9.6 Books 739 JW 2/6/05 4:56 PM Page 740

9.6 books 739 JW 2/6/05 4:56 PM Page 740

BOOKS & ARTS NATURE|Vol 435|9 June 2005

he was often not sturdy enough, physically and the gap is filled exceptionally well. As for know who Craig was. According to Burkhardt: mentally, to handle the load that he imposed Born’s science, the job is done for the physicist, “Thorpe, supposing Craig was dead, was on himself. This was compounded by his who can apply well-informed opinions to astonished to learn that Craig was not only sometimes shaky marriage to a fragile and not grade the significance of the people and dis- alive but in the audience.” always faithful woman. That he produced so coveries described. But other readers would The development of ethology has been much despite all this is remarkable. The por- have benefited from an account of Born’s work greatly influenced by the different personali- trait that emerges is of a refined intellectual of that did a better job of separating the wheat ties involved. Nowhere is this shown more the highest ethical standards, unwilling or from the chaff. clearly than in the relationship between the unable to advocate effectively on his own All the book’s readers would have benefited two key figures in the field, Lorenz and Tin- behalf — even accepting his wife’s demand had the editor insisted that we do not need to bergen. The characters of these two men could that their children should not attend the Nobel know the names of all those Alpine hotels the hardly have been more different. Whereas ceremonies. Although he was a refugee from Borns visited, what they ate there, and a bar- Lorenz was vain, self-centred, an extrovert and Nazi Germany, he was profoundly disturbed rage of other details. This mass of minutae a self-styled philosopher, Tinbergen was mod- to see his beloved pure physics spawning often produces a haze that could make it hard est, an introvert and an empiricist. Lorenz nuclear weapons in the hands of some of his for readers to see what is most exceptional and characterized himself as a ‘farmer’, who mainly most talented students: Robert Oppenheimer, long-lasting among Born’s many achieve- observed the domesticated birds that he kept Edward Teller, Victor Weisskopf and the spy ments. Nevertheless, there is no question that around his own house, in contrast to the Klaus Fuchs. any future work on Born will find this book to ‘hunter’, Tinbergen, who conducted controlled So does this book fill what is a serious gap in be an indispensable study of this major figure experiments both in the field and in the labo- the history of twentieth-century physics? In in one of the most profound transformations ratory. The contrast between the two men contrast to the other great figures in the quan- in the history of science. ■ became painfully obvious during the Second tum revolution, Born’s personality has never Kurt Gottfried is in the Physics Department, World War, when Lorenz was a doctor in the been described in any depth, and this part of Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA. German army and Tinbergen was interred in a detention camp for Dutch intellectuals. Burkhardt devotes an entire chapter to Lorenz’s conduct during the Nazi regime, and shows that, blinded by ambition, Lorenz did Acting on instinct not distance himself from Nazi doctrine. After the war it took some time for the wounds to Patterns of Behavior: Konrad Lorenz, Niko much more to the development of ethology if heal so that the two friends could resume their Tinbergen, and the Founding of Ethology they’d had the resources and the intellectual scientific partnership. by Richard W. Burkhardt, Jr freedom to pursue their empirical studies and One of Tinbergen’s lasting contributions is University of Chicago Press: 2005. 636 pp. develop new ideas. A particularly poignant the identification of the four main problems in $80, £56 (hbk); $29, £20.50 (pbk) example of this is the pioneering biologist animal behaviour: evolution, function, devel- Wallace Craig, who greatly influenced Lorenz opment and causation. Tinbergen has credited Johan J. Bolhuis but struggled to make ends meet for most of British biologist Julian Huxley with identifying The Austrian Konrad Lorenz and Dutchman his life. When the great British ethologist three of these as the main problems in biology, Niko Tinbergen founded ethology, the study William Thorpe lectured at Harvard in 1951, to which he merely added development. On of animal behaviour, at the start of the twenti- he paid tribute to his American colleagues reading Burkhardt’s account, however, it eth century. The history of the ‘study of Charles Otis Whitman, Wheeler and Craig. seems that Tinbergen was being rather gener- instinct’, as it was once known, attracts inter- Thorpe was surprised that only one or two ous towards Huxley. “It is from a failure to dis- est from a range of disciplines, and this natu- members of his large audience seemed to tinguish between ultimate cause, immediate rally affects the viewpoint of books on the subject. Niko’s Nature (Oxford University Press, 2003), for example, a recent biography of Tinbergen, was written by his one-time friend and pupil Hans Kruuk (for a review see Nature 427, 293–294; 2004). In contrast,

Richard Burkhardt is a historian, not an ethol- IMAGES TIME LIFE/GETTY ogist, so his book Patterns of Behavior is quite different. Nevertheless, it is not a dry factual biography of a scientific discipline, but a fascinating and often entertaining account of the life and work of some of ethology’s key figures. Burkhardt has done a tremendous job, meticulously analysing and describing the rise of ethology. He consulted a multitude of written sources and interviewed many of the important players. Modern history of science is not only about scientific concepts, Burkhardt explains, but is just as much about the social context of the individual scientists — what he likes to call “ethology’s ecologies”. The term ‘ethology’ was introduced by the American William Wheeler, and US biologists active around the end of the nineteenth century might have contributed Up close and personal: Konrad Lorenz liked to observe birds in their natural habitats.

