Margulis was dismissed and ridiculed by her peers, but she gave as good as she got. Rebellious, and contemptuous of dogma, she was the consummate scientific iconoclast. “I don’t consider my ideas controversial,” she once said. “I consider them right.” She was certainly right about mitochondria and chloroplasts, but thanks to other oversold claims, she is often viewed with both utmost respect and cautious scepticism.
