William Emerson Ritter | |
|---|---|
.jpg) William E. Ritter | |
| Born | (1856-11-21)November 21, 1856 Hampden Township,Columbia County, Wisconsin |
| Died | January 10, 1944(1944-01-10) (aged 87) |
| Alma mater | Harvard University |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | Scripps Institution of Oceanography University of California, San Diego |
William Emerson Ritter (November 21, 1856 – January 10, 1944) was an American biologist.
Ritter initiated and shaped the Marine Biological Association of San Diego (nowScripps Institution of Oceanography ofUC San Diego) and the American Society for the Dissemination of Science (now theSociety for Science and the Public andScience News). Innovative and entrepreneurial, with a deep desire for human service, he worked tirelessly to educate people in scientific thinking. He was the first biologist to propose a theory of systems, and seems to be the originator of the termorganicism for biological purposes.
William Emerson Ritter was born on a farm on November 21, 1856, in Hampden Township,Columbia County, Wisconsin. His parents, Horatio and Leonora Ritter, moved from New York a few years earlier. The Ritter household included William, his brother Frank, his sisters Mary, Ella, and Flora, and his maternal grandparents, Nathan and Ruby Eason. For the first few years of his life his paternal grandparents, Ezra and Mary Ritter, were also living in the area. The family worked hard on the farm, cultivating corn, wheat, potatoes, apples, and other crops.[1]
Early correspondence shows that he always liked school, and was always seeking meaning—seeking to do something with his life. In 1876, he had the chance to attend high school in Columbus, Wisconsin, which had opened that year. Like many youth, he struggled with what to do with his life. After attending a year of high school, he began to teach at a Hampden school, while continuing his studies. In 1879, he attended college at the Oshkosh Normal School (now theUniversity of Wisconsin–Oshkosh). He left there after only one year due to financial reasons, and took a job teaching inColumbus, Wisconsin. He hoped to earn enough money to go back to college.[1]
In 1881, he took a job as a teacher inOconto, Wisconsin. There, he continued to read voraciously, and had a particular attraction for science. It was here that he started to develop a passion for helping people understand science. He believed that science was the key to the future of society, and that if people could be taught to think with the reasoned, thoughtful, unbiased critical perspective of science, that much suffering in the world could be alleviated.[1]
Ritter went back to college in Oshkosh. While he was there, he read a geology textbook byJoseph LeConte, a professor at theUniversity of California, Berkeley. Ritter was so impressed by the book, and its thoughtful, unbiased perspectives, that he made the decision to go to the University of California and study withJoseph LeConte. He graduated with a teaching certificate from Oshkosh in 1884, and then moved to California to finish his BA at the university.[1]
Ritter needed to earn money for school, and so became a schoolteacher and tutor to pay for his tuition. After a few years of alternately taking classes and teaching to earn money, he graduated with his BA in 1888. The next year he received a scholarship to go toHarvard University for his MA and Ph.D. in zoology.[1]
He spent a few summers at Marine Laboratories, and in 1891 was given a job teaching biology at the University of California in Berkeley.[1]
Joseph LeConte was the chair of all the scientific fields at the university. In the fall of 1891, following the growing trend of science specialization, the science department was divided into four departments, and Ritter was appointed the chair of the new zoology department.[1]
It was also in 1891 that he married a Berkeley physician,Mary Bennett.[2] The couple honeymooned at theHotel del Coronado nearSan Diego; they spent part of their time on marine research, collecting blind goby fish in the ocean nearPoint Loma. In San Diego he met a local physician and naturalist,Dr. Fred Baker, who would later encourage him to build a marine biological laboratory in San Diego.[3]
Ritter was chosen to be among the elite scientists of the 1899Harriman Alaska Expedition. Chosen for his knowledge of marine biology in general and marine invertebrates in particular, he accompanied the group of scientists on their exploration of Alaska.
