Gaia Vince is the First Woman to Win the 2015 Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books

Posted on September 26, 2015

Gaia Vince just became the first solo woman to win the prestigious Royal Society Science Book of the Year award for her book, Adventures in the Anthropocene: A Journey to the Heart of the Planet. Ms. Vince is a science editor and journalist who completed a 800 day tour of the globe which was the basis of her book.

The book investigates the Anthropocene Age (Age of the Humans) the epoch in which we currently live and how humans are changing the planet, for the better and for the worse. Ms. Vince's treks are simply amazing. She swam with sharks, trekked up mountains, got groomed by apes, investigated the disappearing habitats of koalas and generally went everywhere she could think of on planet Earth where there was a good science story to tell.

Ms. Vince is the opinion, analysis and features editor for the journal Nature Climate Change and writes for such outlets as the BBC, The Guardian, New Scientist and the science journal Nature, where she was the news editor.

The Royal Society is a Fellowship of many of the world's most eminent scientists. It was founded on November 28, 1660, at Gresham College. It is the oldest scientific academy in continuous existence. The society's motto is Nullius in verba which means "Take nobody's word for it." The society rejects the domination of authority and reveres the scientific method. This was a pretty revolutionary concept at a time when religion and politics could end the career -- or the life -- of a scientist or writer whose work didn't agree with the powers that be.

The 2015 Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books was founded in 1988 to celebrate outstanding popular science books. It has been won previously by Stephen Hawking and Bill Bryson for their "ambitious and essential" work. Ms. Vince won the prize after a unanimous vote by the judging panel. She prevailed over an impressive short list which included Alex Through the Looking Glass: How Life Reflects Numbers, and Numbers Reflect Life by Alex Bellos, OCD and the True Story of a Life Lost in Thought by David Adam Smashing Physics by Jon Butterworth, Life's Greatest Secret: The Story of the Race to Crack the Genetic Code by Matthew Cobb and Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology by Jim Al-Khalili and Johnjoe McFadden. The prize carries a cash prize of 25,000 British puonds. Ms. Vince was awarded the prize by Professor Brian Cox OBE, currently the Royal Society’s Professor of Public Engagement in Science.

In an interview with the BBC, Ms. Vince said "I really wanted it to be an optimistic book, because I'm an optimist; because we are incredible, we are ingenious, we are this resourceful species." Although she saw quite a bit of devastation in her travels, she still believes that humans will meet the challenges ahead saying, "So, yes, although we've put ourselves in this position, and are reaching all sorts of crises in various different ways in terms of food, water, energy, etc - we're also very capable of turning things around."

You can read more about Ms. Vince and watch videos of her travels on her website. Here she is in the Namibian Desert near Swakupmond meeting a desert gecko which is totally transparent. It only moves at night.