John Burdon Sanderson Haldane Was A Dominant Character
October 12, 2020 at 6:11 p.m.
By Max [email protected]
This column is another I have written about famous people deemed polymaths (Greek for having learned much). I have lost count of the number and names.
This time, I nominate J.B.S. Haldane (1892-1964), a man of great learning whose intellect was not limited by the traditional boundaries between scientific disciplines. According to Samanth Subramanian in his book, “A Dominant Character,” Haldane made important contributions to physiology, genetics, biochemistry, biometry, statistics, cosmology and other subjects, all without ever possessing an academic qualification in any branch of science.
Haldane was the son of Oxford University physiologist John Scott Haldane, who taught his son the fundamentals of science from an early age and involved him in legendary and daring physiological experiments. Both father and son acted as their own “guinea pigs” in experiments testing the physiological effects of poisonous gases and safety conditions in diving experiments, which caused much pain, convulsions and even death. Quite appropriately, their family motto has been called “suffer” and they lived up to it. Haldane was a king-size man who towered over British biology for several decades.
Early life
Haldane was born in Oxford, England, on Nov. 5, 1892.
He was a precocious child. By the age of 3 years, he already acquired some familiarity with scientific terminology. On one occasion, when he fell down and injured his forehead, a doctor came to treat his wound. Upon seeing his blood, young Haldane asked the doctor, “Is this oxyhemoglobin or carboxyhemoglobin?” It is not unusual to hear or read such stories from his childhood.
From a young age, he assisted in his father's experiments. In 1901, when JBS was only 8 years old, his father took him to a lecture by A.D. Darbishire on the newly rediscovered Mendel's laws.
That lecture made a deep impression on young Haldane's mind, creating a lasting interest to find out more about genetics. Haldane was educated at Eton and Oxford University, graduating in classics with honors in 1914. He excelled in mathematics, which earned him a Fellowship to attend Oxford University where he switched from mathematics to classics.
After studying both mathematics and classics at Oxford, Haldane served with the Black Watch during World War I and was wounded twice. He returned to a fellowship at Oxford, and soon afterwards moved to Cambridge as reader in biochemistry.
In 1933, he was invited to University College London to take up a new chair in genetics. He remained there until he left the UK in 1957. UCL was the home of the Galton Laboratory of Eugenics, then presided over by another key figure in mathematical genetics, R. A. Fisher. Between them, Fisher, Haldane and the American mathematician Sewall Wright brought together the theories of Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel to form the “new synthesis” of evolutionary theory. He also published the first evidence of genetic linkage in humans in a study of haemophilia and colour-blindness conducted with fellow UCL geneticist Julia Bell.
Contributions
In magazines and newspapers, Haldane wrote about everything. He wrote cutting opinion pieces on politics – like razor blades in print. He wrote about his own boisterous life, which was stocked with enough danger and drama for a dozen ordinary humans: his boyhood apprenticeship to his scientist father, his time in the trenches, his numerous experiments on himself, his sorties into the teeth of the Spanish Civil War, his clandestine research for the British Admiralty during the Second World War and his emigration to India. He wrote of his views on governments and philosophies, and he wrote about history and literature. He wrote a book for children, about a magician named Mr. Leakey, and most of a science fiction novel. But mainly, he wrote columns that unpicked the convolutions of science for the inexpert reader. He preached science to the laity. Arthur C. Clarke called Haldane “the most brilliant scientific popularizer of his generation.”
He was quite capable of holding two conflicting views at the same time, and yet he did more than anyone previously to mould Darwin's theory of evolution into a robust quantitative framework, making it possible to calculate the effect of natural selection on different populations.
Haldane introduced many to the fascination of science through his popular columns in the “Daily Worker” and books such as “Daedalus: or Science and the Future” (1924), “Possible Worlds and Other Essays” (1928) and “Science and Everyday Life” (1940).
Final Thoughts
A lifelong Marxist, Haldane never hid his contempt for capitalism and imperialism. He visited Spain three times during the Spanish Civil War to assist the Republican cause and later served as chairman of the editorial board of the Communist Party newpaper the “Daily Worker.” After World War II, he left the Communist Party, partly on account of the corruption of Soviet science.
Max Sherman is a medical writer and pharmacist retired from the medical device industry. He has taught college courses on regulatory and compliance issues at Ivy Tech, Grace College and Butler University. Sherman has an unquenchable thirst for knowledge on all levels. Eclectic Science, the title of his column, touches on famed doctors and scientists, human senses, aging, various diseases, and little-known facts about many species, including their contributions to scientific research. His new book “Science Snippets” is available from Amazon and other book sellers. He can be reached by email at [email protected].
