Inferior by Angela Saini – a powerful exploration of women's 'inferiority'

There is nothing inferior about Angela Saini's new book on how science got women wrong and is still struggling to free itself from bias

When Mrs Caroline Kennard, an active member of the women's movement in Boston, wrote to Charles Darwin in late 1881 seeking reassurance that his theories of evolution didn't entail the inferiority of women, she was disappointed by the great man's reply. The author of On the Origin of Species wrote back: "there seems to me to be a great difficulty from the laws of inheritance, (if I understand these laws rightly) in [women] becoming the intellectual equals of man." While Darwin's scientific work has certainly withstood the test of time, his views on the capabilities of women have not, as Angela Saini reveals in her quietly powerful new book, Inferior.

Subtitled "How science got women wrong and the new research that's rewriting the story", Inferior explores the science of gender difference, which turns out to be far more complicated than Darwin supposed. In doing so she uncovers how science has been no better than any other field of human endeavour in freeing itself from the historical and cultural baggage of societies that have long treated women as the second sex. Saini peels back the meritocratic veneer that still coats much of science to reveal a shabbier interior.