[Excerpted from Chapter 9 of Wild Life: Adventures of an Evolutionary Biologist by Prof. Robert Trivers.] It used to be said some forty years ago in Jamaica that if you wanted to murder someone, you should bring him first to Southfield because no one has ever been convicted of murder in Southfield. I am not... Read More

[Excerpted from Chapter 11 of Wild Life: Adventures of an Evolutionary Biologist by Prof. Robert Trivers.] According to Huey, the Black Panther Party started as a simple, old-fashioned robbery, which he was planning with a number of confederates. Problem was he was reading Franz Fanon and becoming politically conscious. So he decided to use the... Read More

[Excerpted from Chapter 11 of Wild Life: Adventures of an Evolutionary Biologist by Prof. Robert Trivers.] One of the few benefits of moving from Harvard to the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1978 was the chance to meet the legendary founder of the Black Panther Party Huey Newton. Indeed he was waved in... Read More

[Excerpted from Chapter 14 of Wild Life: Adventures of an Evolutionary Biologist by Prof. Robert Trivers.] The low point in my relationship with Jamaica came fairly recently. In 2007 I won the Crafoord Prize from the Swedish Royal Society. It was worth $500,000. When it was announced in the local Jamaican newspaper, I knew immediately... Read More

Some of the following people are well worth remembering for their great achievements, and the way they did them; others are not. But all were well known in their time and exercised undue influence. I have already described the parallel cases of Ernst Mayr and Huey Newton, while Bill Drury was the most important influence... Read More