Confessions of a Habitual Skeptic

When I was invited by the Editorial Committee of the Annual Review of Plant Physiology to prepare these memoirs, I was pleased and flattered. At last I had an opportunity to leave a legacy in the literature, limited only by the laws of libel. As it turned out, writing these memoirs has proved extraordinarily difficult. Heretofore my literary ramblings have been constrained by the subject matter and disciplined by editors, Now I must try to record the diffuse speculations of a lifetime without benefit of external restraint.

This article is only marginally autobiographical. It is primarily the history of my ideas on biological topics. It is only incidentally a brief account of a life that has been fairly uneventful except in terms of my exposure to the influence of outstanding intellects.