We follow their progress and their battles as they struggle to understand how life works. A milestone in that saga comes in 1967 when Robert MacArthur and Edward O. Wilson publish a mathematical treatise called The Theory of Island Biogeography . MacArthur and Wilson argue that the number of species on any given island represents a balance between immigration and extinction. The species themselves may change as some become extinct and new ones arrive, but there is for every island an equilibrium. Quammen explains why islands are a good place to start.
Islands are distinct from mainlands in that they represent simplified, exaggerated versions . .
Wilson is no mere theorist. He and his then graduate student, Dan Simberloff, tested the theory in Florida Bay. They censused the insects on minute mangrove islands, then had a professional exterminator from Miami wrap the islands in canvas a la Christo and fumigate them. After several years they censused the islands again. Their insect populations all had equilibrated around their original numbers.