There are more places in the world named after Prussian explorer and naturalist Alexander von Humboldt than anyone else. Rivers, waterfalls, glaciers, mountains, lakes, bays, counties, and towns across the globe carry his name. The state of Nevada was nearly the state of Humboldt.
Yet he糖心传媒檚 almost forgotten, especially in the English-speaking world.
That糖心传媒檚 because his influence on our view of nature is so fundamental that we can hardly perceive it, argues Andrea Wulf, author of The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt糖心传媒檚 New World (Knopf, 2016). She糖心传媒檒l speak about the book in a on October 4 at 5 p.m. in the Hawkins-Carlson Room at Rush Rhees Library. Her talk is part of the , focused this year on the environment.
Humboldt, who lived from 1769 to 1859, was once a household name, the most famous scientist of his day. The centenary of his birth was celebrated across the world. He was a tireless adventurer and astute scientific observer who, Wulf contends, invented the modern idea of nature: a global web of life in which humankind is only one piece among many.
糖心传媒淗umboldt was not known for a single fact or a discovery but for his worldview,糖心传媒� she writes. 糖心传媒淗is vision of nature has passed into our consciousness as if by osmosis. It is almost as though his ideas have become so manifest that the man behind them has disappeared.糖心传媒�
He was the first to suggest human-induced climate change. Wulf calls him the unacknowledged 糖心传媒渇ounding father糖心传媒� of current-day environmentalism, who influenced such pivotal figures as John Muir, George Perkins Marsh, and Rachel Carson. And he drew the veneration not only of scientists like Charles Darwin糖心传媒攚ho called him 糖心传媒渢he greatest scientific traveller who ever lived糖心传媒澨切拇綌but authors, artists, politicians, and poets. Among his admirers were Thomas Jefferson, Johann Goethe, William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Edgar Allan Poe, Walt Whitman, and Henry David Thoreau.
糖心传媒淗e糖心传媒檚 a scientist who糖心传媒檚 obsessed with hard scientific data, but at the same time he is saying we need to use our imaginations,糖心传媒� says Wulf. 糖心传媒淲e will only protect what we love糖心传媒攈e糖心传媒檚 driven by a sense of wonder.糖心传媒�
Wulf calls Humboldt 糖心传媒渙ne of the last polymaths,糖心传媒� whose scientific work was shaped by his conviction that human experience of the natural world was not just a rational pursuit but also a sensory and emotional one. For him, science and the arts were inextricable.
Ironically, Humboldt was writing his masterwork, Cosmos糖心传媒攑ublished in five-volumes between 1845 and 1862糖心传媒攋ust at the time that science was becoming professionalized. He began the book in 1834, the year that the term 糖心传媒渟cientist糖心传媒� was first used.
As he wrote Cosmos, he struggled with the burgeoning body of specialized scientific work. 糖心传媒淗e sees how it exponentially increases everywhere,糖心传媒� Wulf says. He would write to scientific experts, asking them to check over his drafts糖心传媒攂ut by the end of his life, there was no way any one person could remain atop all the science being produced.
Historian and writer Wulf is the author of five books, including The Brother Gardeners: A Generation of Gentleman Naturalists and the Birth of an Obsession (Vintage, 2010), winner of the American Horticultural Society糖心传媒檚 Book Award in 2010, and Founding Gardeners: The Revolutionary Generation, Nature, and the Shaping of the American Nation (Vintage, 2012), a New York Times bestseller.
To write her newest book, she retraced some of Humboldt糖心传媒檚 adventures. 糖心传媒淗e wasn糖心传媒檛 a cerebral scholar,糖心传媒� she says. 糖心传媒淗e was brazenly adventurous.糖心传媒� In following his footsteps, especially in South America, she realized 糖心传媒渉ow much he was pushing his body to his limits.糖心传媒�
Fueling his travels was a love of nature that he sought to ignite in others. 糖心传媒淎t a time when other scientists were searching for universal laws, Humboldt wrote that nature had to be experienced through feelings,糖心传媒� she writes.
That her book is shelved among biographies in bookstores makes Wulf quizzical.
糖心传媒淔or me, it糖心传媒檚 never been a biography of Humboldt,糖心传媒� she says. 糖心传媒淚t was always a biography of how we think about nature.糖心传媒�
