In addition to winning the Nobel Prize, Monod was also the Légion d'honneur and elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society (ForMemRS) in 1968
Monod was born in Paris to an American mother from Milwaukee, Charlotte (Sharlie) MacGregor Todd, and a French Huguenot Father, Lucien Monod who was a Painter and inspired him artistically and intellectually. He attended the lycée at Cannes until he was 18. In October 1928 he started his studies in biology at the Sorbonne. During World War II, Monod was active in the French Resistance, eventually becoming the chief of staff of the French Forces of the Interior. He was an Chevalier in the Légion d'Honneur (1945), and was awarded the Croix de Guerre (1945) and the American Bronze Star Medal.
Monod also made important contributions to the field of enzymology with his proposed theory of allostery in 1965 with Jeffries Wyman (1901-1995) and Jean-Pierre Changeux.
In addition to winning the Nobel Prize, Monod was also the Légion d'honneur and elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society (ForMemRS) in 1968
He was also a proponent of the view that life on earth arose by freak chemical accident and was unlikely to be duplicated even in the vast universe. His very striking suggestion was that this accident may not have been simply of low probability but of identically zero probability, a unique event that will never be repeated. "Man at last knows he is alone in the unfeeling immensity of the universe, out of which he has emerged only by chance. His destiny is nowhere spelled out, nor is his duty. The kingdom above or the darkness below; it is for him to choose", he wrote in 1971. He used the bleak assessment that forms the earlier part of the quote as a springboard to argue for atheism and the absurdity and pointlessness of existence. Monod stated we are merely chemical extras in a majestic but impersonal cosmic drama—an irrelevant, unintended sideshow. His views were in direct opposition to the religious certainties of his ancestor Henri's well-known brothers Frédéric Monod and Adolphe Monod. In 1973 he was one of the signers of the Humanist Manifesto II.
Jacques Monod died of leukemia in 1976 and was buried in the Cimetière du Grand Jas in Cannes on the French Riviera.
