Professor Joe Cain

BONUS Scientific Research for Development | WeAreSTS

In this BONUS episode, Dr Michel Wahome presents a wide-ranging critique of the “research for development” (R4D) model in science and technology policy, with special emphasis on its assumptions about innovation and progress. The deepest […]

BONUS Should Research Into Artificial Intelligence Be Stopped? | WeAreSTS

Professor James Lighthill, UCL Provost (1979-1989), was the author of a highly influential report to the UK government about artificial intelligence (AI). It questioned what AI was and what it could achieve. Its impact was […]

Sergei Chetverikkov, Russian population geneticist

Sergei Sergeevich Chetverikov (1880-1959) Russian population geneticist

Sergeĭ Sergeevich Chetverikov (=Tschetwerikoff) was a Russian entomologist, an expert on butterflies, and a pioneer of population geneticists. Born into a well-educated, professional family, Chetverikov entered the University of Moscow in 1900, graduating six years […]

Simpson (1944) Tempo and mode in Evolution, figure 30

Historical Significance of George Gaylord Simpson’s Tempo and Mode in Evolution (1944)

Cain, Joe. 1989. Moving Beyond Consistency: The Historical Significance of Simpson’s Tempo and Mode in Evolution. Unpublished MA thesis. University of Maryland College Park. Abstract Simpson’s (1944) Tempo and Mode in Evolution (TM) is a […]

Statue from Rapa Nui (Easter Island) in the British Museum

The statue from Rapa Nui (Easter Island) in the British Museum is a beautiful, captivating object. It is a “moai”. Its name is Hoa Hakananai’a (loosely translated to “Stolen Friend”, sometimes spelled Hoa Haka Nanai’a). […]

Plesiosaur skeleton (Thalassiodracon hawkinsi) cast at UCL Grant Museum of Zoology.

Thalassiodracon – Plesiosaur at UCL Grant Museum of Zoology

Humans came to understand the significance of fossils only in the early nineteenth century: their extraordinary variety and quantity, forms unlike anything seen in the world today, incomprehensibly vast periods of time for layer upon […]

Portraits of Charles Darwin and Emma Darwin. 1840. By George Richmond

Darwin in London – Commemorative Plaques and Family Baptism Records

During research concerning Charles and Emma Darwin’s life at number 12 Upper Gower Street, Bloomsbury, London, I identified several errors and vagaries in biographical material found in standard reference works. This note communicates corrections and […]

Joseph Henry Woodger (1894-1981) Papers at University College London (UCL)

Some years ago I searched for archival materials, or papers, related to Joseph Henry Woodger, philosopher, biologist and advocate of logical positivism (Cain 2000) (obituary). The hope was to assess the extent of informal contact […]

Highlights

New Evidence on Dobzhansky 1936 “Jesup” lectures

Who says nothing exciting ever happens in historical research? This letter reports on a recent important find regarding the population geneticist, Theodosius Dobzhansky, and his famous 1937 book, Genetics and the Origin of Species. Most historians […]

Professor Cross's Phrenological Chart, 1892

Phrenology Consultation with Professor Cross

Professor W. Cross was a phrenologist who gave popular public performances at London’s Royal Aquarium in the 1880s and 1890s. Phrenology was the quack medical practice of studying bumps on the head under the false pretence of […]