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How old is the earth?
Summary
One of Darwin’s chief difficulties in making converts to his views, was convincing a sceptical public, and some equally sceptical physicists, that there had been enough time since the advent of life on earth for the slow process of natural selection to…
Matches: 9 hits
- … that there had been enough time since the advent of life on earth for the slow process of natural …
- … damage in a much wider dispute about the age of the earth between geologists and physicists , …
- … Thomson calculated from its assumed rate of cooling that the earth itself was only between 100 to …
- … was the upper, rather than lower, limit of the age of the earth. Darwin explained his dilemma to the …
- … Although Croll responded thoughtfully, suggesting that the earth’s crust could have formed more …
- … was working on the effect of the moon’s gravity on the earth, and suggested that Thomson, who had …
- … friction of the ‘tides’ created in the structure of the earth by the moon’s pull would generate heat …
- … his father crowed, ‘ Hurrah for the bowels of the earth & their viscosity & for the moon …
- … spanned the period from 145 to 65 million years ago. The earth is now estimated to be around 4.5 …
Darwin and dogs
Summary
Darwin was almost always in the company of dogs. Nina, Spark, Pincher, and Shiela. Snow, Dash, Bob, and Bran. The beloved terrier Polly (right). They were Darwin's constant companions at home and in the field, on walks and in sport, in his study and…
Matches: 1 hits
- … reach the highest pitch of joy: " If there is bliss on earth, that is it ". Darwin' …
John Stevens Henslow
Summary
The letters Darwin exchanged with John Stevens Henslow, professor of Botany and Mineralogy at Cambridge University, were among the most significant of his life. It was a letter from Henslow that brought Darwin the invitation to sail round the world as…
Matches: 1 hits
- … of him after his death ' a better man never walked this earth '. Henslow was …
Rewriting Origin - the later editions
Summary
For such an iconic work, the text of Origin was far from static. It was a living thing that Darwin continued to shape for the rest of his life, refining his ‘one long argument’ through a further five English editions. Many of his changes were made in…
Matches: 3 hits
Darwin in letters, 1869: Forward on all fronts
Summary
At the start of 1869, Darwin was hard at work making changes and additions for a fifth edition of Origin. He may have resented the interruption to his work on sexual selection and human evolution, but he spent forty-six days on the task. Much of the…
Matches: 3 hits
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
- … plant, so as to observe how the flowers penetrate the earth. For several months my son & self …
- … ‘ Sachs wants the bean caustic experiment done in loose earth as he seems to suspect abnormalities …
- … I did the caustic experiment with Faba & Phaseolus in damp earth & by evening they had all …
- … mother, ‘ I did some beans extended horizontally in damp earth some causticed above others below …
1.5 Samuel Laurence drawing 2
Summary
< Back to Introduction This chalk sketch of Darwin by Samuel Laurence is (as Francis Darwin surmised) likely to have been done in 1853, at the same sitting as the portrait in three-quarter view which is now at Down House. It is inscribed on the back…
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…
Matches: 1 hits
- … he began to investigate whether seeds were transported in earth stuck to birds’ feet . In …
Essay: Natural selection & natural theology
Summary
—by Asa Gray NATURAL SELECTION NOT INCONSISTENT WITH NATURAL THEOLOGY. Atlantic Monthly for July, August, and October, 1860, reprinted in 1861. I Novelties are enticing to most people; to us they are simply annoying. We cling to a long-accepted…
Matches: 13 hits
- … in time, and their actual geographical distribution over the earth’s surface, were leading up from …
- … generation, and accepts a supernatural beginning of life on earth, in some form or forms of being …
- … 3. The actual geographical distribution of species upon the earth’s surface tends to suggest the …
- … of creation, and in particular of the present kinds of the earth’s inhabitants, or of a large part …
- … all the organic beings which have ever lived on this earth have descended from some one primordial …
- … as universal cataclysms were in vogue, and all life upon the earth was thought to have been suddenly …
- … call secondary causes. The record of the fiat—‘Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding …
- … to introduce the first individuals of each sort upon the earth. Scientifically considered, the two …
- … design in the theist’s view. He believes that the earth’s surface has been very gradually prepared …
- … to account for, or if the successive inhabitants of the earth had no other connections or …
- … one to ‘believe that, at innumerable periods in the earth’s history, certain elemental atoms have …
- … as the ordinary action of Him who laid the foundation of the earth, and without whom not a sparrow …
- … time antecedent to the introduction of organic life upon our earth. A fortiori is physical …
Casting about: Darwin on worms
Summary
Earthworms were the subject of a citizen science project to map the distribution of earthworms across Britain (BBC Today programme, 26 May 2014). The general understanding of the role earthworms play in improving soils and providing nutrients for plants to…
Matches: 3 hits
Essay: What is Darwinism?
