Carl Zimmer Quote

Guns and slavery grew even more intertwined in the Galton family fortune. By the 1750s, the Galtons were delivering more than twenty-five thousand guns a year to European traders, who sold the weapons to African states engaged in increasingly bloody battles. The warring states captured prisoners in the fights, and then sold them to European slave traders. Before long, they demanded to be paid for the slaves with more guns instead of gold.

Carl Zimmer

Guns and slavery grew even more intertwined in the Galton family fortune. By the 1750s, the Galtons were delivering more than twenty-five thousand guns a year to European traders, who sold the weapons to African states engaged in increasingly bloody battles. The warring states captured prisoners in the fights, and then sold them to European slave traders. Before long, they demanded to be paid for the slaves with more guns instead of gold.

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About Carl Zimmer

Carl Zimmer (born 1966) is a popular science writer, blogger, columnist, and journalist who specializes in the topics of evolution, parasites, and heredity. The author of many books, he contributes science essays to publications such as The New York Times, Discover, and National Geographic. He is a fellow at Yale University's Morse College and adjunct professor of molecular biophysics and biochemistry at Yale University. Zimmer also gives frequent lectures and has appeared on many radio shows, including National Public Radio's Radiolab, Fresh Air, and This American Life.
Zimmer describes his journalistic beat as "life" or "what it means to be alive". He is the only science writer to have a species of tapeworm named after him (Acanthobothrium zimmeri). Zimmer's father is Dick Zimmer, a Republican politician from New Jersey, who was a member of U.S. House of Representatives from 1991 to 1997.