization 26. The dominance of social insects 27. The effects of complex social life on evolution and biodiversity 28. Pheidole nasutoides, a new species of Costa Rican ant that apparently mimics termites 29. In memory of William Louis Brown 30. Ant plagues: a centuries-old mystery solved PART II. BIODIVERSITY STUDIES: SYSTEMATICS AND BIOGEOGRAPHY 31. The subspecies concept and its taxonomic application 32. Character displacement 33. Patchy distributions of ant species in New Guinea rain forests 34. The nature of the taxon cycle in the Melanesian ant fauna 35. An equilibrium theory of island biogeography 36. A consistency test for phylogenies based on contemporaneous species 37. The challenge from related species 38. An estimate of the potential evolutionary increase in species density in the Polynesian ant fauna 39. The species equilibrium 40. The plight of taxonomy 41. The biogeography of the West Indian ants 42. Editor's foreword (from Biodiversity) 43. The current state of biological diversity 44. Threats to biodiversity 45. The high frontier 46. The origins of hyperdiversity 47. A global biodiversity map 48. On the future of conservation biology 49. The encyclopedia oflife 50. Taxonomy as a fundamental discipline PART Ill. CONSERVATION AND THE HUMAN CONDITION 51. The conservation of life 52. Applied biogcography 53. Resolutions for the 80s 54. The biological diversity crisis: a challenge to science 55. Outcry from a world of wounds 56. The little things that run the world 57. The coming pluralization of biology and the stewardship of systematics 58. Biophilia and the conservation ethic 59. Is humanity suicidal? 60. Consilience among the great branches of learning 61. Integrated science and the coming century of the environment Appendix: The Published Works of Edward O. Wilson Back cover