If I take a poll of all scientists, young and old, then I am willing to bet that over half of them would not know who is Alfred Russel Wallace. Yet at the same time there is no doubt that 99% of those polled would instantly recognize the name of Darwin whose 200^th birthday we are celebrating this week. But Wallace was a noted scientist contemporary with Darwin and who in fact independently invented the theory of evolution and natural selection. But it is his bad luck that when he wrote his short paper on the subject in 1858, Darwin was already completing his treatise “On the Origin of Species”. Thus he is singularly unlucky to become a footnote on the greatest scientific discovery of the Nineteenth century.

Not being a biologist myself, I only became aware of the name of Wallace when my daughter gave me a birthday present of the book - Infinite Tropics by Andrew Berry, Vesco publisher 2002 which is an anthology of the scientific works and biography of Wallace with a preface by the late Stephen Jay Gould.

“Wallace, unlike Darwin who worked tenaciously and patiently on a single subject, is a restless intellect allowing himself to wonder naively over many subjects, such as spiritualism, possibility of life on Mars, vaccination for smallpox, and spreading himself too thin  To be fair, Wallace was of poor background, shy, awkward, and lacking what might be called the modern skill of self-promotion while Darwin enjoyed the benefit of private wealth, dignity of bearing, and simple luxury of being first. Darwin was 14 years older and had the main idea earlier. (Part of Gould’s preface of the above book)”

Here is perhaps a lesson for young scientists – Depth is preferred over breadth in science.  But it is often the reverse in industry and commerce.