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1.
Trevor Pearce 《Journal of the history of biology》2010,43(3):493-528
In 1749, Linnaeus presided over the dissertation “Oeconomia Naturae,” which argued that each creature plays an important and particular role in nature’s economy. This phrase should be familiar
to readers of Darwin, for he claims in the Origin that “all organic beings are striving, it may be said, to seize on each place in the economy of nature.” Many scholars have
discussed the influence of political economy on Darwin’s ideas. In this paper, I take a different tack, showing that Darwin’s
idea of an economy of nature stemmed from the views of earlier naturalists like Linnaeus and Lyell. I argue, in the first
section of the paper, that Linnaeus’ idea of oeconomia naturae is derived from the idea of the animal economy, and that his idea of politia naturae is an extension of the idea of a politia civitatis. In the second part, I explore the use of the concept of stations in the work of De Candolle and Lyell – the precursor to Darwin’s concept of places. I show in the third part of the paper that the idea of places in an economy of nature is employed by Darwin at many key
points in his thinking: his discussion of the Galapagos birds, his reading of Malthus, etc. Finally, in the last section,
I demonstrate that the idea of a place in nature’s economy is essential to Darwin’s account of divergence. To tell his famous
story of divergence and adaptation, Darwin needed the economy of nature. 相似文献
2.
Alter SG 《Journal of the history of biology》2007,40(2):231-258
This essay traces the interlinked origins of two concepts found in Charles Darwin’s writings: “unconscious selection,” and
sexual selection as applied to humanity’s anatomical race distinctions. Unconscious selection constituted a significant elaboration
of Darwin’s artificial selection analogy. As originally conceived in his theoretical notebooks, that analogy had focused exclusively
on what Darwin later would call “methodical selection,” the calculated production of desired changes in domestic breeds. By
contrast, unconscious selection produced its results unintentionally and at a much slower pace. Inspiration for this concept
likely came from Darwin’s early reading of works on both animal breeding and physical ethnology. Texts in these fields described
the slow and unplanned divergence of anatomical types, whether animal or human, under the guidance of contrasting ideals of
physical perfection. These readings, it is argued, also led Darwin to his theory of sexual selection as applied to race, a
theme he discussed mainly in his book The Descent of Man (1871). There Darwin described how the racial version of sexual selection operated on the same principle as unconscious selection.
He thereby effectively reunited these kindred concepts. 相似文献
3.
Johnson CN 《Journal of the history of biology》2007,40(3):529-556
Almost any modern reader’s first encounter with Darwin’s writing is likely to be the “Historical Sketch,” inserted by Darwin
as a preface to an early edition of the Origin of Species, and having since then appeared as the preface to every edition after the second English edition. The Sketch was intended
by him to serve as a short “history of opinion” on the species question before he presented his own theory in the Origin proper. But the provenance of the “Historical Sketch” is somewhat obscure. Some things are known about its production, such
as when it first appeared and what changes were made to it between its first appearance in 1860 and its final form, for the
fourth English edition, in 1866. But how it evolved in Darwin’s mind, why he wrote it at all, and what he thought he was accomplishing
by prefacing it to the Origin remain questions that have not been carefully addressed in the scholarly literature on Darwin. I attempt to show that Darwin’s
various statements about the “Historical Sketch,” made primarily to several of his correspondents between 1856 and 1860, are
somewhat in conflict with one another, thus making problematic a satisfactory interpretation of how, when, and why the Sketch
came to be. I also suggest some probable resolutions to the several difficulties.
