[...]
>BH>I think any scholar that did not consider the possibility that
>>private correspondence may contain "tentative ideas and even
>>nonsense" would not be much of a scholar. Surely Darwin's
>>parenthetical remark "and oh! what a big if" suggests that
>>Darwin thought the idea tentative at best.
>
>SJ>Of course Darwin's corrrspondence had "tentative ideas". But
>my point was that they would have been well-thought out, and
>certainly not "nonsense".
>
But you wrote:
'Those who have done this must assume that Darwin did
not just dash off "tentative ideas and even nonsense",
but thought deeply and seriously about what he wrote.'
-- SJ
Please make up your mind. What is it now, that Darwin *did*
"dash off" some tentative ideas but they were well-thought out
tentative ideas?
>BH>Also note that
>>the quote begins "It is often said ..." indicating that the
>>subject was commonly discussed at the time. I also read somewhere
>>(but can't seem to find the reference) that Darwin's father
>>Erasmus also discussed the warm little pond. In any event,
>>there seems good reason to doubt that the idea was original
>>to Darwin.
>
>SJ>Erasmus Darwin was Charles Darwin's *grandfather*. I have already
>quoted Orgel and Shapiro who state that "the warm little pond" origin
>of life idea originated with Charles Darwin. If you claim it was
>originated by Erasmus Darwin, then you would need to demonstrate
>that.
>
Would it be too bold to imagine, that in the great length
of time since the earth began to exist, perhaps millions
of ages before the commencement of the history of mankind,
would it he too bold to imagine, that all [vegetables and
animals now existing were originally derived from the
smallest microscopic ones, formed by spontaneous vitality
in primeval oceans], which The Great First Cause endued
with animality, with the power of acquiring new parts,
attended with new propensities, directed by irritations,
sensations, volitions, and associations; and thus possessing
the faculty of continuing to improve by its own inherent
activity, and of delivering down those improvements by
generation to its posterity, world without end!
-- Erasmus Darwin, as quoted by D. King-Hele in
<Erasmus Darwin>, Macmillan, 1963, p. 71.
According to King-Hele, Darwin wrote something like this first in
<Zoonomia> [volume I, 1794] except for the part in [brackets].
The above version appeared in <The Temple of Nature>, 1803.
Now on page 73 of <Erasmus Darwin>, King-Hele writes:
In <The Temple of Nature> Darwin sums up the process
of evolution in four brilliant couplets, emphasizing
his belief that life began spontaneously in the sea:
ORGANIC LIFE beneath the shoreless waves
Was born and nurs'd in Ocean's pearly caves;
First forms minute, unseen by spheric glass,
Move on the mud, or pierce the watery mass;
These, as successive generations bloom,
New powers aquire, and larger limbs assume;
Whence countless groups of vegetation spring,
And breathing realms of fin, and feet, and wing.
[...]
>
>>(b) he doesn't deserve credit for it. IMHO, proper credit is
>>due the first person who *was* willing to take responsibility
>>for the idea by publishing it and defending it publicly.
>
>This is your criteria. But the fact is that Charles Darwin *has*
>been given the "credit" for it, because he first thought of it and
>wrote it down (albeit in private correspondence).
>
It is irrelevant that he *has* been given credit. Orgel et al could
be wrong, no?
Further, this is not just *my* criteria.
[...]
>
>BH>The key in the Darwin quote was his gravity illustration:
>>
>> "Who can explain the essence of the attraction of gravity?
>> No one now objects to following out the results consequent on
>> this unknown element of attraction ..."
>>
>>IOW, the "unknown element of attraction" is accepted as an axiom.
>
>SJ>Darwin says nothing about an "axiom", but he does say: "the
>attraction of gravity...his unknown element of attraction".
>
He doesn't have to actually say "axiom". What do you think
"...following out the results consequent on this unknown element
of attraction ..." means?
========================
Brian Harper |
Associate Professor | "It is not certain that all is uncertain,
Applied Mechanics | to the glory of skepticism" -- Pascal
Ohio State University |
========================