From 1842 to 1848 he studied physics, chemistry, botany, mineralogy, philosophy and medicine at the University of Giessen, where he graduated in 1848 with a dissertation entitled Beiträge zur Hall'schen Lehre von einem excitomotorischen Nervensystem (Contributions to the Hallerian Theory of an Excitomotor Nervous System).

In 1852 he became lecturer in medicine at the University of Tübingen, where he published his magnum opus Kraft und Stoff: Empirisch-naturphilosophische Studien (Force and Matter: Empiricophilosophical Studies, 1855).

[3] According to Friedrich Albert Lange (Geschichte des Materialismus, 1866), Kraft und Stoff was imbued with a fanatical enthusiasm for humanity.

The scientific materialism of this work, which contemporaries often lumped together with the publications of other 'materialists' like Karl Vogt and Jacob Moleschott,[4] caused so much opposition that he was compelled to give up his post at Tübingen, and he retired to Darmstadt.

Being politically active, Büchner was a member of the second chamber of the Landstände of the Grand Duchy of Hesse as a representative of the German Free-minded Party from 1884 to 1890.

To achieve this, Büchner advocated government social programs which would aid greater equality, including the collective ownership of land and women's rights (however he did not extend this to them receiving suffrage, deeming that premature at the time).