Editing James Lovelock (section)

== Early life and education ==
James Lovelock was born in [[Letchworth Garden City]] to Tom Arthur Lovelock and his second wife Nellie.<ref name="The Guardian-2022">{{Cite news |date=27 July 2022 |title=James Lovelock obituary |url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jul/27/james-lovelock-obituary |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220727155934/https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jul/27/james-lovelock-obituary |archive-date=27 July 2022 |access-date=27 July 2022 |work=[[The Guardian]] |language=en}}</ref> Nell, his mother, was born in [[Bermondsey]] and won a scholarship to a grammar school but was unable to take it up, and started work at thirteen in a pickle factory. She was described by Lovelock as a [[socialist]] and [[Women's suffrage|suffragist]], who was also [[anti-vaccine]], and did not allow Lovelock to receive his [[Smallpox vaccine|smallpox inoculation]] as a child.<ref>{{Cite web |date=31 July 2019 |title=James Lovelock at 100: "My life has been one mass of visions" |url=https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2019/07/james-lovelock-interview-life-climate-love |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220727145830/https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2019/07/james-lovelock-interview-life-climate-love |archive-date=27 July 2022 |access-date=27 July 2022 |website=[[New Statesman]] |language=en-US}}</ref> His father, Tom, was born in [[Fawley, Berkshire]], had served six months hard labour for [[poaching]] in his teens, and was illiterate until attending technical college, later running a bookshop.<ref name="Carey-2009" /> Lovelock was brought up a [[Quaker]] and imbued with the notion that "God is a still, small voice within rather than some mysterious old gentleman way out in the universe", which he thought was a helpful way of thinking for inventors, but he would eventually end up as being non-religious.<ref>{{Cite news |date=18 July 2020 |title=James Lovelock: 'The biosphere and I are both in the last 1% of our lives' |url=http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jul/18/james-lovelock-the-biosphere-and-i-are-both-in-the-last-1-per-cent-of-our-lives |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220727153252/https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jul/18/james-lovelock-the-biosphere-and-i-are-both-in-the-last-1-per-cent-of-our-lives |archive-date=27 July 2022 |access-date=30 July 2022 |work=The Guardian |language=en}}</ref> The family moved to London, where his dislike of authority made him, by his own account, an unhappy pupil at [[Strand School]] in [[Tulse Hill]], south London.<ref>{{harvnb|Lovelock|2000|page=[https://archive.org/details/homagetogaialife0000love/page/16 16] }}: "strand school."</ref>

Lovelock could not at first afford to go to university, something which he believed helped prevent him from becoming overspecialised and aided the development of Gaia theory.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Appleyard |first=Bryan |name-list-style=vanc |date=September 2020 |title=James Lovelock Looks Beyond Gaia |url=https://www.noemamag.com/his-mind-forever-voyaging/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220203024721/https://www.noemamag.com/his-mind-forever-voyaging/ |archive-date=3 February 2022 |access-date=29 March 2022 |magazine=[[Noema Magazine]]}}</ref>