Walter Frank Raphael Weldon
Encyclopedia
Walter Frank Raphael Weldon DSc
FRS (Highgate
, London
, 15 March 1860 – Oxford
, 13 April 1906) generally called Raphael Weldon, was an English evolutionary biologist and a founder of biometry. He was the joint founding editor of Biometrika
, with Francis Galton
and Karl Pearson
.
(FRS 1882), and his wife Anne Cotton. Weldon père moved around the country so frequently that Raphael could not attend school until he was thirteen years old. Walter and Anne had three children; their first child was a girl, with Raphael born next followed by his younger brother Dante.
Raphael did receive some tutoring from a local clergyman before he was thirteen years old then, in 1873, he entered Mr Watson's boarding school at Caversham
near Reading
. After three years there, plus several months of private study, he entered University College London
. Weldon spent the academic year 1876/1877 at UCL, being taught by the zoologist E. Ray Lankester and the German mathematician Olaus Henrici. There he studied a wide range of subjects which he took in preparation for studying medicine. Henrici impressed Weldon more than any other lecturer; he later wrote that Henrici was the first naturally gifted teacher he had studied under.
Later in 1877 he transferred to King's College London
and then to St John's College, Cambridge
in 1878. There Weldon studied with the developmental morphologist Francis Balfour who influenced him greatly: Weldon gave up his plans for a career in medicine. In 1881 he gained a first-class honours degree in the Natural Science Tripos despite the loss of his brother Dante, who died suddenly. In the autumn he left for the Naples Zoological Station
to begin the first of his studies on marine biological organisms.
Weldon married Florence Tebb, daughter of William Tebb of Rede Hall, Burstow
in Surrey
, on 13 March 1883. She played a large role in his scientific work, assisting him on many of his projects. He died in 1906 of acute pneumonia, and is buried at Holywell Church, Oxford.
Morphology
. Weldon's work was centred around the development of a fuller understanding of marine biological phenomena and selective death rates of these organisms.
After graduating he began research, going to Naples
where he worked at the Zoological Station. He was appointed a demonstrator in zoology at Cambridge University in 1882, and became a Fellow
of St John's College and a university lecturer in invertebrate morphology in 1884. His teaching was described in these glowing terms:
After he was married to Florence, Weldon took all his holidays with his wife in places where they could study marine biology. In particular they visited the Bahamas in 1886, which was scientifically very profitable. The Marine Biological Association set up a laboratory in Plymouth
, and Weldon and his wife began spending all their vacations there undertaking research. By 1888 they were spending as much time there as his duties at Cambridge would allow, and he only went to the university to give his lectures. He undertook research June to January, teaching at Cambridge for two terms each year.
In 1889 Weldon succeeded Lankester in the Jodrell Chair of Zoology at University College London
, and was elected to the Royal Society
in 1890. Royal Society records show his election supporters included the great zoologists of the day: Huxley, Lankester, Poulton
, Newton
, Flower
, Romanes and others.
His interests were changing from morphology to problems in variation and organic correlation. He began using the statistical techniques that Francis Galton
had developed for he had come to the view that "the problem of animal evolution is essentially a statistical problem." Weldon began working with his University College colleague, the mathematician Karl Pearson
. Their partnership was very important to both men and survived Weldon's move to the Linacre Chair of Zoology
at Oxford University in 1899. In the years of their collaboration Pearson laid the foundations of modern statistics. Magnello emphasises this side of Weldon's career. In 1900 he took the DSc degree and as Linacre Professor he also held a Fellowship at Merton College, Oxford
.
By 1893 a Royal Society Committee included Weldon, Galton
and Karl Pearson
'For the Purpose of conducting Statistical Enquiry into the Variability of Organisms'. In an 1894 paper Some remarks on variation in plants and animals arising from the work of the Royal Society Committee, Weldon wrote:-
In 1900 the work of Gregor Mendel
was rediscovered and this precipitated a conflict between Weldon and Pearson on the one side and William Bateson
on the other. Bateson, who had been taught by Weldon, took a very strong line against the biometricians. This bitter dispute ranged across substantive issues of the nature of evolution
and methodological issues such as the value of the statistical method. Will Provine
gives a detailed account of the controversy. The debate lost much of its intensity with the death of Weldon in 1906, though the general debate between the biometricians and the Mendelians continued until the creation of the modern evolutionary synthesis
in the 1930s.
