“Natural Wonder: At Heart, Edward Wilson’s an Ant Man. But It’s His Theories on Human Behavior That Stir up Trouble”, Josh Getlin1994-10-21 (human evolution, sociology; backlinks; similar)⁠:

[Profile of noted entomologist E. O. Wilson on the occasion of his autobiography, Naturalist. Wilson became interested in insects as a child, making a mark studying scent trails laid down by ants, then shifting into application of evolutionary logic to human groups such as warfare and sports (triggering fierce attacks from activists & Marxists like Stephen Jay Gould), and for getting involved in politics as an environmentalist, warning about rapid species diversity loss.]

Twenty years later, many of Wilson’s conclusions have been accepted as mainstream. He has since clarified his theories to argue that human behavior is a product of cultural and genetic evolution. The great challenge facing science, he says, is to probe the way those two influences interact. Meanwhile, he’s received numerous honors, winning the 1979 Pulitzer Prize for On Human Nature (Harvard), a response to sociobiology critics, and the 1991 Pulitzer Prize for The Ants (Harvard), a 700-page opus written with Bert Holldobler. Yet memories of his bitter conflicts have eased only slightly. The day he was doused with ice water “may be the only occasion in recent American history on which a scientist was physically attacked, however mildly, for the expression of an idea”, he writes. “How could an entomologist with a penchant for solitude provoke a tumult of this proportion?”

…In a packed lecture hall, he spreads the word. Here, biodiversity is more than an abstract concept. Dimming the lights, Wilson shows students a dramatic slide—a nighttime photo of Earth taken by satellites—and points out eerie flames stretching across the Equator, across Latin America and Asia. They’re fires burning out of control in the rain forests on any given evening. It’s a disturbing sight, yet Wilson says there is still time to save the planet.

On another morning, he compares human beings to ants. Consider man’s selfishness and ambition versus the insects’ drive to help their community. They’ll sacrifice their lives for the common good, if need be. Biology doesn’t get more basic than this, and Wilson ends the lesson amid gales of laughter by raising the subject of Marxism. Why did it fail? “Good ideology”, he says dryly. “Wrong species.”

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