How Darwin came to settle on the title “Historical Sketch” for the Preface to the Origin is not certain, but a guess may be ventured. When he first submitted the text to Asa Gray in February 1860 he called it simply
“Preface Contributed by the Author to this American Edition” (Burkhardt et al., eds., vol. 8, 1993, p. 572; the collected
correspondence is hereafter cited as CCD). In fact he had thought of it as being properly called a Preface much earlier, perhaps as early as 1856, as will be seen
in what follows. It came to be called “An Historical Sketch of the Recent Progress of Opinion on the Origin of Species” only
in the third English edition, April 1861. This is the title it retained thereafter, with the exception of an addition to the
title in the sixth English edition, “Previously to the Publication of the First Edition of this Work” (Peckham, 1959, pp. 20, 59). The word “sketch,” on the other hand was one of two words Darwin commonly used in private correspondence to
refer to the book that would later become the Origin, the other word being “Abstract,” and both signifying that Darwin thought of the work as being a resume rather than a full-fledged
study (e.g., letter to J.D. Hooker, May 9 1856, CCD vol. 6 p. 106; letter to Baden Powell January 18 1860, CCD vol. 8 p. 41; letter to Lyell 25 June 1858, CCD v. 7, 1991, pp. 117–8; letter to Lyell May 1856, CCD, v. 6 p. 100). The most likely source of the title “Historical Sketch” for Darwin’s Preface is Charles Lyell’s Principles of Geology in which, beginning with the third edition (1834), Lyell added titles to his chapters, calling chapters 2–4 “Historical Sketch
of the Progress of Geology” (Secord, in Lyell [1997], p. xlvii; for other uses by Lyell of this expression, cf. Porter, 1976, p. 95; idem 1982, p. 38; and Lyell, 1830 [1990], p. 30). Further parallels between Lyell’s Introduction and Darwin’s “Historical Sketch” in terms of content and strategy
are suggested below. 相似文献
4.
Richard Bellon 《Journal of the history of biology》2006,39(1):1-39
Joseph Hooker first learned that Charles Darwin believed in the transmutation of species in 1844. For the next 14 years, Hooker
remained a “nonconsenter” to Darwin’s views, resolving to keep the question of species origin “subservient to Botany instead
of Botany to it, as must be the true relation”. Hooker placed particular emphasis on the need for any theory of species origin
to support the broad taxonomic delimitation of species, a highly contentious issue. His always provisional support for special
creation waned during the 1850s as he lost faith in its expediency for coordinating the study of plant geography, systematics
and physiology. In 1858, Hooker embraced Darwin’s “considerable revolution in natural history,” but only after Darwin had
carefully molded his transmutationism to meet Hooker’s exacting specifications. 相似文献
5.
Cor van der Weele 《Biology & philosophy》2011,26(4):583-593
Frans de Waal’s view that empathy is at the basis of morality directly seems to build on Darwin, who considered sympathy as
the crucial instinct. Yet when we look closer, their understanding of the central social instinct differs considerably. De
Waal sees our deeply ingrained tendency to sympathize (or rather: empathize) with others as the good side of our morally dualistic
nature. For Darwin, sympathizing was not the whole story of the “workings of sympathy”; the (selfish) need to receive sympathy
played just as central a role in the complex roads from sympathy to morality. Darwin’s understanding of sympathy stems from
Adam Smith, who argued that the presence of morally impure motives should not be a reason for cynicism about morality. I suggest
that De Waal’s approach could benefit from a more thorough alignment with the analysis of the workings of sympathy in the
work of Darwin and Adam Smith. 相似文献
6.
Niles Eldredge 《Evolution》2009,2(1):35-54
Detailed analysis of Darwin’s scientific notes and other writings from the Beagle voyage reveals a focus on endemism and replacement of allied taxa in time and in space that began early in the journey. Though
it is impossible to determine exactly when Darwin became a transmutationist, the evidence suggests that he was conversant
with the transmutational ideas of Lamarck and others and testing (“experimenting” with) them—before he received a copy of
Lyell’s Principles of Geology, vol. 2, in November 1832, in which Lyell describes and disputes Lamarck’s theory. To the two rhea species of Patagonia and
the four mockingbird species of the Galapagos, we can now add the living Patagonian cavy (rodent) species, and its extinct
putatively related species that Darwin collected at Monte Hermoso (Bahia Blanca) in the Fall of 1832, as a replacement pattern
absolutely critical to the development of Darwin’s transmutational thinking. Darwin developed his first transmutational theory
by adopting “Brocchi’s analogy” (Rudwick 2008)—i.e. that births and deaths of species are analogous to the births and deaths
of individuals. Births and deaths of species, as of individuals, are thus explicable in terms of natural causes. Darwin explored
these themes and the replacement of the extinct cavy by the modern species explicitly in his February 1835 essay (Darwin 1835a).
相似文献
Niles EldredgeEmail: |
7.
