J. B. S. Haldane
John Burdon Sanderson Haldane FRS (/ˈhɔːldeɪn/; 5 November 1892 – 1 December 1964[1][2]), nicknamed "Jack" or "JBS",[3] was a British-Indian scientist who worked in physiology, genetics, evolutionary biology, and mathematics. With innovative use of statistics in biology, he was one of the founders of neo-Darwinism. He served in the Great War, and obtained the rank of captain.[4] Despite his lack of an academic degree in the field,[1] he taught biology at the University of Cambridge, the Royal Institution, and University College London.[5] Renouncing his British citizenship, he became an Indian citizen in 1961 and worked at the Indian Statistical Institute for the rest of his life.
For another British scientist, see John Scott Haldane.
J.B.S. Haldane
1 December 1964 (aged 72)
- United Kingdom (until 1961)
- India (from 1961)
- John Scott Haldane (father)
Naomi Mitchison (sister)
- Darwin Medal (1952)
- Darwin–Wallace Medal (1958)
United Kingdom
1914–1920
Haldane's article on abiogenesis in 1929 introduced the "primordial soup theory", which became the foundation for the concept of the chemical origin of life. He established human gene maps for haemophilia and colour blindness on the X chromosome, and codified Haldane's rule on sterility in the heterogametic sex of hybrids in species.[6][7] He correctly proposed that sickle-cell disease confers some immunity to malaria. He was the first to suggest the central idea of in vitro fertilisation, as well as concepts such as hydrogen economy, cis and trans-acting regulation, coupling reaction, molecular repulsion, the darwin (as a unit of evolution), and organismal cloning.
In 1957, Haldane articulated Haldane's dilemma, a limit on the speed of beneficial evolution, an idea that is still debated today.[8] He willed his body for medical studies, as he wanted to remain useful even in death. He is also remembered for his work in human biology, having coined "clone", "cloning", and "ectogenesis". With his sister, Naomi Mitchison, Haldane was the first to demonstrate genetic linkage in mammals. Subsequent works established a unification of Mendelian genetics and Darwinian evolution by natural selection whilst laying the groundwork for modern synthesis, and helped to create population genetics.
Haldane was a professed socialist, Marxist, atheist, and secular humanist whose political dissent led him to leave England in 1956 and live in India, becoming a naturalised Indian citizen in 1961. Arthur C. Clarke credited him as "perhaps the most brilliant science populariser of his generation".[9][10] Brazilian-British biologist and Nobel laureate Peter Medawar called Haldane "the cleverest man I ever knew".[11] According to Theodosius Dobzhansky, "Haldane was always recognized as a singular case"; Ernst Mayr described him as a "polymath" (as did others);[12] Michael J. D. White described him as "the most erudite biologist of his generation, and perhaps of the century";[13] James Watson described him as "England's most clever and eccentric biologist",[14] and Sahotra Sarkar described him as "probably the most prescient biologist of this [20th] century".[15] According to a Cambridge student, "he seemed to be the last man who might know all there was to be known".[12]
Biography[edit]
Early life and education[edit]
Haldane was born in Oxford in 1892. His father was John Scott Haldane, a physiologist, scientist, a philosopher, and a Liberal who was the grandson of evangelist James Alexander Haldane.[16] His mother Louisa Kathleen Trotter, was a Conservative, and descended from Scottish ancestry. His only sibling, Naomi, became a writer and married Dick Mitchison, Baron Mitchison (thereby becoming Naomi Mary Margaret Mitchison, Baroness Mitchison), who was his best friend at Eton College.[17] His uncle was Viscount Haldane and his aunt was the author Elizabeth Haldane. Descended from an aristocratic and secular family of the Clan Haldane,[18] he would later claim that his Y chromosome could be traced back to Robert the Bruce.[19]
Haldane grew up at 11 Crick Road, North Oxford.[20] He learnt to read at the age of three, and at four, after injuring his forehead he asked the physician treating him about the bleeding, "Is this oxyhaemoglobin or carboxyhaemoglobin?" As a youth he was raised as an Anglican.[21] From age eight he worked with his father in their home laboratory where he experienced his first self-experimentation, the method he would later be famous for. He and his father became their own "human guinea pigs", such as in their investigation on the effects of poison gases. In 1899, his family moved to "Cherwell", a late Victorian house at the outskirts of Oxford with its own private laboratory.[22] At age 8, in 1901, his father brought him to the Oxford University Junior Scientific Club to listen to a lecture on Mendelian genetics, which had been recently rediscovered.[23] Although he found the lecture given by Arthur Dukinfield Darbishire, Demonstrator of Zoology at Balliol College, Oxford, "interesting but difficult",[10] it influenced him permanently such that genetics became the field in which he made his most important scientific contributions.[13]
His formal education began in 1897 at Oxford Preparatory School (now Dragon School), where he gained a First Scholarship in 1904 to Eton College. In 1905 he joined Eton, where he experienced severe abuse from senior students for allegedly being arrogant. The indifference of authority left him with a lasting hatred for the English education system. However, the ordeal did not stop him from becoming captain of the school.[24]