NATURE|Vol 435|9 June 2005 BOOKS & ARTS

cause, and mere necessary machinery, that so depends on who you ask: a behavioural ecolo- by Lorenz, Tinbergen and their colleagues that much of the barren disputes of biology are gist and a cognitive ethologist might give you made the study of animal behaviour what it is due,” wrote Huxley. It would seem that, with different answers. Nevertheless, Burkhardt today. In order to study the genomic or neural such a sloppy and essentially misguided inter- notes that the core ideas of classical ethology mechanisms of behaviour, we need to know pretation, these disputes would not be solved dissipated astonishingly rapidly; few contem- how behaviour works, and for that an ethologi- in a hurry. Unfortunately, even Tinbergen’s porary ethologists would use such concepts cal analysis is crucial. This wonderful book careful analysis of cause and function could as ‘action-specific energy’, for example. This shows very clearly how early ethologists made not prevent a confusion of concepts that con- discarding of outmoded ideas would seem such analysis possible. ■ tinues to this day. natural for any vibrant scientific discipline. Johan J. Bolhuis is in the Department of Biology, Some will say that ethology is no longer a Burkhardt rightly maintains that it was the Utrecht University, Padualaan 14, scientific discipline in its own right, but that empirical and theoretical approach introduced 3584 CH Utrecht, The Netherlands.

DANCE Einstein in motion

Constant Speed metallic stage is bathed in light. Rambert Dance Company Or they could be photons, tight At Sadler’s Wells, London, 24–28 May packets of energy that also have 2005. UK tour begins September 2005. concerted, wave-like motions. A. CRICKMAY www.rambert.org.uk Then the whiteness is subsumed by red, with red lighting and red Alison Wright costumes as more dancers join I admit, I cringed when I heard that the UK the fray, evolving eventually Institute of Physics (IOP) had commissioned a through the full spectrum of ballet to celebrate the World Year of Physics colour. The colour-coded dancers 2005, or ‘Einstein Year’. Truly enlightening are compartmentalized — quan- meetings of art and science are rare indeed. tized, if you like — each pair Einstein: The Ballet? Please, no. exploring its own motion at its But the IOP had wisely put themselves in own frequency until the rainbow the hands of the Rambert Dance Company, finale. The music by Franz Lehár, and the results, revealed at a Sadler’s Wells pre- composed like Einstein’s physics mière on 24 May, are stunning. in 1905, adds another dimension: Constant Speed is inspired by Einstein’s 1905 you can almost imagine Einstein publications; the World Year of Physics cele- day-dreaming, seeing the multi- brates their centenary. From the patent office coloured quanta of his theory in Bern, Switzerland, Einstein dashed off before him as he hummed along five papers, all of them seminal work, on three to the pop music of his day. themes: brownian motion, the photoelectric At just 27 minutes long, the effect and the special theory of relativity. swirling colour of Constant Speed Relativity, and Eǃmc2, will be forever asso- seemed to be over all too quickly. ciated with Einstein. But it is his work on the But the work was superbly com- photoelectric effect, which established the plemented by the preceding pro- notion of the ‘quantum’, that Einstein himself gramme, especially Momenta, regarded as his most revolutionary. The effect created by Rambert dancer describes the release of electrons from a metal Mikaela Polley. To music by when light is shone on its surface. To explain Patrick Nunn, the dance builds the relation between the energy of the electrons steadily in energy, speed and released and the frequency of the incident coherence (more physics!). Dif- light, Einstein proposed that light energy is ferent moods were created by the transferred to the electrons in distinct chunks, tawdry humour of the opening or quanta. No less significant was his study of Getting physical: dancers of the Rambert Dance Company. piece, Judgement of Paris, and the fluctuation phenomena within the framework heart-rending emotion of Dark of kinetic-molecular theory — work that think, he shied away from specifically repre- Elegies. However, the maturity of these pieces, recalled the brownian motion seen in the senting relativity in the piece, alluding only in choreographed by Anthony Tudor in the dance of pollen grains in water decades earlier. the title to that theory’s central tenet of a con- 1930s, perhaps highlighted a few rough edges Choreographer Mark Baldwin, the artistic stant speed of light. Brownian motion, on the in Constant Speed. director of the Rambert, developed Constant other hand, is a concept easily reflected in the The physics is there if you look — but don’t Speed through conversations with Ray Rivers, movements and configuration of the dancers. look too hard. As Baldwin said, this is not a professor of theoretical physics at Imperial But it is the ideas surrounding the photoelec- physics lesson. Rather, Constant Speed is about College London. Although he claims to be tric effect that dominate Constant Speed. inspiration: inspiring physics and inspired ignorant of physics, Baldwin was struck by a Running on to the stage, fists clenched and dance. ■ similarity of language — space, time, energy — elbows pumping, the white-clad dancers could Alison Wright is the editor of Nature Physics. between physics and dance. Quite rightly, I be photoelectrons, released as the seemingly ➧ www.nature.com/naturephysics