Edward O. Wilson
Edward O. Wilson
1929 - 2021
American Biologist and Naturalist
Pulitzer Prize Winner, Nonfiction
World-renowned entomologist Edward 0. Wilson is nicknamed "Dr. Ant," but his achievements impact much of the field of biology. He is co founder of the modern field of sociobiology, believed by some to be one of the great paradigms of science, which has touched off much controversy but also a great deal of research in animal and human social behavior. From his posts as Harvard Univeristy's Frank B. Baird, Jr. Professor of Science and Mellon Professor of Science, Wilson is the recipient of Sweden's Crafoord Prize (equal in stature to the Nobel Prize), a 1979 Pulitzer Prize for literature, and the 1977 National Medal of Science. He has influ enced the field of animal taxonomy through his work in speciation theory, conducted research which led to the discovery of pheromones-chemicals which cause behavior in animals-and has been a harbinger of the threat of mass extinction resulting from man's un checked use of the environment.
Fateful Fishing Trip Determines Career
Edward Osborne Wilson was born on June 10, 1929 in Birmingham, Alabama. A descendant of farmers and shipowners in subtropical Alabama, Wilson had already decided to become a naturalist explorer by age seven.
Fate intervened, however, when on a fishing trip he vigorously pulled his catch out of the water and its fin hit and damaged his right eye. He thus developed the habit of examining animals and objects close-up with his keen left eye, and when he subsequently read a National Geographic article entitled "Stalking Ants, Savage and Civilized" at age 10, the entomologist was born. Wilson later studied biology at the University of Alabama, obtaining a B.S. degree in this discipline in 1949 and an M.S. in 1950. In 1955, at age 26, he received his Ph.D. in biology from Harvard. He gained full professorship in 1964, and became Frank B. Baird, Jr. Professor of Science in 1976.
The field of new systematics--the attempt to classify species based on the principles of evolutionary theory--occupied Wilson during the early years of his career. With his colleague William L. Brown, Wilson critiqued the utilization of the subspecies category, prompting revised procedures among taxonomists. In 1956, Wilson also co-developed the concept of "character displacement," which occurs when two similar species begin a process of genetic differentiation to avoid competition and cross-breeding.
During the mid- to late-l 950s, Wilson traveled to Australia, the South Pacific islands, and Melanesia to further study and classify ants native to those regions. As a result of his field work in the Melanesian archipelagoes, he developed the concept of the taxon cycle, which has since been found among birds and other insects. Wilson described the taxon cycle of Melanesian ants as the process through which a species disperses to a new, harsher habitat and evolves into one or more new "daughter" species, which then adapt to the new habitat.
All the while, Wilson was developing the foundation for what would he would term "sociobiology" two decades later. In 1959, influenced by the rise of molecular biology, he proved his hypothesis that social insects such as ants communicate through chemical releasers. Wilson crushed a venom gland extracted from a fire ant and created a trail of the chemical near a colony of the same species. He had anticipated that a few ants would trace the chemical path. Instead, dozens of fire ants swarmed out of the colony to follow the trail, and were bailed
at its end. "That night I couldn't sleep," Wilson notes. "I envisioned accounting for the entire social repertory of ants with a small number of chemicals." Indeed, the chemicals came to be known as pheromones, and this discovery launched an "explosion of research" on the behavior of social insects-research which continues still. Wilson wrote later that pheromones were "not just a guidepost, but the entire message." These chemicals communicate complex instructions for fellow ants--everything from the location of food and how to obtain it to a call for help when in distress.
First to Identify Species Equilibrium Theory
In the early and middle 1960s, Wilson collabo rated with Princeton University mathematician Robert H. MacArthur to develop the first quantitative theory of species equilibrium. Prior to their work in this area, it was believed that the regularity of species in a given area was maintained through incomplete colonization. Wilson and his coauthor hypothesized that the number of species on a small island would remain constant, though the variety of species would undergo constant reshuffling.
Two factors affect the number of species in an ecosystem: extinction and immigration. In Wilson and MacArthur's island model, these factors are determined by the size and proximity of the islands larger, less crowded islands typically have lower extinction rates, for example, and islands that are close together experience greater species immigration from one island to another. The "equilibrium hypothesis of island biogeography" describes the relationship between these factors in a mathematical model. The two determinants in the number of species are the rate of extinction of species (depicted by a positive sloping curve) and the rate of immigration of new species (indicated by a negative sloping curve). The actual number of species is found at the intersection of the two curves.
MacArthur and Wilson's hypothesis was borne out by a 1968 study by Wilson and biologist Daniel Simberloff, who examined the insect life on six islands off the Florida Keys. They first counted the number of insect species, then fumigated the islands and recounted eight months later. As Wilson had predicted, the number of species remained the same, while the composition of species was significantly different and did in fact evolve over time. For this landmark work, Wilson received the Crafoord Prize in 1990, awarded by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.
"This relatively simple idea transformed the study of species richness into a quantitative and experimental branch of biology," the academy noted. "Arguably, hardly a single important work in conservation biology is written today without the author making use of this theory as a launching ramp.”
Founds Field of Sociobiology
But Wilson's greatest milestone probably was his 1975 book, Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. In it he defines sociobiology as "the systematic study of the biological basis of all social behavior." The term was in use prior to Wilson's landmark book, but he identified the interdisciplinary endeavor as one which was to change the way animal and human behavior is viewed and researched by the scientific community. Arthur Fisher, in Society magazine, declares, "Many biologists believe that sociobiology is indeed one of the great scientific paradigms, a powerful new tool for understanding some of the most bailing phenomena in the living world." Fisher compares the new frame work to Darwin's theory of natural selection and Einstein's revolution of space/time theory….
-Sketch by Karen Withem
For Gale Publishing Company
Reprinted with permission
Read more about the fascinating man who developed the new field of Social Biology in his own words:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/31624.Edward_O_Wilson