diff --git a/pkgs/applications/science/biology/neuron/default.nix b/pkgs/applications/science/biology/neuron/default.nix
index 35710fd1fe1f..1dc0688d5e97 100644
--- a/pkgs/applications/science/biology/neuron/default.nix
+++ b/pkgs/applications/science/biology/neuron/default.nix
@@ -33,6 +33,12 @@ stdenv.mkDerivation rec {
       --replace 'float abs(float arg);' "" \
       --replace 'short abs(short arg);' "" \
       --replace 'long abs(long arg);' ""
+  '' + stdenv.lib.optionalString stdenv.isDarwin ''
+    # we are darwin, but we don't have all the quirks the source wants to compensate for
+    substituteInPlace src/nrnpython/setup.py.in --replace 'readline="edit"' 'readline="readline"'
+    for f in src/nrnpython/*.[ch] ; do
+      substituteInPlace $f --replace "<Python/Python.h>" "<Python.h>"
+    done
   '';
 
   enableParallelBuilding = true;