Microbe Hunters

I recently finished the book "Microbe Hunters" by Paul de Kruif, and I can say that I'm glad I read it. It describes the lives of early microbiologists, and explains their discoveries in an easy to understand way.

Because English has changed a lot since Microbe Hunters was written, the writing style can be hard to follow at times, but if you don't read it too quickly, it's not a problem at all.

The book is split into sections, each one about one microbe hunter in particular, and each microbe hunter's section is split into chapters. I usually read one of these chapters per day, because if I read much more than that I'd lose track of the story.

I can hardly remember any individual Microbe Hunter, because the book was long enough that I forgot a good deal of it, but I'm glad I read it because I now know how the microbe hunters felt to work in a largely ridiculed field.

Microbes had been a very controversial subject when they were first discovered. People didn't want to give up their old beliefs that spirits were the cause of all diseases known to man. When scientists found their own explanation that clashed with popular belief, they were laughed at, and even ignored.

This reminds me of a lot of how science works now. When creationists find some mind-blowing proof for God, the rest of the scientific world just laughs at them, and usually ignore it. The only difference is that the microbe hunters eventually got the message across that microbes were indeed real, and the cause of almost every disease.

Microbe Hunters makes for an interesting read, and I would like to read it again sometime.