Heather E. Heying is an American

evolutionary biologist Evolutionary biology is the subfield of biology that studies the evolutionary processes (natural selection, common descent, speciation) that produced the diversity of life on Earth. It is also defined as the study of the history of life for ...

, former professor, and author, who came to national attention following the

Evergreen State College The Evergreen State College is a public liberal arts college in Olympia, Washington. Founded in 1967, it offers a non-traditional undergraduate curriculum in which students have the option to design their own study towards a degree or follow a p ...

protests in 2017. She has been associated with the informal group known as the

intellectual dark web The intellectual dark web (IDW) is a label which has been applied to some commentators who oppose what they regard as the dominance of identity politics, political correctness, and cancel culture in higher education and the news media within W ...

and testified at the US Department of Justice forum on Free Speech on College Campuses in 2018. Heying is also known for her opposition to

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

vaccines and her discredited belief that the drug

ivermectin Ivermectin (, '' EYE-vər-MEK-tin'') is an antiparasitic drug. After its discovery in 1975, its first uses were in veterinary medicine to prevent and treat heartworm and acariasis. Approved for human use in 1987, today it is used to treat i ...

is effective in treating the disease.

Career

Until 2017, Heying was a professor of biology at

Washington State Washington (), officially the State of Washington, is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. Named for George Washington—the first U.S. president—the state was formed from the western part of the Washington ...

. Her doctoral research focused on the evolutionary ecology and sexual selection of '' Mantella laevigata'', a Madagascan poison

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely Carnivore, carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order (biology), order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-f ...

. In addition to papers in the reproductive evolutionary adaptations of frogs, Heying has also published a popular work describing her graduate student research in Madagascar, ''Antipode: Seasons with the Extraordinary Wildlife and Culture of Madagascar'' (2002)''.''

Evergreen State College protests

In July 2017, following a year of student protests at Evergreen State College, which disrupted the campus, including one altercation between protesters and Heying's husband and fellow professor of biology at Evergreen,

Bret Weinstein Bret Samuel Weinstein (; born February 21, 1969) is an American podcaster, author, and former professor of evolutionary biology. He served on the faculty of Evergreen State College from 2002 until 2017, when he resigned in the aftermath of a s ...

, the pair brought a lawsuit against the college; the $3.85 million suit alleged the college failed to "protect its employees from repeated provocative and corrosive verbal and written hostility based on race, as well as threats of physical violence." A settlement was reached in September 2017, in which both Heying and Weinstein resigned, and received $250,000 each.

Post-Evergreen

Following her resignation, Heying has written articles and opinion pieces related to evolution and cultural politics for journals and newspapers such as ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' and ''

The Chronicle of Higher Education ''The Chronicle of Higher Education'' is a newspaper and website that presents news, information, and jobs for college and university faculty and student affairs professionals (staff members and administrators). A subscription is required to rea ...

.'' She co-hosts a weekly podcast, the ''Darkhorse Podcast,'' with her husband on his YouTube channel. Heying was a 2019–2020 James Madison Program Visiting Fellow at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

, a fellowship which continued for the 2020–2021 year. With Weinstein, they presented a theory on the evolutionary adaptation of consciousness on 29 April 2020 . In 2021, Heying and Weinstein's book, ''A Hunter-Gatherer's Guide to the 21st Century'', was published. Reviewing it for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'',

Stuart J. Ritchie Stuart James Ritchie is a Scottish psychologist and science communicator known for his research in human intelligence. He has served as a lecturer at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience at King’s College London since the ...

wrote that the authors "lazily repeat false information from other pop-science books", and that overall the book was characterized by an annoying, know-it-all attitude. Writing for ''

Willamette Week ''Willamette Week'' (''WW'') is an alternative weekly newspaper and a website published in Portland, Oregon, United States, since 1974. It features reports on local news, politics, sports, business, and culture. History Early history ''Willame ...

'', Nancy Koppelman and Leo Blakeslee said that the book did well at covering basic topics around evolution and biology, but faltered when the authors claim expertise beyond their own fields such as in matters related to politics. Another review, written for ''Areo Magazine'' by English Literature graduate Daniel James Sharp, said the book was "a great, if also greatly flawed, achievement.".

COVID-19

On January 29, 2021, Heying appeared on ''

Real Time with Bill Maher ''Real Time with Bill Maher'' is an American television talk show that airs weekly on HBO, hosted by comedian and political satirist Bill Maher. Much like his previous series ''Politically Incorrect'' on Comedy Central and later on ABC, ''Real ...

'' along with Weinstein, presenting the "Lab Leak" hypothesis around the origins of

SARS-CoV-2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019), the respiratory illness responsible for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had a ...

. Heying has said that she has taken

to guard against

and that she and Weinstein have not been vaccinated "because we have fears bout the side-effects of the COVID-19 vaccines as we have discussed at length on this podcast." Heying compared the use of ivermectin for this purpose to taking

anti-malarial drug Antimalarial medications or simply antimalarials are a type of antiparasitic chemical agent, often naturally derived, that can be used to treat or to prevent malaria, in the latter case, most often aiming at two susceptible target groups, young c ...

s. Whereas all WHO-approved vaccines have shown a high level of safety and efficacy in all populations, there is no good evidence of benefit from ivermectin in preventing or treating COVID-19. *

Publications

* * Heying, Heather E. (2001).
The evolutionary ecology and sexual selection of a Madagascan poison frog (Mantella laevigata)
'. Dissertation.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Heying, Heather Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Women evolutionary biologists Evergreen State College faculty American biologists American women scientists Princeton University faculty American women podcasters American podcasters 21st-century American women COVID-19 misinformation