He participated for the first time in scientific research as a volunteer subject for his father in 1906. John was the first to study the effects of decompression (relief from high pressure) in humans.[25] He investigated the physiological condition called "bends", such as when goats lift and bend their legs if discomforted, that is also experienced by deep-sea divers.[26] In July 1906, on board HMS Spanker off the west coast of Scotland, Rothesay, young Haldane jumped into the Atlantic Ocean with the experimental diving suit. The study was published in a 101-paged article in The Journal of Hygiene in 1908; where Haldane was described as "Jack Haldane (age 13)" for whom it "was the first time [he] had ever dived in a diving dress".[26]: 436 The research became a foundation for a scientific theory called Haldane's decompression model.[27]
He studied mathematics and classics at New College, Oxford, and obtained first-class honours in mathematical moderations in 1912. He became engrossed in genetics and presented a paper on gene linkage in vertebrates in the summer of 1912. His first technical paper, a 30-page long article on haemoglobin function, was published that same year, as a co-author alongside his father.[28] He presented the mathematical treatment of the study on 19 October in the Proceedings of the Physiological Society and was published in December 1913.[29]
Haldane did not want his education to be confined to a specific subject. He took up Greats and graduated with first-class honours in 1914. While he had full intention of studying physiology, his plan was, as he described later, "somewhat overshadowed by other events" (referring to World War I).[24] His only formal education in biology was an incomplete course in vertebrate anatomy.[1]
Career[edit]
To support the war effort, Haldane volunteered for and joined the British Army, and was commissioned a temporary second lieutenant in the 3rd Battalion of the Black Watch (Royal Highland Regiment) on 15 August 1914.[30] He was assigned as the trench mortar officer, to lead his team for hand-bombing the enemy trenches, the experience of which he described as "enjoyable".[24] In his article in 1932 he described how "he enjoyed the opportunity of killing people and regarded this as a respectable relic of primitive man".[1] He was promoted to temporary lieutenant on 18 February 1915 and to temporary captain on 18 October.[31][32] While serving in France, he was wounded by an artillery fire for which he was sent back to Scotland. There he served as instructor of grenades for the Black Watch recruits. In 1916, he joined the war in Mesopotamia (Iraq) where an enemy bomb severely wounded him. He was relieved from war fronts and was sent to India and stayed there for the rest of the war.[24] He returned to England in 1919 and relinquished his commission on 1 April 1920, retaining his rank of captain.[4] For his ferocity and aggressiveness in battles, his commander described him as the "bravest and dirtiest officer in my Army".[33] Another senior officer of his regiment called him 'mad' and 'cracked'.[34]
Between 1919 and 1922, he served as Fellow of New College, Oxford,[35] where, despite his lack of formal education in the field, he taught and researched in physiology and genetics. During his first year at Oxford, he published six papers dealing with physiology of respiration and genetics.[1] He then moved to the University of Cambridge, where he accepted a newly created readership in Biochemistry in 1923 and taught until 1932.[18] During his nine years at Cambridge, he worked on enzymes and genetics, particularly the mathematical side of genetics.[18] While working as a visiting professor at the University of California in 1932, he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society.[36]
Haldane worked part-time at the John Innes Horticultural Institution (later named John Innes Centre) at Merton Park in Surrey from 1927 to 1937.[37] When Alfred Daniel Hall became the director in 1926,[38] one of his earliest tasks was to appoint as assistant director "a man of high quality in the study of genetics" who could become his successor. Recommended by Julian Huxley, the council appointed Haldane in March 1927, with the terms: "Mr. Haldane to visit the Institution fortnightly for a day and a night during the Cambridge terms, to put in two months also at Easter and long vacations in two continuous blocks and to be free in the Christmas vacation."[39] He was officer in charge of Genetical Investigations.[1] He became the Fullerian Professor of Physiology at the Royal Institution from 1930 to 1932 and in 1933, he became Professor of Genetics at University College London, where he spent most of his academic career.[40] As Hall did not retire so early as expected – retiring in 1939,[38] Haldane had to resign from the John Innes in 1936 to become the first Weldon Professor of Biometry at University College London.[18] Haldane's service was recorded to have helped the John Innes as "the liveliest place for research in genetics in Britain".[39] At the height of World War II, he moved his team to the Rothamsted Experimental Station in Hertfordshire during 1941 to 1944 to escape bombings.[1] Reginald Punnett, founder of the Journal of Genetics in 1910 with William Bateson, invited him to become editor in 1933, a post he retained until his death.[2]
Social and scientific views[edit]
Human cloning[edit]
Haldane was the first to have thought of the genetic basis for human cloning, and the eventual artificial breeding of superior individuals. For this he introduced the terms "clone" and "cloning",[110] modifying the earlier "clon" that had been used in agriculture since the early 20th century (from Greek klōn, twig). He introduced the term in his speech on "Biological Possibilities for the Human Species of the Next Ten Thousand Years" at the Ciba Foundation Symposium on Man and his Future in 1963. He said:[111]