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From morphology to movement: observation and experiment

Summary

Darwin was a thoughtful observer of the natural world from an early age. Whether on a grand scale, as exemplified by his observations on geology, or a microscopic one, as shown by his early work on the eggs and larvae of tiny bryozoans, Darwin was…

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  • time. We have seen that the idea of what constituted anexperimentevolved during Darwins
  • youngest son, Horace, who was the founder of the Cambridge Scientific Instruments company.  …

What is an experiment?

Summary

Darwin is not usually regarded as an experimenter, but rather as an astute observer and a grand theorist. His early career seems to confirm this. He began with detailed note-taking, collecting and cataloguing on the Beagle, and edited a descriptive zoology…

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  • fits nicely with the view of natural history as a science of observation, collection, and
  • The two-fold division of Darwins science between observation and theory also seems to reflect
  • picture. The most obvious is the sharp distinction between observation and theory. Darwin would be
  • that without speculation there is no good & original observation’ ( letter to A. R. Wallace, 22
  • subtle distinction that needs to be questioned: that between observation and experiment. Today we
  • Darwins day this was by no means the case. The termsobservationandexperimentwere often used
  • stems, and roots undetectable to the naked eye. Anexperimentmight involve repeating the
  • Fox, 7 May [1855] ). But increasingly over time, detailed observation and experimental work became

Fool's experiments

Summary

‘I love fools' experiments. I am always making them’, was one of the most interesting things the zoologist E. Ray Lankester ever heard Darwin say. ‘A great deal might be written as comment on that statement’, Lankester later recorded, but he limited…

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  • may be summed up by the proposition that even a wise experiment when made by a fool generally leads
  • the dark into great discoveries’? The fools experiment that Darwin had described to
  • run by Julius Sachs in Würzburg, totry a troublesome experiment, of the class Fool. ’ Sachs had
  • Francis Darwin, in turn, told Darwin abouta real fools experimentthat Sachs had tried: ‘ he
  • observed curious facts when making what I calla fools experiment”. ’ He even encouraged other
  • destitute of silk. While not labelling this a fools experiment, Darwin did admit that in the ‘ …
  • diamonds in 1881, Darwin suggested a modification to the experiment. Organic matterthe flesh of an
  • proportions of carbon and nitrogen)—could be used in the experiment, becausesuch perhaps has
  • … ‘ I am very fond of trying what I calla fools experiment”; & such experiments, thorarely
  • … ‘ side-resulthad emerged from a fools experiment Darwin carried out in June 1842. While
  • whose early development had been the subject of intense observation by Darwin, who had responded to
  • This unanticipated reaction meant that the record of the experiment ended up not in Darwins
  • children, Francis Darwin, when recalling Darwins love of experiment, mentioned his fathers
  • … ‘probably the only man who ever attempted to solve by experiment the problem of free will and
  • … ‘ I am like a gambler,’ he declared, ‘& love a wild experiment. ’   [1] …

Instinct and the Evolution of Mind

Summary

Sources|Discussion Questions|Experiment Slave-making ants For Darwin, slave-making ants were a powerful example of the force of instinct. He used the case of the ant Formica sanguinea in the On the Origin of Species to show how instinct operates—how…

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  • … case of F. sanguinea intrigued Darwin's network of scientific friends and acquaintances …
  • … as a tool for gathering information and confirming his own scientific observations. In this case, …
  • … it might be F. sanguinea. If so, it would be the first observation of the species outside its …
  • … [1861] In a letter full of advice on publishing scientific works, Darwin encourages the …

Power of movement in plants

Summary

Sources|Discussion Questions|Experiment Family experiments Darwin was an active and engaged father during his children's youth, involving them in his experiments and even occasionally using them as observational subjects. When his children…

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  • … father. Darwin's letters to Francis mix advice on scientific matters with more practical …
  • … decade of Darwin’s life, he is still interested in his scientific questions and ideas. …
  • … of Oats bending toward the light would do as an appropriate observation for heliotropism. He remarks …
  • … writes to his father with some results from his latest experiment on movement in plants. By the time …

Before Origin: the ‘big book’

Summary

Darwin began ‘sorting notes for Species Theory’ on 9 September 1854, the very day he concluded his eight-year study of barnacles (Darwin's Journal). He had long considered the question of species. In 1842, he outlined a theory of transmutation in a…

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  • … the other chapters had been revised and some even sent to scientific specialists for comments. …
  • … ‘ that without speculation there is no good & original observation ’. In 1857, Darwin …

Review: The Origin of Species

Summary

- by Asa Gray THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES BY MEANS OF NATURAL SELECTION (American Journal of Science and Arts, March, 1860) This book is already exciting much attention. Two American editions are announced, through which it will become familiar to many…

