The Origin of Species

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:30:59 -0500

Summary

This book (as the title implies) is interested in the emergence of species, and now that we are talking about it, what are species to begin with? At the time, there were many very experienced naturalists who would disagree on whether a certain plant or animal belonged in species A as a variety or actually should be considered a distinct species. These disagreements arose due to the fact that no one had a clear theory as to how these differences arose and up to then we used internal and external structure to define species. If these structures diverged enough, we would separate them into species. They also used the concept of whether entity A could potentially breed with entity B. If not, then the two entities must not be in the same species. There were other methods used, but these two should suffice to show how difficulties in definition might arise. For example, the internal and external structure of sexed organisms may very greatly as in humans, but we obviously must be the same species, right?….. Actually, that might explain some things. As for mating, this brings its own difficulties (I’m on a roll), but strictly speaking, you can have two different species reproduce, like a grizzly bear and polar bear, and this happens quite often in the plant kingdom. On the other hand, you have many instances of creatures in the same species category that can’t reproduce inside their own species. Think Mastiff and Chihuahua. So these principles are by no means black and white. The prevalent view at the time was the belief that each species was created individually, with this view the categorization of species should be much more straight-forward than it is, but Darwin had other ideas. Using pigeons, due to their availability and the long history they have of human selection, he built an argument. He stated that if we had found the various varieties of pigeons in the wild, we would without a doubt classify them as different species. We only refrain from doing so because we happen to know in this case that all the varieties descended from rock pigeons. What if this same concept applied to the whole animal kingdom? What if instead of individually created species there was a single progenitor which has given rise to the magnificent variety we observe today? How far might these accumulated minute changes take us?

Notes from the Underground

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:31:04 -0500

In 1864, Russia and the Western world was experiencing a philosophical reversal with reverberations that can still be felt almost two hundred years later. One by one “unquestionable” truths were being placed in the dust bin by a cold rationality. The attack on humanity’s placement of itself in the universe started over three hundred years earlier, when a polymath named Copernicus rediscovered the forgotten truth that we are not the center of the universe. Ever since then, the more scientific details that are catalogued about the world, the further man is pushed from that once prized and secure position. There are two main ideas that the underground man (UM) simultaneously seems to prove by his actions and disapprove of by his words. First is man as nature, the second is man as automata, and by extension nature as automata. It had only been five years since Charles Darwin had written ‘On the Origin of Species’ and already Dostoyevsky has incorporated his theory and worked out what he sees as its possible ramifications. Chiefly that of an alienated human that is horrified to look in the mirror and see no-thing looking back. In an opening note to the book Dostoevsky makes clear that the UM is an inevitable product of the spread of these two ideologies. The book opens with the memorable…

Charles_darwin on George's Blog

The Origin of Species

Notes from the Underground