The Invention of Nature

Guest: Andrea Wulf, Author of “The Invention of Nature: Alexander Von Humboldt’s New World”  Alexander von Humboldt was the most famous man you’ve never heard of. He was a German aristocrat who invented nature as we know it today: the idea that earth is a web of interconnected life; that the health of a tree in a forest depends on the soil and the sky and the other plants and animals.  Humboldt was so admired that after his death in the mid-1800s, tens of thousands of people crammed the streets in cities around the world to celebrate him. If there’s a county, river, park or bay called Humboldt near you, it’s named after Alexander von Humboldt.  And yet, this is probably the first time you’re hearing about him, isn’t it?