Ritter, like many of his contemporaries, believed it was important to study living things in their natural environment rather than isolate them in laboratory conditions. He was familiar with the work being done at field research stations like theMarine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole (1888), theHopkins Marine Laboratory (1892), and the Puget Sound Biological Station, later known as theFriday Harbor Laboratories (1903).[4]
Ritter wanted to set up a permanent laboratory to study the biology along the Pacific coast. Between 1892 and 1902, he and his colleagues set up temporary research sites at Pacific Grove, Avalon Bay, and San Pedro Harbor. His goal was frustrated by lack of money and lack of an appropriate site.[5]
In 1903, Ritter was introduced to newspaper magnateE.W. Scripps who, together with his half-sister,Ellen Browning Scripps, agreed to fund his work in San Diego. In early 1903, Ritter established a biological laboratory in theHotel del Coronado's boathouse at Glorietta Bight. At the end of the year, the Marine Biological Association of San Diego was founded with Ritter as scientific director.[5][6]
In 1905, the laboratory moved from Coronado toLa Jolla where Ritter secured a lease of land inLa Jolla Park, just aboveThe Cove. ArchitectsWilliam S. Hebbard andIrving J. Gill built what was known as the "little green laboratory at the Cove."[6]
Two years later, the Biological Association purchased a 170-acre (0.69 km2) site atLa Jolla Shores which would provide space for future expansion and isolation from the inevitable growth of La Jolla.Ellen Browning Scripps gave a substantial endowment that made possible the construction of theGeorge H. Scripps Laboratory (1910).[6]
In 1912, the Biological Association became a department within the University of California and was renamed The Scripps Institution for Biological Research, later theScripps Institution of Oceanography.[2] Donations byEllen Browning Scripps made possible the construction of a pier, a public aquarium, and a library-museum building. She also paid for the construction of a director's residence and cottages for staff and their families.[6]
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Ritter andE.W. Scripps became good friends as well as business partners. It seemed to be an odd couple, as Ritter was kind, quiet, and scholarly, and Scripps was opinionated and boisterous, a self-described "damned old crank." Scripps, however, continued to push Ritter to make biology more practical. They came to believe that since people were biological animals, then biology ought to have some insights into human behavior and human motivation.
After World War I, Scripps and Ritter became convinced that nations needed a forum to rationally work out their differences, rather than going to war. They became great advocates for theLeague of Nations, believing it could be an alternative to war.
Both Ritter and Scripps believed that science had become too parochial. Many scientists had no desire to solve human problems or even share their insights with the laity. Many scientists felt that sharing their scientific discoveries with the popular media would somehow soil their pure discovery. Ritter and Scripps, on the other hand, believed that it was critical to share these scientific discoveries, and by doing so, would help people to "think like a scientist"—with a reasoned thoughtfulness. By the end of 1920, Ritter and Scripps had come to the conclusion that a newspaper would be the best avenue for sharing these scientific discoveries. With Scripps funding, and Ritter as the scientific director, they started theScience Service in Washington DC, using a newspaper format (now Science News) to share science information and discoveries.
One of the great biological controversies of the day was "what is life?" One school of thought wasmechanism, which believed that there is no essential difference between a rock and a human life—it's simply a matter of the chemistry involved. If all the chemical reactions were known, we would understand what makes life. The mechanists were fond of saying things like, "the brain secretes thoughts in the same way that the kidneys secrete urine."[7]
On the other hand, the school of thought calledvitalism said that there was something different in life than in non-life. There was a vital force—a spiritual force—that made life. Rocks did not have the vital force. Humans did. The vitalists and the mechanists entered endless debates and wrote endless papers advocating their perspective.
According toErnst Mayr,[8] Ritter introduced the third school of thought: organicism. While the term "organicism" had been used before, Ritter was the first to use it for biological purposes and to create a theory of it. Organicism believed that life was interrelationships between living things, living in a complex web. Today, organicism might be calledsystems theory. In 1918, Ritter wrote his organicist tome,The Unity of the Organism, which he believed was his magnum opus.
He continued his study and science advocacy into his later years. He continued to explore the question that E.W. Scripps gave to him, "What is this damned human animal, anyway?" He continued to explore human nature, from a philosophically zoological point of view.[9]
The University of California awarded him the Doctor of Laws degree in 1933. He continued to be a tireless advocate of evolution, science education, and human service. He continued to write, finishing his last published book,The California Woodpecker and I, at the age of 81. At the time of his death, on January 10, 1944, he had 5 book-length unpublished manuscripts written, and parts of many other books and articles. His literary executor, Edna Bailey, consolidated his manuscripts and published sections of them, posthumously, under the titleCharles Darwin and the Golden Rule.
| Preceded by Founder ofSIO | Director ofScripps Institution of Oceanography 1903–1924 | Succeeded by |
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