Lewis Thomas (1913–1993)

2023 - ‘70’s Immersion Reading Challenge

The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher (#1) by Lewis Thomas (1974; 1884 ed.) 180 pages.

This book is not what I thought it was going to be about. I have basal cell melanoma on my nose that keeps popping up. I thought I could learn a thing or two. But, nope! It contains an assortment of short essays of the authors thoughts, opinions and ideas on lives of cells, their use and their purpose for existing in different species here on earth. You will need to keep a dictionary close by.

It is very reminiscent of Carl Sagan’s Cosmos (1980), except Thomas focuses more on earth; whereas, Sagan focuses on the universe. But, like Sagan, Thomas was a bit of a dreamer and rambled on and on about a lot of “what ifs”. What if we were to communicate with aliens in outer space? What if we had control over our own cells, telling them what to do instead of them telling us what to do? Rambling! This was a long, tedious and an absolute boring read.

Just so you know where this author stands on the issue of the formation of life, he states:

The uniformity of the earth’s life, more astonishing than its diversity, is accountable by the high probability that we arrived, originally, from some single cell, fertilized in a bolt of lightning as the earth cooled. (p. 3)

You will read a lot of his opinions stated as facts about evolution with no mention of God’s helping hand in the matter what-so-ever. That’s fine. As an adult, accept it or not.

But, why would I even need to know that he is a Democrat in this sort of book? As he is describing the life cycle of a slime mold cell, he writes:

At first they are single amebocytes swimming around, eating bacteria, aloof from each other, untouching, voting straight Republican. (p. 14) Hmm!

Really? But, if he wants to go there, then I get to put my two cents in too…just sayin'.… (más)