Most people think of Aristotle as a philosopher, not a scientist. Evolutionary biologist Armand Marie Leroi (Mutants) argues that Aristotle not only was a man of science, too, but perhaps the first true scientist.
In The Lagoon: How Aristotle Invented Science, Leroi sets out to read Aristotle's writings from the viewpoint of a fellow biologist. He begins with the disclaimer that biologists make poor historians, then he proves himself wrong by setting Aristotle firmly in his historical and philosophical context-- taking a few digs at Plato's anti-empirical bias along the way.
Like Aristotle, Leroi moves between the big picture and tiny details, from Aristotle's theories about knowledge, form and soul to his empirical observations of dogfish embryos. Leroi describes Aristotle's process--a combination of direct observation, investigation of popular wisdom, skepticism and guesswork--and speculates about his sources for animals he had no personal knowledge of. He considers the things Aristotle got right (the elephant does not have a gall bladder) and the things he got wrong (elephants do, in fact, have knees.)
Leroi lightens the often technical discussions with anecdotes of his experiences walking in Aristotle's footsteps: talking with fisherman on the island of Lesbos where the philosopher lived and worked, dissecting a cuttlefish, reading Aristotle's description of the heart's structure in conjunction with a modern diagram. Planting itself firmly at the crossroads of biology, philosophy and history, The Lagoon is a challenging read but never dull. --Pamela Toler, blogging at History in the Margins