After his death, the Weldon Memorial Prize
was established by the University of Oxford in his honour; it is awarded annually.
DSC
-in academia:* D.Sc., Doctor of Science* Doctor of Surgical Chiropody, superseded in the 1960s by Doctor of Podiatric Medicine* Dalton State College, Georgia* Daytona State College, Florida* Deep Springs College, California* Dixie State College of Utah...
FRS (Highgate
Highgate
Highgate is an area of North London on the north-eastern corner of Hampstead Heath.Highgate is one of the most expensive London suburbs in which to live. It has an active conservation body, the Highgate Society, to protect its character....
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, 15 March 1860 – Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
, 13 April 1906) generally called Raphael Weldon, was an English evolutionary biologist and a founder of biometry. He was the joint founding editor of Biometrika
Biometrika
- External links :* . The Internet Archive. 2011....
, with Francis Galton
Francis Galton
Sir Francis Galton /ˈfrɑːnsɪs ˈgɔːltn̩/ FRS , cousin of Douglas Strutt Galton, half-cousin of Charles Darwin, was an English Victorian polymath: anthropologist, eugenicist, tropical explorer, geographer, inventor, meteorologist, proto-geneticist, psychometrician, and statistician...
and Karl Pearson
Karl Pearson
Karl Pearson FRS was an influential English mathematician who has been credited for establishing the disciplineof mathematical statistics....
.
Life and education
Weldon was the second child of the journalist and industrial chemist, Walter WeldonWalter Weldon
Walter Weldon was an English chemist, journalist, and fashion publisher.-Family:He was brother to Ernest J. Weldon, founder of Weldon & Wilkinson Ltd...
(FRS 1882), and his wife Anne Cotton. Weldon père moved around the country so frequently that Raphael could not attend school until he was thirteen years old. Walter and Anne had three children; their first child was a girl, with Raphael born next followed by his younger brother Dante.
Raphael did receive some tutoring from a local clergyman before he was thirteen years old then, in 1873, he entered Mr Watson's boarding school at Caversham
Caversham, Berkshire
Caversham is a suburb and former village in the unitary authority of Reading, England. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, within the royal county of Berkshire, on the opposite bank from the rest of Reading...
near Reading
Reading, Berkshire
Reading is a large town and unitary authority area in England. It is located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the River Thames and River Kennet, and on both the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 motorway, some west of London....
. After three years there, plus several months of private study, he entered University College London
University College London
University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...
. Weldon spent the academic year 1876/1877 at UCL, being taught by the zoologist E. Ray Lankester and the German mathematician Olaus Henrici. There he studied a wide range of subjects which he took in preparation for studying medicine. Henrici impressed Weldon more than any other lecturer; he later wrote that Henrici was the first naturally gifted teacher he had studied under.
Later in 1877 he transferred to King's College London
King's College London
King's College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. King's has a claim to being the third oldest university in England, having been founded by King George IV and the Duke of Wellington in 1829, and...
and then to St John's College, Cambridge
St John's College, Cambridge
St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college's alumni include nine Nobel Prize winners, six Prime Ministers, three archbishops, at least two princes, and three Saints....
in 1878. There Weldon studied with the developmental morphologist Francis Balfour who influenced him greatly: Weldon gave up his plans for a career in medicine. In 1881 he gained a first-class honours degree in the Natural Science Tripos despite the loss of his brother Dante, who died suddenly. In the autumn he left for the Naples Zoological Station
Stazione Zoologica
The Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn is a research institute in Naples, Italy, devoted to basic research in biology. Research is largely interdisciplinary involving the fields of evolution, biochemistry, molecular biology, neurobiology, cell biology, biological oceanography, marine botany, molecular...
to begin the first of his studies on marine biological organisms.