Extending Darwin’s analogy: Bridging differences in concepts of selection between farmers, biologists, and plant breeders 总被引:1,自引:0,他引:1
Darwin developed his theory of evolution based on an analogy between artificial selection by breeders of his day and “natural
selection.” For Darwin, selection included what biologists came to see as being composed of (1) phenotypic selection of individuals
based on phenotypic differences, and, when these are based on heritable genotypic differences, (2) genetic response between
generations, which can result in (3) evolution (cumulative directional genetic response over generations). The use of the
term “selection” in biology and plant breeding today reflects Darwin’s assumption—phenotypic selection is only biologically
significant when it results in evolution. In contrast, research shows that small-scale, traditionally-based farmers select
seed as part of an integrated production and consumption system in which selection is often not part of an evolutionary process,
but is still useful to farmers. Extending Darwin’s analogy to farmers can facilitate communication between farmers, biologists,
and plant breeders to improve selection and crop genetic resource conservation. 相似文献
8.
Giambattista Brocchi’s (1814) monograph (see Dominici, Evo Edu Outreach, this issue, 2010) on the Tertiary fossils of the Subappenines in Italy—and their relation to the living molluscan fauna—contains a theoretical,
transmutational perspective (“Brocchian transmutation”). Unlike Lamarck (1809), Brocchi saw species as discrete and fundamentally stable entities. Explicitly analogizing the births and deaths of species
with those of individual organisms (“Brocchi’s analogy”), Brocchi proposed that species have inherent longevities, eventually
dying of old age unless driven to extinction by external forces. As for individuals, births and deaths of species are understood
to have natural causes; sequences of births and deaths of species produce genealogical lineages of descent, and faunas become
increasingly modernized through time. Brocchi calculated that over 50% of his fossil species are still alive in the modern
fauna. Brocchi’s work was reviewed by Horner (1816) in Edinburgh. Brocchi’s influence as a transmutational thinker is clear in Jameson’s (1827) “geological illustrations” in his fifth edition of his translation of Cuvier’s Theory of the Earth (read by his student Charles Darwin) and in the anonymous essays of 1826 and 1827 published in the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal—which also carried a notice of Brocchi’s death in 1827. The notion that new species replace older, extinct ones—in what today
would be called an explicitly phylogenetic context—permeates these essays. Herschel’s (1830) discussion of temporal replacement of species and the modernization of faunas closely mirrors these prior discussions. His
book, dedicated to the search for natural causes of natural phenomena, was read by Charles Darwin while a student at Cambridge.
Darwin’s work on HMS Beagle was in large measure an exploration of replacement patterns of “allied forms” of endemic species
in time and in space. His earliest discussions of transmutation, in his essay February 1835, as well as the Red Notebook and the early pages of Notebook B (the latter two written in 1837 back in England), contain Brocchi’s analogy, including
the idea of inherent species longevities. Darwin’s first theory of the origin of species was explicitly saltational, invoking
geographic isolation as the main cause of the abrupt appearance of new species. We conclude that Darwin was testing the predicted
patterns of both Brocchian and Lamarckian transmutation as early as 1832 at the outset of his work on the Beagle. 相似文献
9.
Gerald Ostdiek 《Biosemiotics》2011,4(1):69-82
As Darwin portended but failed to develop, and of which Gould made much, the forensic evidence of evolution points toward
Punctuated Equilibrium rather than Phyletic Gradualism; however Gould’s empirical postulation has long suffered from its lack
of a testable theoretical basis. This is rectified by the work of Jaroslav Flegr and the Frozen Plasticity Theory, a hypothesis
with striking application within semiotic theory and hence to questions of epistemology and ontology. The consequences of
applying FPT within Biosemiotics is this: when any particular sign carries a great range of interpretation (semiotic polymorphism)
combined with a high degree of mutually supportive referencing (semiotic pleiotropy), that sign is less likely to exhibit
plasticity—less able to find new expressions capable of taking on a life of their own (as it were), but more likely to exhibit
elasticity, and the flexibility necessary to survive a wide variety of niches. By contrast, much Darwinian and most Neo-Darwinian
thought presumes that plasticity is equally and necessarily present in all living things, and that all populations thus slowly
evolve. This devalues the point of interplay of such processes, which is the instigation of a specific instance of relating
both delineated by and delineating its own unique heritage, and a phenomenon of signage. The presumption that these moments
of transaction are all of a singular type has generated certain failures in extrapolating from evolutionary theory to understanding
the experience of life. However Darwin was read differently by Darwin’s philosophical champion and Peirce’s “boxing master”
Chauncey Wright. Using the historical encounter of the early Pragmatists with Origin, the hypothesis that Peirce’s Pragmatism and Semiotics originated within a study of the ontology implicit within Darwin’s
one long argument, and also an evocative import from Sir Edward Strachey, this essay approaches Frozen Plasticity as a theoretical
semiosis, so as to clarify the functioning of signage in evolution and cognition. 相似文献
10.
