Alexander Wilson FRSE (1714 – 16 October 1786) was a Scottish surgeon, type-founder, astronomer, mathematician and meteorologist.

In 1737, he left for London to make his fortune, He found work as assistant to a French surgeon-apothecary, which included caring for his patients.

In 1749, Wilson made the first recorded use of kites in meteorology with his lodger, a 23-year-old University of Glasgow student Thomas Melvill.

Wilson primarily made contributions to astronomy and meteorology, and posited that "what hinders the fixed stars from falling upon one another", the question that Newton had posed in his Opticks (1704), was that the entire universe rotated around its centre.

When the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters announced a prize to be awarded for the best essay on the nature of solar spots, Wilson submitted an entry.

Patrick wrote a biographical article of his father which was published both in the Transactions of the RSE and Edinburgh Journal of Science.