E.O. Wilson: TED PrizeHelp build the Encyclopedia of Life

Biologist E.O. Wilson explores the world of ants and other tiny creatures, and writes movingly about the way all creatures great and small are interdependent.

Why you should listen to him: One of the world's most distinguished scientists, E.O. Wilson is a professor and honorary curator in entomology at Harvard. In 1975, he published Sociobiology: The New Synthesis, a work that described social behavior, from ants to humans.
Drawing from his deep knowledge of the Earth's "little creatures" and his sense that their contribution to the planet's ecology is underappreciated, he produced what may be his most important book, The Diversity of Life. In it he describes how an intricately interconnected natural system is threatened by man's encroachment, in a crisis he calls the "sixth extinction" (the fifth one wiped out the dinosaurs).
With his most recent book, The Creation, he wants to put the differences of science- and faith-based explanations aside "to protect Earth's vanishing natural habitats and species ...; in other words, the Creation, however we believe it came into existence."