Tl;dr — A great read on the life and evolutionary thinking of Lamarck, going far beyond the caricature of his work that is often presented post-Darwin. The book’s last section focused on the evolution of evolutionary theory after Lamarck I found uncharitable; but nonetheless a book I highly recommend on the history of evolutionary thinking. I recently read a biography of Alfred Russel Wallace and learned much more about his evolutionary thinking than I had previously been exposed to. When you learn evolutionary theory today, you learn about Darwin and the thinkers that came after him to refine his theory of natural selection. But it’s often on you to read the history to find out what came before (next month’s book guide will almost certainly be one on the history of evolutionary thinking — stay tuned!). When I came across The Power of Life: The Invention of Biology and the Revolutionary Science of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck by Jessica Riskin, it was an instant addition to my reading list. History of science is one of my favorite genres of books because you gain so much insight into current science knowing the deep history of thinkers before. Although not formally a biography of Lamarck, or at least not marketed as one, it mostly is but with additional context of the burgeoning field of biology — a term Lamarck coined. Lamarck, like most early naturalists, had the privilege of being a polymath in a way that is almost impossible today. His career spanned botany, zoology, and meteorology, publishing vast and influential works, including his own evolutionary theory the year Darwin was born. What all of these naturalists — Lamarck, Wallace, and Darwin alike — all have the benefit of interdisciplinary curiosity and practice in a way that is extremely difficult in today’s modern scientific environment, at least in one’s early career. Today many who do bridge disciplines do so only post-tenure. But the benefit of interdisciplinary thinking is bigger thinking; the kind that...