Deists
How Thomas Edison Illuminated Modern America
The 1893 Columbian Exposition introduced the United States as an industrial power on the world’s stage. Americans flocked to Chicago to ride the world’s first Ferris Wheel, to hear Frederick Jackson Turner lecture on his frontier thesis and, perhaps most of all, to see electric light for the first time. As the exposition opened on May […]
Edward O. Wilson and the Diversity of Life
Steve talks with Pulitzer Prize-winning biologist Edward O. Wilson about his new book The Diversity of Life. The book documents the human impact on other life forms, which he calls the “sixth great extinction,” and lays out an ambitious plan to study, catalogue and preserve every species on Earth.
Making a Novel out of an Anthill
E.O. Wilson is a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction and a world famous biologist. Now in his eighth decade, he took on a new challenge: writing a novel. Wilson talks with host Jeff Young about “Anthill,” a work of fiction that was inspired by his childhood.
A Little Known Planet, Part 3
We’ve heard how both researchers and the lay public can help count up the earth’s creatures. Now, in the final segment of Living on Earth’s special, we’ll see how technology is helping to speed up the identification of species. But first, we’ll see how things were done the old fashioned way. And for that, Living […]
A Little Known Planet, Part 1
It may be surprising to learn that we really have no idea how many species exist on our planet. Many experts believe that the earth plays host to anywhere from 10 to 30 million species. A few say that number could be much higher. But by any reckoning, only a fraction of them are known […]