Brian J. Ford

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Brian J. Ford
Brian J Ford.jpg
Born1939 (age 86–87)
Corsham, Wiltshire, England
OccupationsScientist, author and broadcaster

Brian J. Ford HonFLS HonFRMS (born on May 13, 1939 in Corsham, Wiltshire [1] ) is an independent research biologist, author, and lecturer, who publishes on scientific issues for the general public. He has also been a television personality for more than 40 years. Ford is an international authority on the microscope. [2] Throughout his career, Ford has been associated with many academic bodies. He was elected a Fellow of Cardiff University in 1986, was appointed Visiting Professor at the University of Leicester, [3] and has been awarded Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Microscopical Society [4] and of the Linnean Society of London. [5] In America, he was awarded the inaugural Köhler Medal [6] and was recently recipient of the Ernst Abbe medal awarded by the New York Microscopical Society. [7] In 2004 he was awarded a personal fellowship from NESTA, [8] the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts. During those three years he delivered 150 lectures in scores of countries, meeting 10,000 people in over 350 universities around the world.

Contents

Education

Ford attended the King's School, Peterborough, and then Cardiff University to study botany and zoology between 1959 and 1961, leaving before graduating to set up his own multi-disciplinary laboratory. [9]

Career and positions

Universities

Learned Societies

Other positions

He was the first British President of the European Union of Science Journalists' Associations,[ citation needed ] founding Chairman of the Science and Technology Authors Committee at the Society of Authors, [ citation needed ] and the president of the Cambridge Society for the Application of Research (CSAR) of Cambridge University. [17] Ford has been a member of Mensa and was a director of British Mensa from 1993–1997, resigning a few months after being elected for a second term. [18] [19] He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Microscopical Society in 1962.

Aquatic dinosaur hypothesis

In the April 2012 issue of Laboratory News , Ford put forward the idea that all large dinosaurs were aquatic, arguing that they were too large and heavy to be land animals. [20] In 2018, Too Big To Walk: The New Science of Dinosaurs, a book authored by Ford and published by William Collins (an imprint of HarperCollins), was released expounding on this hypothesis. [21]

Although evidence has been presented for some dinosaurs like spinosaurids being partially aquatic, reaction to Ford's theory that the majority of dinosaurs being largely aquatic have been highly, if not universally negative, with other experts in the fields of paleontology and paleobiology having continuously disproven or refuted Ford's claims, [21] with some suggesting Ford's hypotheses could be relegated as fringe theories. Several paleontologists, such as Darren Naish, have directly countered Ford in his arguments using documented evidence of dinosaurs being terrestrial to back their rebuttals to his work. [22] [23] [24]

Bibliography

Books

Audio Book

Book chapters

References

  1. ↑ GRO Register of Births: JUN 1939 5a 88 CHIPPENHAM – Brian J. Ford
  2. ↑ "Brian J Ford: Life through a microscope". Wiley . 27 January 2017. Retrieved 9 October 2017.
  3. ↑ "Scientist, Author and Broadcaster to Support University's Developments in E-Learning". Leicester . Leicester, UK. 10 February 2013. Retrieved 15 March 2013.
  4. ↑ "New Honorary Fellow Announced". Royal Microscopical Society . Leicester, UK. 1 January 2017. Archived from the original on 16 March 2017. Retrieved 16 March 2017.
  5. ↑ "Congratulations to our newly-elected Fellows 'honoris causa'". Linnean Society . Leicester, UK. 10 January 2021. Retrieved 7 June 2021.
  6. ↑ "Brian J Ford wins inaugural Köhler medal in America". ResearchGate . New York, US. 17 August 2020. Retrieved 11 November 2020.
  7. ↑ "Brian J. Ford Receives the New York Microscopical Society Ernst Abbe Award". Ernst Abbe . New York, US. 17 August 2020. Retrieved 11 November 2020.
  8. ↑ "The NESTA Reports by Brian J Ford". Nesta (charity) . Illinois, US. 7 August 2021. Retrieved 18 November 2021.
  9. 1 2 3 4 "Prof Brian J Ford announced as RMS Honorary Fellow". Royal Microscopical Society . Oxford, UK. 27 February 2017. Retrieved 15 March 2017.
  10. ↑ "All recipients". Honorary Fellows. Cardiff University. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
  11. ↑ McCrone Research Institute (McRI) – Chicago, IL Archived 15 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  12. ↑ "Cambridge Society for the Application of Research | CSAR".
  13. ↑ The Royal Literary Fund Archived 4 October 2006 at the Wayback Machine
  14. ↑ "University of Leicester - Scientist, Author and Broadcaster to Support University's Developments in E-Learning". 14 August 2023.
  15. ↑ University of Leicester – Leicester Professor elected at Cambridge
  16. ↑ Institute of Biology: The First Fifty Years, Institute of Biology, ISBN   0-900490-37-3
  17. ↑ "Society for the Application of Research".
  18. ↑ "Mensa Elections", p.4, Mensa Magazine October 1993
  19. ↑ "Musical Chairs", p.4, Mensa Magazine March 1998
  20. ↑ Ford, Brian J (3 April 2012). "A prehistoric revolution". Laboratory News. Archived from the original on 21 September 2014.
  21. 1 2 Naish, Darren (2 September 2025). "The response to and rejection of Brian Ford's Too Big to Walk , a 21 st century effort to reinstate the aquatic dinosaur hypothesis" . Historical Biology. 37 (9): 2147–2156. doi:10.1080/08912963.2024.2421268. ISSN   0891-2963.
  22. ↑ "Book review – Too Big to Walk: The New Science of Dinosaurs". 25 June 2018.
  23. ↑ Naish, Darren. "A Vast Quantity of Evidence Confirms That Non-Bird Dinosaurs Were Not Aquatic" (PDF). Retrieved 7 September 2025.
  24. ↑ "Pteroformer: Ford vs. Naish - 'Too Big to Walk'". 16 May 2018.
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