Theunissen B 《Journal of the history of biology》2012,45(2):179-212
The analogy between artificial selection of domestic varieties and natural selection in nature was a vital element of Darwin’s
argument in his Origin of Species. Ever since, the image of breeders creating new varieties by artificial selection has served as a convincing illustration
of how the theory works. In this paper I argue that we need to reconsider our understanding of Darwin’s analogy. Contrary
to what is often assumed, nineteenth-century animal breeding practices constituted a highly controversial field that was fraught
with difficulties. It was only with considerable effort that Darwin forged his analogy, and he only succeeded by downplaying
the importance of two other breeding techniques – crossing of varieties and inbreeding – that many breeders deemed essential
to obtain new varieties. Part of the explanation for Darwin’s gloss on breeding practices, I shall argue, was that the methods
of his main informants, the breeders of fancy pigeons, were not representative of what went on in the breeding world at large.
Darwin seems to have been eager to take the pigeon fanciers at their word, however, as it was only their methods that provided
him with the perfect analogy with natural selection. Thus while his studies of domestic varieties were important for the development
of the concept of natural selection, the reverse was also true: Darwin’s comprehension of breeding practices was moulded by
his understanding of the working of natural selection in nature. Historical studies of domestic breeding practices in the
eighteenth and nineteenth century confirm that, besides selection, the techniques of inbreeding and crossing were much more
important than Darwin’s interpretation allowed for. And they still are today. This calls for a reconsideration of the pedagogic
use of Darwin’s analogy too. 相似文献
11.
Sarah Blaffer Hrdy 《Human nature (Hawthorne, N.Y.)》1997,8(1):1-49
Sociobiologists and feminists agree that men in patriarchal social systems seek to control females, but sociobiologists go
further, using Darwin’s theory of sexual selection and Trivers’s ideas on parental investment to explain why males should
attempt to control female sexuality. From this perspective, the stage for the development under some conditions of patriarchal
social systems was set over the course of primate evolution.
Sexual selection encompasses both competition between males and female choice. But in applying this theory to our “lower origins”
(prehominid ancestors), Darwin assumed that choices were made by essentially “coy” females. I argue here that female solicitation
of multiple males (either simultaneously or sequentially, depending on the breeding system) characterized prehominid females;
this prehominid legacy of cyclical sexual assertiveness, itself possibly a female counter-strategy to male efforts to control
the timing of female reproduction, generated further male counter-strategies. This dialectic had important implications for
emerging hominid mating systems, human evolution, and the development of patriarchal arrangements in some human societies.
For hominid males who will invest in offspring, there would be powerful selection for emotions, behaviors, and customs that
ensure them certainty of paternity. The sexual modesty that so struck Darwin can be explained as a recent evolved or learned
(perhaps both) adaptation in women to avoid penalties imposed by patrilines on daughters and mates who failed to conform to
the patriline’s prevailing norms for their sex. Other supposedly innate universals, such as female preferences for wealthy
husbands, are also likely to be facultative accommodations by women to constraints set up when patrilines monopolized resources
needed by females to survive and reproduce, and passed on intergenerational control of these resources preferentially to sons. 相似文献
12.
Frank J. Sulloway 《Journal of the history of biology》2009,42(1):3-31
During his historic Galápagos visit in 1835, Darwin spent nine days making scientific observations and collecting specimens
on Santiago (James Island). In the course of this visit, Darwin ascended twice to the Santiago highlands. There, near springs
located close to the island’s summit, he conducted his most detailed observations of Galápagos tortoises. The precise location
of these springs, which has not previously been established, is here identified using Darwin’s own writings, satellite maps,
and GPS technology. Photographic evidence from excursions to the areas where Darwin climbed, including repeat photography
over a period of four decades, offers striking evidence of the deleterious impact of feral mammals introduced after Darwin’s
visit. Exploring the impact that Darwin’s Santiago visit had on his thinking – especially focusing on his activities in the
highlands – raises intriguing questions about the depth of his understanding of the evolutionary evidence he encountered while
in the Galápagos. These questions and related insights provide further evidence concerning the timing of Darwin’s conversion
to the theory of evolution, which, despite recent claims to the contrary, occurred only after his return to England. 相似文献
13.
