Professor Anthony Edwards on RA Fisher

Gonville & Caius College Fellow Professor Anthony Edwards FRS is a statistician, geneticist and evolutionary biologist who was the last undergraduate student of RA Fisher.

A video interview with Professor Edwards, carried out by Dr Robert Asher, and filmed and produced by Professor Axel Zeitler, has been published and is also available through the Fisher in the 21st Century page.

Timestamps
00:00 Introduction
01:05 Ronald Fisher and his major contributions to science
04:20 Impact on the lives of normal people, including non-scientists
08:04 What was he like as a person?
14:43 How well did you know his other students?
16:55 Populairity of applying population genetics principles to human society throughout the mid 20th century.
22:07 What role did the Second World War play in Fisher's views of eugenics?
30:25 Did Fisher's views on human population genetics influence national policy in Britain?
31:26 The concept of the class system in Britain during and before the second world war and its relation to the term 'race'
35:49 How should Ronald Fisher be judged today for his involvement in the Cambridge Eugenics Society?
37:22 Do you think Fisher should be judged today for his correspondence with German biologists who were active in Germany during the Second World War?
40:39 The Fisher window at Gonville and Caius College


References:
Fisher RA. 1925. Statistical Methods for Research Workers. Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd.

Fisher RA. 1930. The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
https://doi.org/10.5962/bhl.title.27468

Fisher RA. 1935. The Design of Experiments. London: Oliver and Boyd.

Fisher RA. Croonian Lecture-Population genetics. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B-Biological Sciences. 1953 Sep 9; 141(905):510-23.
https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.1953.0058

Darwin, Charles. 1871. The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex. London: Charles Murray.
https://doi.org/10.5962/bhl.title.24784

Cobb JA. 1913. Human fertility. The Eugenics Review 4(4): 379-382.

W. Beveridge, 1942. The Beveridge Report https://blog.nationalarchives.gov.uk/...

R.A. Fisher (1943) The birthrate and family allowances. Agenda, 2, 124-133 (1943). Collected Papers No 198.

J.F.Crow (1990) R.A.Fisher, A Centennial Review. Genetics, February 1990.