On this day in 1859, Charles Darwin's book 'On the Origin of Species' was published in London. Written in a very convincing and cleverly-crafted manner, Darwin presents overwhelming and easy-to-follow-through evidence for his theory - particularly logical observations of the generalized patterns in nature that he studied. The book begins by accustoming the mind to the idea of artificial selection and how humans can select for different varieties, as per traits desired. Darwin provides many examples of the variation techniques that breeders have developed with domesticated plants and animals. In the ensuing chapters, he introduces the mechanism for natural selection (through numerous examples from his very wide experience) as a means to propagate different variations and adaptive functions that in turn lead to differential reproductive success. It follows from his reasoning that organisms can become adapted to different environments in different areas, or changing conditions at a particular environment over time, or certain beneficial hereditary variations that become available at a specific time in the gene pool. In the last few chapters, he addresses the arguments raised against his theory and concludes with a wider context of adaption and design. Even though at the time, his arguments were presented without definite certainty (of course he had no knowledge of genes) and were merely taken as only a clever suggestion, Darwin’s arguments were presented with immense explanatory power and ingenious inductive methods - they are a culmination of a coordination and integration of well-established known facts in embryology, morphology, geology, etc.
Indeed, the data Darwin gathered in the ‘On The Origin of Species’ confirmed the deducible consequences suggested by the hypothesis of mutability of species. Such a method of scientific analysis, often attributed to Darwin, is often known as the hypothetico-deductive method.
The premise of validity for such a method rests upon how much explanatory power one’s arguments can elicit relative to the alternative supposition. What could account for two structurally similar, yet self-distinct species? Why would distinct species exist that can perform similar functions? Are similar displays of striped patterns in equine species indicative of descent of these species from a common ancestor? In the Origin of Species, Darwin remarks:
“He who believes that each equine species was independently created, will, I presume, assert that each species has been created with a tendency to vary, both under nature and under domestication, in this particular manner, so as often to become striped like other species of the genus; and that each has been created with a strong tendency, when crossed with species inhabiting distant quarters of the world, to produce hybrids resembling in their stripes, not their own parents, but other species of the genus. To admit this view is, as it seems to me, to reject a real for an unreal, or at least for an unknown, cause. It makes the works of God a mere mockery and deception; I would almost as soon believe with the old and ignorant cosmogonists, that fossil shells had never lived, but had been created in stone so as to mock the shells now living on the sea-shore.”
The explanatory power of such a hypothesis very much supersedes the explanatory vacuity of immutable design by an intelligent agency. Darwin reflects “What can be more curious than that the hand of a man, formed for grasping, that of a mole for digging, the leg of the horse, the paddle of the porpoise, and the wing of the bat, should all be constructed on the same pattern, and should include the same bones, in the same relative positions?” Indeed, such structures seem to be traceable to a common plan, rather than discretely designed. On traveling from north and south of South America and observing two similar yet distinct species of rheas that are not separated by any geographical boundaries, Darwin concedes “it was evident that such facts as these, as well as many others, could only be explained on the supposition that species gradually become modified; and the subject haunted me.”
Darwin’s powerful abstractions in the Origin of Species, untrammeled by the shackles of presumed prejudice, had the foresight to ask what lay behind his commonplace observations. They, indeed, constitute the brilliancy of wit that defined Darwin’s legacy.
Happy birthday to The Origins of Species!
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