Podcasts · Stuff You Missed in History Class

Thomas Henry Huxley

29 Jul 2026 · 41 min

Huxley is an example of having a good attitude about publicly acknowledging errors and learning from them. He earned the nickname “Darwin’s bulldog” for his very vocal support of Darwin’s work, and he wanted to promote science and education, particularly to people that didn’t normally have access to those things.

Research:

• Bernoulli, D., Jenkyns, H.C. “Thomas Henry Huxley, a stone tablet, coccoliths, and deep-sea sediments in the high Alps.” Int J Earth Sci (Geol Rundsch) 112, 1661–1669 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00531-023-02330-5 • Bowen, Keith. “Thomas Henry Huxley.” Ebsco. 2024. https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/thomas-henry-huxley • Burkhardt, Richard W.. "Jean-Baptiste Lamarck". Encyclopedia Britannica, 14 Dec. 2025, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jean-Baptiste-Lamarck • Darwin, Charles. “On the Origin of Species.” JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET. London. 1859. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1228/1228-h/1228-h.htm • Desmond, Adrian J. "Thomas Henry Huxley". Encyclopedia Britannica, 25 Jun. 2026, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Thomas-Henry-Huxley • Dolan, John R. “The famous and lesser-known illustrations of Thomas Huxley’s Bathybius.” History of Oceanography. International Commission of the History of Oceanography. https://oceansciencehistory.com/2020/07/13/the-famous-and-lesser-known-illustrations-of-thomas-huxleys-bathybius/ • “Freshwater Bathybius.” Nature 4, 49–50 (1871). https://doi.org/10.1038/004049b0 • “The Great Debate.” University of Oxford Museum of Natural History. https://oumnh.ox.ac.uk/great-debate • “The History of Evolutionary Thought.” Understanding Evolution. Berkeley University. https://evolution.berkeley.edu/the-history-of-evolutionary-thought/1800s/early-concepts-of-evolution-jean-baptiste-lamarck/ • Huxley, T.H. “Agnosticism.” K. Paul, Trench. London. 1889. https://archive.org/details/a622650700huxluoft/page/169/mode/1up • Huxley, T.H. “Aphorisms and Reflections. From the Works of T. H. HUXLEY, Selected by Henrietta A. Huxley. Macmillan and Co. London. 1907. Accessed online: http://aleph0.clarku.edu/huxley/Book/Aphor.html • Huxley, T.H. “Autobiography and Selected Essays.” Riverside College Classics. 1909. Accessed online: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1315/1315-h/1315-h.htm#link2H_4_0007 • Huxley, T.H. “Collected Essays, Volume V: Science and Christian Tradition.” https://www.gutenberg.org/files/15905/15905-h/15905-h.htm • Huxley, T.H. “Evidence as to man's place in nature.” D. Appelton and Co. New York. 1863. https://archive.org/details/evidenceastomans00huxl/page/n1/mode/2up • Huxley, T.H. “On Some Organisms Living at Great Depths in the North Atlantic Ocean.” Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science. viii., new Series, 1868, pp. 203-212. http://aleph0.clarku.edu/huxley/SM3/bathy.html • Huxley, T.H. “On the Relations of Man to the Lower Animals.” Project Gutenberg eBook. 2001. https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2932/pg2932-images.html • Joshi RS. “The Inner Root Sheath and the Men Associated with it Eponymically.” Int J Trichology. 2011 Jan;3(1):57-62. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3129131/ • Lamarck, Jean-Baptiste. “Zoological Philosophy.” Macmillan. London. 1914. https://archive.org/details/ZoologicalPhilosophy • Lyons, Sherrie L. “Thomas Henry Huxley : the evolution of a scientist.” Prometheus Books. New York. 1999. • McGraw, Donald J. “Bye-Bye Bathybius: The Rise and Fall of a Marine Myth.” Bios, vol. 45, no. 4, 1974, pp. 164–71. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/4607257 • “Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1963.” The Nobel Prize. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/1963/summary/ • Pearce, JMS. “Thomas Henry Huxley.” Hektoen International. Sept. 18, 2020. https://hekint.org/2020/09/18/thomas-henry-huxley/ • Schwartz, Joel S. “Darwin, Wallace, and Huxley, and ‘Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation.’” Journal of the History of Biology, vol. 23, no. 1, 1990, pp. 127–53. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/4331120 • “Thomas…

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