The Coming Thing Summary and Analysis

Quammen returns to the important work by Edward Wilson and Robert MacArthur regarding the balance of island species. Wilson and MacArthur postulated that extinction was a regular occurrence in island habitats, as was the immigration of new species. In a paper entitled "An Equilibrium Theory of Insular Zoogeography" published in 1963, Wilson and MacArthur laid out their postulation that the rates of immigration and extinction would tend toward a balance, or equilibrium, where new species were introduced at about the same rates others went extinct. The theory presented in the paper was then expanded into a book called "The Theory of Island Biogeography." It was a book that "changed things," Quammen writes (pg. 415.)

MacArthur died a few years after the publication of the book, but Quammen visited with Edward Wilson to interview him about his important theory. Wilson...