Benjamin Sylvester Bradley 《Journal of the history of biology》2011,44(2):205-232
Recent Darwin scholarship has provided grounds for recognising the Origin as a literary as well as a scientific achievement. While Darwin was an acute observer, a gifted experimentalist and indefatigable
theorist, this essay argues that it was also crucial to his impact that the Origin transcended the putative divide between the scientific and the literary. Analysis of Darwin’s development as a writer between
his journal-keeping on HMS Beagle and his construction of the Origin argues the latter draws on the pattern of the Romantic or Kantian sublime. The Origin repeatedly uses strategies which challenge the natural-theological appeal to the imagination in conceiving nature. Darwin’s
sublime coaches the Origin’s readers into a position from which to envision nature that reduces and contains its otherwise overwhelming complexity.
As such, it was Darwin’s literary achievement that enabled him to fashion a new ‘habit of looking at things in a given way’
that is the centrepiece of the scientific revolution bearing his name. 相似文献
14.
Rachel M. Goodman 《Evolution》2008,1(3):306-311
Darwin Day is an international celebration of Charles Darwin’s birthday, February 12, and is used as an occasion for education
and outreach in evolutionary biology. I describe the history and structure of Darwin Day at the University of Tennessee, one
of the oldest Darwin Day organizations in the world. I detail past events including speakers, themes, and advertising ideas
that have worked for us and suggestions for getting a Darwin Day started. I encourage interested groups especially those at
schools, museums, libraries, nature centers, and other institutions to adapt ideas from our organization to fit their own
circumstances and to start planning their own Darwin Days for the celebration of Darwin’s 200th birthday in 2009. 相似文献
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17.
Frank J. Sulloway 《Journal of biosciences》2009,34(2):173-183
As a Cambridge University undergraduate Charles Darwin was fascinated and convinced by the argument for intelligent design,
as set forth in William Paley’s 1802 classic, Natural Theology. Subsequently, during his five-year voyage on HMS Beagle (1831–1836), Darwin interpreted his biological findings through a creationist lens, including the thought-provoking evidence
he encountered during his historic visit to the Galápagos Islands in September and October 1835. After his return to England
in 1836 and his subsequent conversion to the idea of organic evolution in March 1837, Darwin searched for a theory that would
explain both the fact of evolution and the widespread appearance of intelligent design. His insight into the process of natural
selection, which occurred in September 1838, provided this alternative explanation. Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859) exemplifies his skillful deployment of the hypothetico-deductive method in testing and refuting the arguments for
intelligent design that he had once so ardently admired. 相似文献
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19.
M. J. S. Hodge 《Journal of the history of biology》2009,42(3):399-416
When socio-economic contexts are sought for Darwin’s science, it is customary to turn to the Industrial Revolution. However,
important issues about the long run of England’s capitalisms can only be recognised by taking a wider view than Industrial
Revolution historiographies tend to engage. The role of land and finance capitalisms in the development of the empire is one
such issue. If we historians of Darwin’s science allow ourselves a distinction between land and finance capitalisms on the
one hand and industrial capitalism on the other; and if we ask with which side of this divide were Darwin and his theory of
branching descent by natural selection aligned, then reflection on leading features of that theory, including its Malthusian
elements, suggests that the answer is often and largely, though not exclusively: on the land side. The case of Wallace, socialist
opponent of land capitalism, may not be as anomalous for this suggestion as one might at first think. Social and economic
historians have reached no settled consensuses on the long-run of England’s capitalisms. We historians of Darwin’s science
would do well to import some of these unsettled states of discussion into our own work over the years to come. 相似文献
20.
Ridley RM 《Molecular biotechnology》2003,24(3):243-256
T. H. Huxley was “Darwin’s bulldog,” and took the offensive in championing the cause of evolution against skeptical scientists
and outraged theologians. As such, he took part in one of the great “paradigm shifts” of biology, at the end of the nineteenth
century. Huxley was a rigorous scientist and wrote important articles on scientific method, as well as publishing extensively
on a wide range of subjects in natural history. In the second half of the twentieth century, the “prion hypothesis” was put
forward to explain the pathogenesis of a curious group of diseases known as the transmissible spongiform encephalopathies.
This also involved a “paradigm shift” because the prion hypothesis postulated that biologically relevant information could
be enciphered in protein conformation (rather than encoded in nucleic acid base sequences), and could be transmitted from
one molecule to another, thereby causing infectious disease. This article examines a few of Huxley’s remarks to speculate
on how he might have responded to the scientific debate about prion disease had he lived a century later. 相似文献