The Passing of a 'Scientific Nomad'

"What sort of man, with what strengths and weaknesses, what convictions, what doubts, have I been?"

I normally don't read the obituaries. I'll scan the tag lines of those people who have been deemed worthy of a write-up, but rarely will I read the entire write-up. 'Rarely' happened today when the tag line was 'Adventurer worked at the edges of science'. My curiosity was peaked when I realized we were talking about the man who had come up with the now-disproved hundredth monkey theory - Lyall Watson. (I'll link you to a better write-up, which is worth reading in its entirety.)

His 1973 book Supernature had been part of a collection of large collection of books on the paranormal that I inherited some years ago. I like interesting ideas, and this book was full of them. But I had never connected this book with the hundredth monkey theory, nor had I remembered the name of the man responsible for either. Watson's ideas were not synonymous with his name, and perhaps that says something about him, his ideas, or both.

Having recently finished reading The Reluctant Mr. Darwin, by David Quammen (2007), I can't help but compare the two men and think about what aspects of their lives and personalities were the same or different. Both saw large portions of the world. Both were highly educated in their respective times. Both were biologists with diverse interests. Both entertained and published radical, though not entirely unheard of, ideas. Both lived to see their books become best-sellers.

Quantifying their differences is a bit harder. The most obvious one is that Darwin fostered and maintained solid contacts with his academic peers, where Watson acknowledged his role as an 'outsider'. Did Darwin suffered more personal angst because of his closer attachment to the current state of 'orthodox' knowledge? It's tempting to wonder who had a better quality of life. Was one man more driven than the other to make a substantial contribution?

What would each man have thought of the other, if they could have met?