Gaia metaphor unfalsifiable

Abstract

Jim Lovelock's nice-guy image may not last if he persists in responding to his critics by impugning their motives. Biologists, he says, "seem to see Gaia as another threat to the sanctity of their creature, neo-darwinism". Reductionists, he says, are engaged in a "dogmatic crusade". Lovelock apparently even sees fit to accuse me of a witch hunt: "like some figure of the Inquisition, he publicly burned several imaginary Gaias, and his pyrotechnic demolition of the strong Gaia stole the show. But when the sparks faded, the real system Gaia was still there hidden only by the smoke".

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