Gordon Rattray Taylor (11 January 1911 – 7 December 1981) was a popular

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

author In legal discourse, an author is the creator of an original work that has been published, whether that work exists in written, graphic, visual, or recorded form. The act of creating such a work is referred to as authorship. Therefore, a sculpt ...

and

journalist A journalist is a person who gathers information in the form of text, audio or pictures, processes it into a newsworthy form and disseminates it to the public. This is called journalism. Roles Journalists can work in broadcast, print, advertis ...

. He is most famous for his 1968 book ''The Biological Time Bomb'', which heralded the rise of

biotechnology Biotechnology is a multidisciplinary field that involves the integration of natural sciences and Engineering Science, engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms and parts thereof for products and services. Specialists ...

and for his 1983 book ''The Great Evolution Mystery''.

Biography

Gordon Rattray Taylor was born in Eastbourne on 11 January 1911, and educated at

Radley College Radley College, formally St Peter's College, Radley or the College of St. Peter at Radley, is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school (independent boarding school) for boys near the village of Radley, in Oxfordshire, in the United Kingd ...

public school, before studying natural sciences at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any ...

. In 1933 he entered journalism. During the war he worked in the Psychological Warfare division of

SHAEF Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF; ) was the headquarters of the Commander of Allies of World War II, Allied forces in northwest Europe, from late 1943 until the end of World War II. US General Dwight D. Eisenhower was the ...

. In 1958 he joined the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

where he wrote and devised science television programs such as ''Eye on Research''. In 1966 he became a full-time author. He served as a member of the

Society for Psychical Research The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) is a nonprofit organisation in the United Kingdom. Its stated purpose is to understand events and abilities commonly described as psychic or paranormal. It describes itself as the "first society to condu ...

, London (1976–81).

Writing

In ''The Biological Time Bomb'' Taylor heralded the advent of

artificial insemination Artificial insemination is the deliberate introduction of sperm into a female's cervix or uterine cavity for the purpose of achieving a pregnancy through in vivo fertilization by means other than sexual intercourse. It is a fertility treatment ...

organ transplant Organ transplantation is a medical procedure in which an organ (anatomy), organ is removed from one body and placed in the body of a recipient, to replace a damaged or missing organ. The donor and recipient may be at the same location, or org ...

s, as well as research into

memory Memory is the faculty of the mind by which data or information is encoded, stored, and retrieved when needed. It is the retention of information over time for the purpose of influencing future action. If past events could not be remembe ...

and controlling moods.

Evolution

Taylor wrote a book on evolution called ''The Great Evolution Mystery'' first released in 1983 with a second edition in 1984. Taylor criticized

neo-Darwinism Neo-Darwinism is generally used to describe any integration of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection with Gregor Mendel's theory of genetics. It mostly refers to evolutionary theory from either 1895 (for the combinations of D ...

, and said that the origin of species and the mechanisms for

evolution Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...

are still deep mysteries that have not been solved. Taylor supported

Lamarck Jean-Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet, chevalier de Lamarck (1 August 1744 – 18 December 1829), often known simply as Lamarck (; ), was a French naturalist, biologist, academic, and soldier. He was an early proponent of the idea that biolo ...

over Darwin. Taylor discussed the possibility of an inherent self-stabilization of the

genome A genome is all the genetic information of an organism. It consists of nucleotide sequences of DNA (or RNA in RNA viruses). The nuclear genome includes protein-coding genes and non-coding genes, other functional regions of the genome such as ...

as an important selective factor in evolution. He was supportive of the idea of Lancelot Law Whyte, the evolutionary ideas highlighted in Whyte's book ''Internal factors of evolution'' in which no

mutation In biology, a mutation is an alteration in the nucleic acid sequence of the genome of an organism, virus, or extrachromosomal DNA. Viral genomes contain either DNA or RNA. Mutations result from errors during DNA or viral replication, ...

is due entirely to chance: only those that meet the internal demands of the genome can be utilized in evolutionary processes. Taylor discussed his own evolutionary mechanism called "masking theory" which is the notion that blueprints for building

phenotypes In genetics, the phenotype () is the set of observable characteristics or traits of an organism. The term covers the organism's morphology (physical form and structure), its developmental processes, its biochemical and physiological properti ...

can be hidden for millions of years before suddenly being expressed by the

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

. The zoologist Mark Ridley states that Taylor appears to have failed to have familiarised himself with Darwinian thinking before criticising it and particularly that Taylor has made the "familiar and elementary" mistake of conflating

natural selection Natural selection is the differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. It is a key mechanism of evolution, the change in the Heredity, heritable traits characteristic of a population over generation ...

with chance. Ridley states that Taylor's alternative to Darwinian evolution is described "only in general outline", involving "

Lamarckism Lamarckism, also known as Lamarckian inheritance or neo-Lamarckism, is the notion that an organism can pass on to its offspring physical characteristics that the parent organism acquired through use or disuse during its lifetime. It is also calle ...

and other inarticulated internal factors". The anthropologist H. James Birx in ''

BioScience ''BioScience'' is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal that is published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Institute of Biological Sciences. It was established in 1964 and was preceded by the ''AIBS Bulletin'' (1951–1 ...

'' wrote that ''The Great Evolution Mystery'' is a "stimulating book and raises important questions and encourages future scientific inquiry." The philosopher

Michael Ruse Michael Escott Ruse (21 June 1940 – 1 November 2024) was a British-born Canadian philosopher of science who specialised in the philosophy of biology and worked on the relationship between science and religion, the creation–evolution contr ...

stated that although he did not find Taylor's arguments convincing, he had collected a lot of information and used very good illustrations. The American novelist

Cormac McCarthy Cormac McCarthy (born Charles Joseph McCarthy Jr.; July 20, 1933 – June 13, 2023) was an American author who wrote twelve novels, two plays, five screenplays, and three short stories, spanning the Western, post-apocalyptic, and Southern Got ...

read ''The Great Evolution Mystery'' and "seems to have taken an interest in the book and to have taken its premises seriously," having included some pointed critiques of Darwinist reasoning in the dialogue of his play '' The Stonemason''.

Books

* ''Economics for the Exasperated'' (1948) * ''Sex in History: The Past in the Present'' (1953) * ''Conditions of Happiness'' * ''Are Workers Human?'' * ''The Angel Makers'' * ''The Science of Life: A Pictorial History of Biology'' (1967) * ''The Biological Time Bomb'' (1968) * ''Rethink: A Paraprimitive Solution'' (1972) * ''Rethink: Radical Proposals to Save a Disintegrating World'' (1974) * ''The Doomsday Book: Can the World Survive?'' (1st ed. : 1970 / ed.1972) , * ''How to Avoid the Future'' (1975) * ''Salute to British Genius'' (1978) * ''The Natural History of the Mind'' (1981) * ''The Great Evolution Mystery'' (1983)

References

External links