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  • … that the flavor is lost to the general or even to the scientific reader. The volume itself—the proof …
  • … naturally devolve upon the principal editor,’ whose wide observation and profound knowledge of …
  • … his pen, and to seek in distant lands the entire repose from scientific labor so essential to the …
  • … far as possible, Darwin’s aim and processes are strictly scientific, and his endeavor, whether …
  • … In doing so, however, he is not supposed to be offering a scientific explanation of the phenomena. …
  • … foundations combined, a theory of Nature as theistic and as scientific as that which he has so …
  • … can hardly be said to have undertaken either line, in a scientific way. He would explain the whole …
  • … Mr. Darwin attempts both lines of proof, and in a strictly scientific spirit; but the stress falls …
  • … variable than others, but that no species subjected to the experiment persistently refuses to vary; …
  • … under cultivation.’ It is fair to conclude, from the observation of plants and animals in a wild as …
  • … of authorities is owing to imperfect or restricted observation, and to one naturalist’s adopting the …
  • … advantage, at first probably inappreciable to human observation, must decide which shall prevail and …
  • … suggestive of derivation, and unaccountable upon any other scientific view—deferring all attempts to …
  • … and concern us is, that it should be so denounced by a scientific man, on the broad assumption that …
  • … planetary orbits of the exact measure and form in which observation shows them to exist—a view which …
  • … may be tested by one or two analogous cases. The common scientific as well as popular belief is that …
  • … of this view is reckoned as one of the greatest scientific triumphs of this century. Perhaps, …
  • … theory, than to establish the theory itself upon adequate scientific evidence. Perhaps scarcely any …
  • … equally exposed. Yet the nebular hypothesis finds general scientific acceptance, and is adopted as …
  • … work. How the author of this book harmonizes his scientific theory with his philosophy and …
  • … examination of the theory itself, and of the interesting scientific points which are brought to bear …
  • … for some other convenient opportunity. The work is a scientific one, rigidly restricted to …
  • … mysterious than ever. How far the author has succeeded, the scientific world will in due time be …

Essay: Design versus necessity

Summary

—by Asa Gray DESIGN VERSUS NECESSITY.—DISCUSSION BETWEEN TWO READERS OF DARWIN’S TREATISE ON THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES, UPON ITS NATURAL THEOLOGY. (American Journal of Science and Arts, September, 1860) D.T.—Is Darwin’s theory atheistic or pantheistic…

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  • … the first ball to the pocket before him. You infer this from observation alone. Must you not from a …
  • … the presumption of design is as strong, or upon continued observation of instances soon becomes as …
  • … design, I think you will allow, everywhere is drawn from the observation of adaptations and of …
  • … predict what particular new variation will occur from any observation of the past. Just as the first …
  • … in the variety or new form was given at a point beyond observation, and is equally mysterious or …
  • … into this region, but not till then. But the whole course of scientific discovery goes to assure us …
  • … First, conjecture of certain laws or facts in optics. Then, experiment proving these laws or facts. …

Darwin in letters, 1882: Nothing too great or too small

Summary

In 1882, Darwin reached his 74th year Earthworms had been published the previous October, and for the first time in decades he was not working on another book. He remained active in botanical research, however. Building on his recent studies in plant…

Matches: 16 hits

  • … requests for autographs, and provided financial support for scientific colleagues or their widows …
  • … brother Erasmus had been interred in 1881. But some of his scientific friends quickly organised a …
  • … Westminster Abbey. Botanical work Botanical observation and experiment had long been …
  • … gone for ever and I should be classed (most unjustly) as a scientific person’. The two men also …
  • … be derived from basing the practice of medicine on a solid scientific foundation cannot be …
  • … George’s recent work had been highly praised by his scientific peers. A lecture by Robert Stawell …
  • … the work … I believe that George will some day be a great scientific swell’. Darwin also mentioned …
  • … Cambridge with his wife, Ida, and continued to build up his scientific instrument company, but his …
  • … Despite his declining condition, Darwin continued to answer scientific correspondents, and fielded …
  • … 150)). Letters of condolence arrived from Darwin’s scientific friends, correspondents, and …
  • … leading clergymen, politicians, and presidents of scientific societies, as well as immediate and …
  • … ). Another batch of letters provides glimpses of Darwin’s scientific life in the 1840s: his duties …
  • … diffused’. But he also cited Galton and others for the observation that the poor and degraded seemed …
  • … corpus will also be available through the nineteenth-century scientific correspondence website, …
  • … education, membership in learned societies, and positions of scientific employment were open to very …
  • … who engaged seriously with his work, offered some careful observation, a new specimen, a comment, or …

