educated at george heriot's school in edinburgh, scotland (captain and dux 1965), he spent a decade as an undergraduate student (wrangler 1968), graduate student (phd 1973), and research fellow (1972–1976) at trinity college, cambridge and institute of theoretical astronomy. following his appointment to a lectureship (1975) at the then department of mathematics in edinburgh, his entire professional career has been based there, with prolonged research visits to princeton, cambridge, kyoto, and warsaw.