Professor Gregory Radick

Profile

I’m a historian and philosopher of science specializing in the history of the modern biological and human sciences. Educated in history at Rutgers (BA 1992) and history and philosophy of science at Cambridge (MPhil 1996, PhD 2000), I’ve been at Leeds since 2000, serving as Director of the Centre for History and Philosophy of Science (2006–08) and Director of the Leeds Humanities Research Institute (2014–17).

My books include Disputed Inheritance: The Battle over Mendel and the Future of Biology (Chicago, 2023), shortlisted for the 2024 Pickstone Prize of the British Society for the History of Science for best academic book in English in the general field of history of science, medicine and technology; The Simian Tongue: The Long Debate about Animal Language (Chicago, 2007), awarded the 2010 Suzanne J. Levinson Prize of the History of Science Society for best book in the history of the life sciences and natural history; and, as co-editor, The Cambridge Companion to Darwin (Cambridge, 2003; 2nd edition, 2009).

I’ve held research fellowships from the British Academy and the Leverhulme Trust, and served as President of the British Society for the History of Science (2014‒16) and the International Society for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Biology (2019‒21). Currently Editor-in-Chief of the journal Metascience, I write and lecture frequently for general audiences, contributing regularly to the Times Literary Supplement, and have appeared on BBC Radio 4’s In Our Time and in the PBS/National Geographic television series Genius with Stephen Hawking.

I’m a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London and a STEM Trustee of the Science Museum Group. In 2025 I became the first humanities scholar to win the J. B. S. Haldane Lecture Award from the Genetics Society, recognizing “outstanding ability to communicate topical subjects in genetics research, widely interpreted, to an interested lay audience.”

Research interests

I’ve published widely on the history of biology and the human sciences after 1750, with particular emphases on:

• Darwin and Darwinism
• genetics and eugenics
• sciences of mind, language and behaviour

I’ve also pursued more general questions about scientific knowledge, especially to do with:

• history-of-science counterfactuals (e.g. "What would biology be like now if the Mendelians had not triumphed in the early 20th century?")
• the organization of scientific knowledge and its cognitive and social consequences (e.g. “What difference does it make if Mendelian patterns are presented to students not as exemplary of how inheritance works but as exceptional?”)
• intellectual property, narrowly and broadly construed (including ownership grabs by scientific discplines or sub-disciplines, e.g. Mendelian genetics grabbing plant breeding).

My research has been more historical than philosophical, but philosophical questions come up all the time, for me as much as for the people I study.

Recent Publications (Selected)

• 2024 – “Alternative Paths for Genetics, Then and Now: Q&A with Gregory Radick about Disputed Inheritance,” with Maria Smit. Trends in Genetics 40: 1‒14.
• 2024 – “‘As Man Advances in Civilisation...’: Darwin on the Expanding Circle of Moral Regard, from His Day to Ours.” In Sex, Gender, Ethics and the Darwinian Evolution of Mankind: 150 years of Darwin’s ‘Descent of Man’, ed. Michel Veuille. London: Routledge, ch. 14.
• 2024 – “The Baldwin Effect and the Potentialities for Thoughtful Darwinism Around 1900.” In The Riddle of Organismic Agency: New Historical and Philosophical Reflections, coedited with Alejandro Fábregas-Tejeda, Jan Baedke and Guido L. Prieto. London: Routledge, pp. 97–113.
• 2024 – “Myth 18: That Darwin’s Theory Would Have Become More Widely Accepted
  Immediately Had He Read Mendel’s 1866 Paper.” In Darwin Mythology: Debunking Myths, Correcting Falsehoods, ed. Kostas Kampourakis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 204–215.
• 2023 – Disputed Inheritance: The Battle over Mendel and the Future of Biology (Chicago: University of Chicago Press)
• 2022 – “Mendel the Fraud? A Social History of Truth in Genetics.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 93: 39‒46
• 2021 – Darwin's Argument by Analogy: From Artificial to Natural Selection, with Roger M. White and Jonathan Hodge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Recent Grants (Selected)

• “’Coaxing Nature to the Screen’: Frank Percy Smith and the Transformations of British Natural History in the Pre-WWII Era of Technological Innovation and Mass Entertainment” (WRoCAH CDA award, in collaboration with the National Science and Media Museum, 2025–28)
• “Interdisciplinary Research Cultures in Mid-20th Century British Science: The Working Worlds of AI Pioneer Donald Michie (1923-2007)” (AHRC PhD studentship with the British Library, 2023-26)
• "The Sustainable Seed Innovation Project 2.0: Translating Research into Action for the Benefit of Rural Communities in India" (QR GCRF, 2019).
• "Disputed Inheritance: The Battle over Mendel and the Future of Biology" (Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship, 2017–19)
• with Sean Dyde as researcher, "Making Biological Minds" (Marie Curie Individual Fellowship, 2017–19)

Qualifications

• BA Rutgers (History) 1992
• MPhil Cambridge (HPS) 1996
• PhD Cambridge (HPS) 2000

Professional memberships

• British Society for the History of Science
• History of Science Society
• International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology

Student education

At Leeds I’ve taught undergraduate modules at all levels, including introductory courses in the history of psychology, the philosophy of psychology, and the philosophy of mind (Level 1); courses in the history of genetics and the reading of scientific texts in their historical contexts (my texts were Darwin’s Descent of Man (1871) and Expression of the Emotions (1872) (Level 2); and a seminar in the philosophy of biology (Level 3).

At Master’s Level I’ve contributed to courses in the history and historiography of modern science, and have also run a module on topics in the history and philosophy of biology.

Above Master’s Level, I regularly supervise research students (MRes, PhD) and postdoctoral researchers. I also convene the free online course “History and Philosophy of Science in 20 Objects,” incorporating lectures delivered by Leeds HPS staff and students in 2016–17, and featuring objects from the University’s Museum of the History of Science, Technology and Medicine.

I’d be glad to hear from anyone, at any level, interested in working on topics connected with the research interests outlined above.

Current PhD students

• Elizabeth Schulz, 2024 – “The 'Great Tree of Life': Darwinism, Evolution, and the Evolutionary Tree” (WRoCAH PhD studentship, jointly supervised with Jonathan Topham)
• YuYou Wu, 2023 – “Naturalism, Cognitive Science, and the Case of Scientific Anti-Realism” (China Scholarship Council PhD studentship, jointly supervised with Juha Saatsi)
• Aswin Valsala Narayanan, 2023 – “Interdisciplinary Research Cultures in Mid-20th Century British Science: The Working Worlds of AI Pioneer Donald Michie (1923‒2007).” (WRoCAH CDA PhD studentship with British Library, jointly supervised with Jonathan Pledge.)
• Frank Cui, 2022 – “Byron and Epicureanism.” (Jointly supervised with John Whale)
• Stefan Bernhardt-Radu, 2021 – “Julian Huxley's ‘Epigenetic’ Biology: Origins, Development, and Legacies, 1899-1936.” (Faculty funding; Freer Prize Fellowship at the Royal Institution.)

Research groups and institutes

• Centre for History and Philosophy of Science
• History and Philosophy of Science

Current postgraduate researchers

• Alex Aylward
• Stefan Bernhardt-Radu
• Frank Cui
• Elizabeth (Lizzie) Schulz