Weldon married Florence Tebb, daughter of William Tebb of Rede Hall, Burstow
Burstow
Burstow is a parish in Tandridge, Surrey, England. It is one of the largest parishes in the local government district of Tandridge and its principal settlement is the village of Smallfield...
in Surrey
Surrey
Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...
, on 13 March 1883. She played a large role in his scientific work, assisting him on many of his projects. He died in 1906 of acute pneumonia, and is buried at Holywell Church, Oxford.
Career
Upon returning to Cambridge in 1882, he was appointed university lecturer in InvertebrateInvertebrate
An invertebrate is an animal without a backbone. The group includes 97% of all animal species – all animals except those in the chordate subphylum Vertebrata .Invertebrates form a paraphyletic group...
Morphology
Morphology (biology)
In biology, morphology is a branch of bioscience dealing with the study of the form and structure of organisms and their specific structural features....
. Weldon's work was centred around the development of a fuller understanding of marine biological phenomena and selective death rates of these organisms.
After graduating he began research, going to Naples
Naples
Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...
where he worked at the Zoological Station. He was appointed a demonstrator in zoology at Cambridge University in 1882, and became a Fellow
Fellow
A fellow in the broadest sense is someone who is an equal or a comrade. The term fellow is also used to describe a person, particularly by those in the upper social classes. It is most often used in an academic context: a fellow is often part of an elite group of learned people who are awarded...
of St John's College and a university lecturer in invertebrate morphology in 1884. His teaching was described in these glowing terms:
- "Seldom is it given to a man to teach as Weldon taught. He lectured almost as one inspired. His extreme earnestness was only equalled by his lucidity. He awoke enthusiasm even in the dullest, and had the divine gift of compelling interest."
After he was married to Florence, Weldon took all his holidays with his wife in places where they could study marine biology. In particular they visited the Bahamas in 1886, which was scientifically very profitable. The Marine Biological Association set up a laboratory in Plymouth
Plymouth
Plymouth is a city and unitary authority area on the coast of Devon, England, about south-west of London. It is built between the mouths of the rivers Plym to the east and Tamar to the west, where they join Plymouth Sound...
, and Weldon and his wife began spending all their vacations there undertaking research. By 1888 they were spending as much time there as his duties at Cambridge would allow, and he only went to the university to give his lectures. He undertook research June to January, teaching at Cambridge for two terms each year.
In 1889 Weldon succeeded Lankester in the Jodrell Chair of Zoology at University College London
University College London
University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...
, and was elected to the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
in 1890. Royal Society records show his election supporters included the great zoologists of the day: Huxley, Lankester, Poulton
Edward Bagnall Poulton
Sir Edward Bagnall Poulton, FRS was a British evolutionary biologist who was a lifelong advocate of natural selection...
, Newton
Alfred Newton
Alfred Newton FRS was an English zoologist and ornithologist.Newton was Professor of Comparative Anatomy at Cambridge University from 1866 to 1907...
, Flower
William Henry Flower
Sir William Henry Flower KCB FRCS FRS was an English comparative anatomist and surgeon. Flower became a leading authority on mammals, and especially on the primate brain...
, Romanes and others.
His interests were changing from morphology to problems in variation and organic correlation. He began using the statistical techniques that Francis Galton
Francis Galton
Sir Francis Galton /ˈfrɑːnsɪs ˈgɔːltn̩/ FRS , cousin of Douglas Strutt Galton, half-cousin of Charles Darwin, was an English Victorian polymath: anthropologist, eugenicist, tropical explorer, geographer, inventor, meteorologist, proto-geneticist, psychometrician, and statistician...
had developed for he had come to the view that "the problem of animal evolution is essentially a statistical problem." Weldon began working with his University College colleague, the mathematician Karl Pearson
Karl Pearson
Karl Pearson FRS was an influential English mathematician who has been credited for establishing the disciplineof mathematical statistics....
