Ferris Jabr is the New York Times bestselling author of Becoming Earth and a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine. Becoming Earth won the Rachel Carson Environment Book Award and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the Oregon Book Award, with reviewers describing it as an “electrifying” and “infectiously poetic” “masterwork” that “earns its place alongside the best of today’s essential popular science books, as well as acknowledged classics.” Ferris has also written for The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Harper’s, National Geographic, and Scientific American, receiving fellowships from Yale, MIT, and UC Berkeley, as well as grants from the Pulitzer Center and the Whiting Foundation. His work has been anthologized in four editions of The Best American Science and Nature Writing series. Notable articles include “The Social Life of Forests” (on underground networks of roots and fungi through which trees exchange resources and information), “The Earth Is Just as Alive as You Are” (exploring the scientific acceptance of the idea of a living, breathing planet), “Can Prairie Dogs Talk?” (examining whether prairie dogs and other creatures have true language), and “Why Walking Helps Us Think” (on the deep, intuitive connection between mind and feet). Ferris has an MA in journalism from New York University and a Bachelor of Science from Tufts University. He lives in Portland, Oregon with his husband, Ryan, and a thriving, thrumming, ever-changing wildlife garden.
Why their voice matters: Ferris illuminates the profound intelligence and aliveness of the natural world—from trees exchanging resources through underground fungal networks to prairie dogs potentially possessing true language to Earth itself functioning as a living, breathing organism—transforming our understanding of nature from backdrop to protagonist in the story of life. By revealing the deep connections between seemingly disparate phenomena—how walking helps us think, how microbes in clouds change the weather, how fish consciously experience pain—Jabr shows that recognizing the sentience, communication, and agency of nonhuman life demands fundamentally rethinking our relationship with the living planet. His “electrifying” and “infectiously poetic” writing bridges rigorous science and wonder, proving that accepting Earth’s aliveness is not mysticism but emerging scientific consensus with profound implications for how we live.