This column is another I have written about famous people deemed polymaths (Greek for having learned much). I have lost count of the number and names.
This time, I nominate J.B.S. Haldane (1892-1964), a man of great learning whose intellect was not limited by the traditional boundaries between scientific disciplines. According to Samanth Subramanian in his book, “A Dominant Character,” Haldane made important contributions to physiology, genetics, biochemistry, biometry, statistics, cosmology and other subjects, all without ever possessing an academic qualification in any branch of science.
Haldane was the son of Oxford University physiologist John Scott Haldane, who taught his son the fundamentals of science from an early age and involved him in legendary and daring physiological experiments. Both father and son acted as their own “guinea pigs” in experiments testing the physiological effects of poisonous gases and safety conditions in diving experiments, which caused much pain, convulsions and even death. Quite appropriately, their family motto has been called “suffer” and they lived up to it. Haldane was a king-size man who towered over British biology for several decades.
Early life
Haldane was born in Oxford, England, on Nov. 5, 1892.
He was a precocious child. By the age of 3 years, he already acquired some familiarity with scientific terminology. On one occasion, when he fell down and injured his forehead, a doctor came to treat his wound. Upon seeing his blood, young Haldane asked the doctor, “Is this oxyhemoglobin or carboxyhemoglobin?” It is not unusual to hear or read such stories from his childhood.
From a young age, he assisted in his father's experiments. In 1901, when JBS was only 8 years old, his father took him to a lecture by A.D. Darbishire on the newly rediscovered Mendel's laws.
That lecture made a deep impression on young Haldane's mind, creating a lasting interest to find out more about genetics. Haldane was educated at Eton and Oxford University, graduating in classics with honors in 1914. He excelled in mathematics, which earned him a Fellowship to attend Oxford University where he switched from mathematics to classics.
After studying both mathematics and classics at Oxford, Haldane served with the Black Watch during World War I and was wounded twice. He returned to a fellowship at Oxford, and soon afterwards moved to Cambridge as reader in biochemistry.
In 1933, he was invited to University College London to take up a new chair in genetics. He remained there until he left the UK in 1957. UCL was the home of the Galton Laboratory of Eugenics, then presided over by another key figure in mathematical genetics, R. A. Fisher. Between them, Fisher, Haldane and the American mathematician Sewall Wright brought together the theories of Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel to form the “new synthesis” of evolutionary theory. He also published the first evidence of genetic linkage in humans in a study of haemophilia and colour-blindness conducted with fellow UCL geneticist Julia Bell.
Contributions
In magazines and newspapers, Haldane wrote about everything. He wrote cutting opinion pieces on politics – like razor blades in print. He wrote about his own boisterous life, which was stocked with enough danger and drama for a dozen ordinary humans: his boyhood apprenticeship to his scientist father, his time in the trenches, his numerous experiments on himself, his sorties into the teeth of the Spanish Civil War, his clandestine research for the British Admiralty during the Second World War and his emigration to India. He wrote of his views on governments and philosophies, and he wrote about history and literature. He wrote a book for children, about a magician named Mr. Leakey, and most of a science fiction novel. But mainly, he wrote columns that unpicked the convolutions of science for the inexpert reader. He preached science to the laity. Arthur C. Clarke called Haldane “the most brilliant scientific popularizer of his generation.”
He was quite capable of holding two conflicting views at the same time, and yet he did more than anyone previously to mould Darwin's theory of evolution into a robust quantitative framework, making it possible to calculate the effect of natural selection on different populations.
Haldane introduced many to the fascination of science through his popular columns in the “Daily Worker” and books such as “Daedalus: or Science and the Future” (1924), “Possible Worlds and Other Essays” (1928) and “Science and Everyday Life” (1940).
Final Thoughts
A lifelong Marxist, Haldane never hid his contempt for capitalism and imperialism. He visited Spain three times during the Spanish Civil War to assist the Republican cause and later served as chairman of the editorial board of the Communist Party newpaper the “Daily Worker.” After World War II, he left the Communist Party, partly on account of the corruption of Soviet science.
Max Sherman is a medical writer and pharmacist retired from the medical device industry. He has taught college courses on regulatory and compliance issues at Ivy Tech, Grace College and Butler University. Sherman has an unquenchable thirst for knowledge on all levels. Eclectic Science, the title of his column, touches on famed doctors and scientists, human senses, aging, various diseases, and little-known facts about many species, including their contributions to scientific research. His new book “Science Snippets” is available from Amazon and other book sellers. He can be reached by email at [email protected].
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