. Their partnership was very important to both men and survived Weldon's move to the Linacre Chair of Zoology
Linacre Chair of Zoology
The position of Linacre Professor of Zoology in the University of Oxford was founded in 1860, initially as the Linacre Professorship of Physiology and then as the chair of Human and Comparative Anatomy, although its origins can be traced back a further 300 years, to the Linacre Lectureships at...
at Oxford University in 1899. In the years of their collaboration Pearson laid the foundations of modern statistics. Magnello emphasises this side of Weldon's career. In 1900 he took the DSc degree and as Linacre Professor he also held a Fellowship at Merton College, Oxford
Merton College, Oxford
Merton College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Its foundation can be traced back to the 1260s when Walter de Merton, chancellor to Henry III and later to Edward I, first drew up statutes for an independent academic community and established endowments to...
.
By 1893 a Royal Society Committee included Weldon, Galton
Francis Galton
Sir Francis Galton /ˈfrɑːnsɪs ˈgɔːltn̩/ FRS , cousin of Douglas Strutt Galton, half-cousin of Charles Darwin, was an English Victorian polymath: anthropologist, eugenicist, tropical explorer, geographer, inventor, meteorologist, proto-geneticist, psychometrician, and statistician...
and Karl Pearson
Karl Pearson
Karl Pearson FRS was an influential English mathematician who has been credited for establishing the disciplineof mathematical statistics....
'For the Purpose of conducting Statistical Enquiry into the Variability of Organisms'. In an 1894 paper Some remarks on variation in plants and animals arising from the work of the Royal Society Committee, Weldon wrote:-
- "... the questions raised by the Darwinian hypothesis are purely statistical, and the statistical method is the only one at present obvious by which that hypothesis can be experimentally checked."
In 1900 the work of Gregor Mendel
Gregor Mendel
Gregor Johann Mendel was an Austrian scientist and Augustinian friar who gained posthumous fame as the founder of the new science of genetics. Mendel demonstrated that the inheritance of certain traits in pea plants follows particular patterns, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance...
was rediscovered and this precipitated a conflict between Weldon and Pearson on the one side and William Bateson
William Bateson
William Bateson was an English geneticist and a Fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge...
on the other. Bateson, who had been taught by Weldon, took a very strong line against the biometricians. This bitter dispute ranged across substantive issues of the nature of evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
and methodological issues such as the value of the statistical method. Will Provine
Will Provine
William B. Provine is an American historian of science, particularly of evolutionary biology and population genetics. He is the Andrew H. and James S. Tisch Distinguished University Professor at Cornell University and is a professor in the Departments of History, Science and Technology Studies,...
gives a detailed account of the controversy. The debate lost much of its intensity with the death of Weldon in 1906, though the general debate between the biometricians and the Mendelians continued until the creation of the modern evolutionary synthesis
Modern evolutionary synthesis
The modern evolutionary synthesis is a union of ideas from several biological specialties which provides a widely accepted account of evolution...
in the 1930s.
After his death, the Weldon Memorial Prize
Weldon Memorial Prize
The Weldon Memorial Prize, also known as the Weldon Memorial Prize and Medal, is given yearly by the University of Oxford. The prize is to be awarded...
was established by the University of Oxford in his honour; it is awarded annually.
Weldon's Dice
In 1894, Weldon rolled a set of 12 dice 26,306 times. He collected the data in part, 'to judge whether the differences between a series of group frequencies and a theoretical law, taken as a whole, were or were not more than might be attributed to the chance fluctuations of random sampling.' Weldon's dice data were utilized by Karl Pearson in his pioneering paper on the chi-squared statistic. As a project for a History of Statistics course taught at the University of Chicago, Zacariah Labby built a machine to roll the dice and automatically count the dots (pips) on each die. The resulting data allowed Labby to repeat Weldon and Pearson's original investigations, as well as delve deeper into the analysis.External links
- "On Certain Correlated Variations in Carcinus moenas" Proceedings of the Royal Society, 54, (1893), 318-329. An example of Weldon’s use of statistical methods
- Photograph of Weldon on the Portraits of Statisticians page.