Darwin in letters, 1875: Pulling strings

Summary

‘I am getting sick of insectivorous plants’, Darwin confessed in January 1875. He had worked on the subject intermittently since 1859, and had been steadily engaged on a book manuscript for nine months; January also saw the conclusion of a bitter dispute…

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  • … on a book manuscript for some nine months. The pleasures of observation and experiment had given way …
  • … with a heated debate over vivisection , working with scientific colleagues and family members to …
  • … while still respecting codes of conduct and communication in scientific society. Huxley chose …
  • … who operated on an animal not rendered insensible, if the experiment made this possible … Under this …
  • … on the effects of grafting by George John Romanes. A scientific friendship had developed between the …
  • … Darwin on women In the wider public sphere and in scientific communities abroad, Darwin’s …
  • … of science: ‘of course, like all women, I have had no scientific training … And it is just this very …
  • … as the Lubbocks, Huxleys, and Hookers, Darwin hosted many scientific guests and others of social …
  • … man’ (‘Recollections’, p. 407).   Even scientific colleagues could be trying at times. In …
  • … career. ‘It seems to me the most disgraceful act which any scientific Socy. has done in my time,’ …
  • … Arabella Buckley. Lyell had helped to introduce Darwin to scientific society in London, and offered …

Darwin in letters, 1877: Flowers and honours

Summary

Ever since the publication of Expression, Darwin’s research had centred firmly on botany. The year 1877 was no exception. The spring and early summer were spent completing Forms of flowers, his fifth book on a botanical topic. He then turned to the…

Matches: 14 hits

  • … and was happiest when at work on topics requiring careful observation and experiment, and little or …
  • … ‘I often wish that I could be content to give up all scientific work & then I sh d . bother no …
  • … these remarks, which did not appear in Darwin’s original observation notebook, at the end of the …
  • … the contributors as ‘German representatives of free scientific research … united in the firm …
  • … portraits as photographs are. … The best photograph of a scientific man is to my understanding his …
  • … included students, schoolteachers, and artists as well as scientific and medical professionals (see …
  • … ‘an Irishman’, such a passage, appearing in ‘a great Scientific work destined to go to all Time and …
  • … & I have often & often thought this is the motto for every scientific worker. I am sure it …
  • … mad mad mad as a book can be’. Though he disclaimed its ‘scientific value’, he confessed in a …
  • … in 1876, but as he was a philosophical writer rather than a scientific researcher, Darwin thought …
  • … and went straight to the point: ‘I am a forester of scientific learning— I have entered some debts…. …
  • … in Senate House, and included an oration on Darwin’s scientific life and work: ‘With what intimate …
  • … Ancient remains and archaeological sites were key places of observation for Darwin. He and his sons …
  • … November 1877 ). Even at Cambridge, Darwin found time for scientific observation. Having lunched …

Experimenting with emotions

Summary

Darwin’s interest in emotions can be traced as far back as the Beagle voyage. He was fascinated by the sounds and gestures of the peoples of Tierra del Fuego. On his return, he started recording observations in a set of notebooks, later labelled '…

Matches: 4 hits

  • burst out crying. This is curiousI repeated the experiment’ ( ‘Observations of children’, …
  • book on the subject. At first glance, the book seems lessscientificthan his other works. It is
  • made by the instantaneous process the best means for observation, as allowing more deliberation’ (p. …
  • of the neck, prominent in extreme fear. But the apparatus of experiment, especially the presence of

Darwin in letters, 1878: Movement and sleep

Summary

In 1878, Darwin devoted most of his attention to the movements of plants. He investigated the growth pattern of roots and shoots, studying the function of specific organs in this process. Working closely with his son Francis, Darwin devised a series of…

Matches: 4 hits

  • … remarked to Joseph Dalton Hooker, ‘or as far as I know any scientific man’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker …
  • … (1872), Darwin had turned almost exclusively to botanical observation and experiment. He had begun a …
  • … day before yesterday & today I observed (but perhaps the observation will prove erroneous) that …
  • … (‘Journal’, Appendix II). His only extended break from scientific work came during visits with …

Darwin in letters, 1851-1855: Death of a daughter

Summary

The letters from these years reveal the main preoccupations of Darwin’s life with a new intensity. The period opens with a family tragedy in the death of Darwin’s oldest and favourite daughter, Anne, and it shows how, weary and mourning his dead child,…

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  • … and mourning his dead child, Darwin persevered with his scientific work, single-mindedly committed …
  • … were rewarded with the first public recognition of his scientific achievements when, in 1853, he was …
  • … that soon developed into a valued friendship. London scientific society As letters in …
  • … of shared interests was extended into the political realm of scientific life in London, as revealed …
  • … study was drawing to a close, Darwin re-entered London scientific society, accepting membership in …
  • … awards of the society, giving thought to proposing men of scientific eminence, such as Charles Lyell …
  • … Darwin’s decision to take a more active interest in London scientific life was prompted by a general …
  • … those consequences of his theories that might be subject to experiment and illustrates his skill in …
  • … of natural selection as a theory firmly founded on observation and on experiment. …

