Gregory Thomas Laden is an American

biological anthropologist Biological anthropology, also known as physical anthropology, is a scientific discipline concerned with the biological and behavioral aspects of human beings, their extinct hominin ancestors, and related non-human primates, particularly from an e ...

and science blogger.

Education

Born in 1958, Laden received his B.A. from the

University of the State of New York The University of the State of New York (USNY, ) is the state of New York's governmental umbrella organization for both public and private institutions in New York State. The "university" is not an educational institution: it is, in fact, a lic ...

's Regents College program in 1984, and his M.A. and Ph.D. from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

in 1987 and 1992, respectively, where he was advised by

Irven DeVore Irven DeVore (October 7, 1934 – September 23, 2014) was an anthropologist and evolutionary biologist, and Curator of Primatology at Harvard University's Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. He headed Harvard's Department of Anthropolog ...

Career

Laden has taught at multiple institutions, including, but not limited to, Harvard, the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. ...

, and

Century College Century College is a two-year community college and technical college in White Bear Lake, Minnesota. It is a member of the Minnesota State system. It was founded in 1967 as Lakewood State Junior College and in 1996 merged with Northeast Metro Te ...

. In 1999, when he was on the faculty of the University of Minnesota, he co-authored a study in ''

Current Anthropology ''Current Anthropology'' is a peer-reviewed anthropology academic journal published by the University of Chicago Press for the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. Founded in 1959 by the anthropologist Sol Tax1907-1995. ''Current A ...

'' that found that the practice of humans cooking food evolved because it allowed them to cook vegetables. He published a blog, "Greg Laden's Blog", on

ScienceBlogs ScienceBlogs is an invitation-only blog network and virtual community that operated initially for almost 12 years, from 2006 to 2017. It was created by Seed Media Group to enhance public understanding of science. Each blog had its own theme, spec ...

, where he focused on public controversies regarding multiple scientific topics, including

global warming In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

and

evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...

References

1958 births Living people American anthropologists Science bloggers University of Minnesota faculty Harvard University alumni SUNY Regents College alumni Physical anthropologists {{US-anthropologist-stub