Inspiration, mentor and a truly great man: Tim Flannery farewells scientist James Lovelock, who has returned to Gaia at 103

By Tim Flannery, Professorial fellow, Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, The University of Melbourne

James Lovelock, scientist and inventor, returned to Gaia on his 103rd birthday, July 26 2022.

Just three years earlier, I had attended his 100th birthday celebration at Blenheim Castle, Oxfordshire. There he sat, surrounded by some of the greats of British science, including the astronomer and ex-president of the Royal Society Sir Martin Rees, and other rather idiosyncratic thinkers such as the diplomat Sir Crispin Tickell and the French philosopher Bernard Latour, who had travelled from overseas to be there.

Lovelock was in rude good health. Later, at the Lovelock Centenary…

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