Oren Harman’s Metamorphosis: A Natural and Human History uses the most dramatic transformations in nature — caterpillar to butterfly, larva to adult starfish, even the axolotl’s “refusal” to grow up — as a lens for a bigger argument: change isn’t an oddity on life’s margins. It’s one of evolution’s central strategies, and it has uncomfortable implications for how humans think about identity and ethics.
On the biological side, Harman treats metamorphosis as an ecological solution. Across roughly three-quarters of animal species, radical post-embryonic development can reduce competition between young and adults by pushing them into different diets and niches.
It also divides labor: larvae prioritize growth; adults prioritize reproduction. In some insects, even the gut is rebuilt, offering a kind of immunological reset. Harman gives the examples of a starfish’s “birthing” an adult body from within, butterflies deceiving ants into adoption, insects dissolving and reassembling in a chrysalis—highlight both the creativity and the costs of the process.
The book also probes the meaning of metamorphosis for us humans. Harman holds up the perennial unanswered questions about transformation, struggle and the cycle of life. The process has inspired many of the great thinkers, from Plato to Orwell. It has been a muse for composers and authors of books including “The Very Hungry Caterpillar.”
He is also asking central questions like “Why are we afraid to grow up?” and “How do we manage to dramatically change but still remain ourselves?”
But ultimately the message of nature’s metamorphosis is about the promise of a new life after death. Harman writes a meditation that explores the scientific, philosophical, and artistic aspects of transformation, asking fundamental questions about individuality, struggle, and the nature of the life cycle.
Guest:
Oren Harman is a Senior Fellow at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute and teaches at the Graduate Program in Science Technology and Society at Bar Ilan University. His latest book is “Metamorphosis: A Natural and Human History.”
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This episode will be recorded on Wednesday, January 28, 2026, at 12:00 p.m.