Summary
—by Asa Gray WHAT IS DARWINISM? The Nation, May 28, 1874 The question which Dr. Hodge asks he promptly and decisively answers: ‘What is Darwinism? it is atheism.’ Leaving aside all subsidiary and incidental matters, let us consider–1. What the…
Matches: 3 hits
- … single problem–namely, How are the fauna and flora of our earth to be accounted for? . . . To …
- … one or more primordial germs. . . . How all living things on earth, including the endless variety of …
- … curiously wrought (or embroidered) in the lower parts of the earth. . . . God makes the grass to …
German poems presented to Darwin
Summary
Experiments in deepest reverence The following poems were enclosed with a photograph album sent as a birthday gift to Charles Darwin by his German and Austrian admirers (see letter from From Emil Rade, [before 16] February 1877). The poems were…
Matches: 6 hits
- … know there is a constant struggle, An eternal fight on earth, That every beautiful thing …
- … Which, with fearless spirit Has conquered the earth, the beasts. What is the point of …
- … The mirror of virtue. You would like to walk the earth As a pious and devout man, …
- … Most of all I warn you— Consider! here on earth, The worst thing is the spirit, It …
- … You always praised yourself As the grandest spirits on earth, Who carry the torch of …
- … release from arrest, of his controversial assertion that the earth moved around the sun. 3. …
The Lyell–Lubbock dispute
Summary
In May 1865 a dispute arose between John Lubbock and Charles Lyell when Lubbock, in his book Prehistoric times, accused Lyell of plagiarism. The dispute caused great dismay among many of their mutual scientific friends, some of whom took immediate action…
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- … 1865. Elements of geology, or the ancient changes of the earth and its inhabitants as illustrated …
The geology of the Beagle voyage
Summary
The primary concern that linked much of Darwin’s geological work in the Beagle years was to understand the changing relation between the levels of land and sea. As he studied the shores of South America, and discovered shells inland at thousands of feet…
Darwin & the Geological Society
Summary
The science of geology in the early nineteenth century was a relatively new enterprise forged from the merging of several distinct traditions of inquiry, from mineralogy and the very practical business of mining, to theories of the earth’s origin and the…
4.9 'Graphic', cartoon
Summary
< Back to Introduction A cartoon which appeared in the Graphic in 1871 was unusual, in that it pictured a serious scientific challenge to Darwin’s theories. Sir William Thomson, later Lord Kelvin, a leading physicist based at the University of…
Darwin’s student booklist
Summary
In October 1825 Charles Darwin and his older brother, Erasmus, went to study medicine in Edinburgh, where their father, Robert Waring Darwin, had trained as a doctor in the 1780’s. Erasmus had already graduated from Cambridge and was continuing his studies…
Darwin & Glen Roy
Summary
Although Darwin was best known for his geological work in South America and other remote Beagle destinations, he made one noteworthy attempt to explain a puzzling feature of British geology. In 1838, two years after returning from the voyage, he travelled…
Matches: 3 hits
- … had since been pushed above sea level by the bulging of the earth beneath South America. He went to …
- … MacCulloch, or Darwin. Agassiz was convinced that the earth had formerly experienced an ‘epoch of …
- … when he was giving full expression to the theory of the earth that was his proudest product of the …
Darwin in letters, 1847-1850: Microscopes and barnacles
Summary
Darwin's study of barnacles, begun in 1844, took him eight years to complete. The correspondence reveals how his interest in a species found during the Beagle voyage developed into an investigation of the comparative anatomy of other cirripedes and…
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- … Species theory In November 1845, Charles Darwin wrote to his friend and confidant Joseph …
Darwin in letters, 1821-1836: Childhood to the Beagle voyage
Summary
Darwin's first known letters were written when he was twelve. They continue through school-days at Shrewsbury, two years as a medical student at Edinburgh University, the undergraduate years at Cambridge, and the of the voyage of H.M.S. Beagle.…
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- … Darwin's first known letters were written when he was twelve. They continue through his school …