John Randal Baker | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1900-10-23)23 October 1900 |
| Died | 8 June 1984(1984-06-08) (aged 83) |
| Citizenship | British |
| Alma mater | University of Oxford |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Biology,physical anthropology |
| Institutions | University of Oxford |
| Thesis | Sex studies on mammals (1927) |
| Doctoral students | Jock Marshall |
John Randal BakerFRS (23 October 1900 – 8 June 1984)[1] was an Englishbiologist,zoologist, andmicroscopist, and a professor at theUniversity of Oxford, where he was Emeritus Reader inCytology. He received hisD.Phil. at the University of Oxford in 1927.
Baker was the youngest of five children born to Rear Admiral Julian Alleyne Baker and his wife Geraldine Eugenie (née Alison).[1] He was a grandson of GeneralSir Archibald Alison and among the papers collected in Baker's name at theBodleian Library are volumes of correspondence and other material related to Alison's military service during theIndian Mutiny,Ashanti Campaign, andEgyptian Campaign of 1882.[2]
Born inWoodbridge, Baker grew up in a country home nearBromyard. At age ten, he was sent to Boxgrove School, nearGuildford. Due to World War I, his schooling there was cut short and he joined the Bournemouth School of Flying at age sixteen. Though he achieved a pilot's certificate, he was excluded from the Royal Flying Corps due to inadequate eyesight and thereafter joined theOxford University Officers' Training Corps.[1]
Upon war's end, Baker entered Oxford'sNew College, where he studied zoology. Among the small staff of the Department of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy was Dr. (later Sir)Julian Huxley, of whom Baker would write a biographical memoir many years later. Other students in the department during Baker's time includedCharles Elton,E. B. Ford,Alister Hardy andCarlos Blacker. Baker became the captain of New College'srowing team and completed hisB.A. withfirst class honours in 1922, partially on the basis of his microscopical investigation ofspermatogenesis in crickets.[1]
Baker participated in several overseas research expeditions following his undergraduate work. An anthropological and zoological mission headed by Professor T. T. Barnard in 1922 provided the first of three visits to theNew Hebrides Islands, where Baker turned his attention to the influence of a relatively non-seasonal climate on thebreeding seasons and sexual activity of animals. He also became interested in thehermaphroditic pigs bred by the native people for use in rituals of initiation and, later, in comparing them with the intersex pigs of Britain. Examination of theanatomical andhistological characteristics of these animals, in conjunction with research into factors ofsex determination and development of sexual organs, led to his bookSex in man and animals (1926).[1]
In 1927, Baker returned to the New Hebrides for a year. On this trip, his study of the native population and interest in reproduction became focused on questions of humanpopulation control, about the growth of which he and many others had become concerned. His research in this area would eleven years later issue in the development of the contraceptivespermicide Volpar[3] and, for this work, he would in 1958 receive the Oliver Bird Medal from theFamily Planning Association. Interestingly, Baker's great-grandfather,Sir Archibald Alison, had in 1840 published a book titledThe principles of population.[1]
In 1933, under the auspices of theOxford University Exploration Club founded by his schoolmate Charles Elton, Baker organized and led the Oxford Expedition to the New Hebrides, the primary focus of which was to investigate the influence of environmental factors on the breeding seasons of rainforest fauna. Additional purposes included specimen collection and surveying. The company included his wife Inezita and sister Geraldine - who had collaborated with him on previous research, ornithologistTom Harrisson, zoologist and surveyor Terence Bird, and naturalistA. J. Marshall. One of the expedition's accomplishments was the first ascent and mapping ofMount Tabwemasana, the highest peak in the New Hebrides. The resultant map was used by the U.S. Army during their World War IIoccupation of the islands.[1]
The most widely received of his works wasRace (1974). Uncharacteristically for the time, Baker used the traditional categories ofphysical anthropology and classified human populations in terms ofrace.
Baker rejected themethodological relativism that had characterized anthropology since the days ofFranz Boas, instead going back to earlier ideas ofhereditarianism andcultural evolution. The book received mixed reviews.
InRace, Baker used a restrictive sense of the term "civilization", giving 21 criteria[a] by which civilizations might be identified.[4] Based on these criteria, Baker declared that Mesoamerican societies such as those of theAztecs andMaya were not civilizations, and that noindigenous civilizations ever arose inAfrica. He enumerated five civilizations (Sumerian, ancient Egyptian, Helladic-Minoan, Indus Valley, and Sinic)sensu stricto and explored the relationship between the biological traits and the cultures of these five civilizations.[5] In this book, Baker speculated that different human races evolved from different subspecies of apes (known aspolygenism). Baker claimed that "negrids" were less evolved, and also inferior, to races Baker described as civilized. Baker also quotes Long's claim[6] that black people have a "fetid smell".[7][8] According to a 1974 review by A. O. Ladimeji inRace & Class, Baker misrepresents or misunderstands the history of the study of race. Per Ladimeji, "Most of Baker's biological data comes from the nineteenth century with no corroboration from recent research." Ladimeji wrote that most of Baker's more outlandish claims had already been refuted by available studies at the time of publication.[8]
Together withMichael Polanyi, Baker founded theSociety for Freedom in Science in 1940. In March, 1958 he was elected aFellow of the Royal Society.[9]