Living and fossil cirripedia

Summary

Darwin published four volumes on barnacles, the crustacean sub-class Cirripedia, between 1851 and 1854, two on living species and two on fossil species. Written for a specialist audience, they are among the most challenging and least read of Darwin’s works…

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  • … natural selection, these volumes reveal, in fact, how observation, experiment, and classification …
  • … the volumes, reveals something about Darwin’s approach to scientific investigation. While appearing …

Darwin in letters, 1874: A turbulent year

Summary

The year 1874 was one of consolidation, reflection, and turmoil for Darwin. He spent the early months working on second editions of Coral reefs and Descent of man; the rest of the year was mostly devoted to further research on insectivorous plants. A…

Matches: 8 hits

  • … impetus to science by showing what could be done by observation during prolonged intervals’ ( …
  • … of marriage’,   in which he suggested that modern scientific views of inheritance might lead to …
  • … of Darwin’s evolutionary views and the ethics of scientific conduct (see Correspondence vol. 22, …
  • … of view, Mivart had violated codes of friendship and of scientific conduct by attacking Darwin’s …
  • … He reported to his son George that Spalding was planning to experiment on the sense of direction in …
  • … plants , this work drew on methods from a variety of scientific fields, especially physiology and …
  • … The Zoological Station at Naples Mindful of the scientific assistance he received from so …
  • … to Eugène Desmarest, 4 March 1874 ). He featured in the scientific worthies series  in  Nature  ( …

Movement in Plants

Summary

The power of movement in plants, published on 7 November 1880, was the final large botanical work that Darwin wrote. It was the only work in which the assistance of one of his children, Francis Darwin, is mentioned on the title page. The research for this…

Matches: 4 hits

  • … Darwin’s experimental work required patience, acute observation, and new apparatus. ‘ It is …
  • … the size of diagrams on the woodblock using photography for scientific accuracy ( letter from J. D. …
  • … beans in sawdust since ‘ Sachs wants the bean caustic experiment done in loose earth as he seems to …
  • … He complained to his father, ‘ I did the caustic experiment with Faba & Phaseolus in damp earth …

Charles Harrison Blackley

Summary

You may not have heard of Charles Harrison Blackley (1820–1900), but if you are one of the 15 million people in the UK who suffer from hay fever, you are indebted to him. For it was he who identified pollen as the cause of the allergy. Darwin was…

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  • … sticky slides on them to sample the air. He perfected the experiment by adding a clockwork mechanism …

Dipsacus and Drosera: Frank’s favourite carnivores

Summary

In Autumn of 1875, Francis Darwin was busy researching aggregation in the tentacles of Drosera rotundifolia (F. Darwin 1876). This phenomenon occurs when coloured particles within either protoplasm or the fluid in the cell vacuole (the cell sap) cluster…

Matches: 8 hits

  • … today and cemented the notion of carnivorous plants in the scientific and public imagination. …
  • … legacy in a variety of ways, including through his own scientific ventures into plant carnivory. …
  • … the glandular hairs of his specimens were too withered for observation and he postponed work until …
  • … that his son’s despair would weaken his will to pursue scientific endeavours, Darwin gently yet …
  • … 1877a, pp. 5-8). In his full paper, Francis proposed an experiment in which ‘teasel raised from seed …
  • … coaxing of his father wasn’t enough to rekindle Francis’ scientific pursuit of the curious filaments …
  • … of  Dipsacus  were the natural continuation of a scientific legacy firmly grounded in his father’s …
  • … in carnivorous ways. This discovery opened the door to the scientific evaluation of proto …

Darwin and vivisection

Summary

Darwin played an important role in the controversy over vivisection that broke out in late 1874. Public debate was sparked when the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals brought an unsuccessful prosecution against a French physiologist who…

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  • … anatomy, including dissection, and natural-historical observation. But he had drawn extensively on …
  • … Darwin even described an animal enduring a painful experiment as an example of its tender and …
  • … Support was then sought from some ‘half dozen eminent scientific men’. Darwin sent a copy to Joseph …
  • … secretary, and a certificate signed by the heads of various scientific and medical institutions. …
  • … the restriction of the making of experiments on animals for scientific purposes   …
  • … to prohibit the making of painful experiments on animals for scientific purposes except by duly …
  • … the title and opening clauses, in which the reference to ‘scientific purposes’ was replaced with the …
  • … and physiology … Any person, for the purpose of new scientific discovery, but for no other purpose, …
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