bright spots in bleak reading

"John Mercer was an English eccentric and, frankly, somewhat disreputable. The list of charges against him is long. He had a penchant for doing his fieldwork in the nude, and was once convicted for jogging naked near his campus at Ohio State University, in Columbus. He ... once abandoned two graduate students, including his acolyte and eventual successor ... high in the Andes after the money ran out on a field trip."

- With Speed and Violence: Why Scientists Fear Tipping Points in Climate Change, Fred Pearce