Alfred Russel Wallace vs. Charles Darwin

[BurtWorm]

Anyone have any opinions on the debate?

Wallace is the English biogeologist whose letter to Darwin giving his thoughts on the origin of species based on his observations in Malaysia prompted Darwin (at Charles Lyell's urging) to hurry up the schedule for publishing The Origin of Species. Some say if Wallace hadn't been such a mensch, we'd be referring to Wallacism instead of Darwinism now.

My own feeling is that Darwin is properly credited, and that Wallace receives his due with the standard nods he receives from anyone who mentions him as co-discoverer. I'm reading a biography of Wallace now, and the author, who is identified on the dust jacket as a "Wallace enthusiast" seems to think so too (although he seems to believe Wallace should be put on the same level as Darwin, which I disagree with). Darwin thought about and worked on the idea of natural selection for a some 14 years before the publication of The Origin of Species. Wallace did not call it natural selection but something like "the tendency toward variation." He also borrowed the Spencerian term "struggle of the fittest" and urged Darwin to use it in his book as a kind of PR trick to popularize the theory. (As readers of the book know, Darwin took Wallace's advice, but he was not a fan of Spencer's.)

The bottom line for me is that Darwin was most interested in truth. Wallace, I think, was a bit more interested in iconoclasm. I think there is a lot to be admired in Wallace's work leading to his co-discovery of the theory, but I don't believe his intellect is quite as worthy of admiration as Darwin's.

[wryter2000]

1. Correct me if I'm wrong

I believe Darwin insisted that he and Wallace presented their papers together at whichever scientific society they reported to. In other words, Darwin could have scooped Wallace completely but didn't.

Also, didn't Wallace believe that the human brain was an exception to evolution and that it had been created by God?

[BurtWorm]

2. I'm not sure of the last point.

You're right about the first point. Darwin did insist on Wallace's article being included at the unveiling of the theory at the Linnean Society. Darwin had two sketchy pieces included, and Wallace's article for publication was the last. Wallace later complained that the way it had been presented was designed to leave the impression that Darwin had the idea first. But it was true that Darwin had the idea first. Furthermore, when The Origin of Species came out, Wallace admitted that he could not have done the justice to the subject that Darwin had done it.

I am just now reading about Wallace's intense infatuation with spiritualism. It does seem that he believed in the supernatural. Therefore, he may have thought mind was god-created. But he hasn't said anything anywhere near like that so far.

[whistle]

3. More on Wallace

http://www.naturalhistorymag.com/0904/0904_selections.html

[BurtWorm]

4. I'm reading "The Heretic in Darwin's Court"

The coverage of the co-discovery of "the mechanism" behind speciation is excellent.

But now that he's onto Wallace's weird period, the bio is getting a little weird itself.

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. Isn't it accepted that Darwin had also collected more evidence

and thus the quick public acceptance of the theory was more due to Darwin's work than Wallace?

[BurtWorm]

6. In scientific circles, I believe you're right.

It is more accepted, and apparently was accepted by Wallace himself. On the other hand, Wallace had vastly more experience than Darwin in the wildernesses of South America and Malaysia. He had seen vastly many more species in their natural environment with his own eyes than Darwin. And it was that experience that convinced Wallace in the truth of evolution.

[KittyWampus]

7. Neither Of Them "Invented" Natural Selection Or Survival Of Fittest

Both were around beforehand... it's just that when Darwin published his work it meshed well with the Colonialism that was going amok. What a great way for Europeans to justify their behavior.

[BurtWorm]

8. Interesting theory.

Of course they didn't "invent" natural selection. I hope you didn't get the impression that I was naive enough to think so.

[muriel_volestrangler]

9. On the other hand, it tore down the crappy 'biblical justifications'

for slavery that people tried to make up based on the sons of Noah.

So who was talking about natural selection before them?

[BurtWorm]

10. I thought cs was claiming that natural selection was not invented

but discovered. By Darwin and Wallace. Right, cs? ;)

[BurtWorm]

11. I wish you would explain how Darwin's work "meshed well" with colonialism

Your charge needs more explanation.

[wryter2000]

12. Social Darwinism

Darwin never intended anything like social Darwinism, but the theory got perverted in that way, anyway. Of course, the idea of inherently inferior classes existed long before Darwin, but the theory of evolution was used as a scientific justification.

And, it's still with us. It's a lot of what justifies Republican policy today. If you're poor, it's your fault because you're defective.

[BurtWorm]

13. Spencer's "social Darwinism" actually predated Darwin.

Spencer coined the term "survival of the fittest." It seems to me Darwin's work highlighted the creative aspect of natural and sexual selection, while Spencer was all about competition and lex talens.

It is certainly true, however, that even Darwin (and Wallace) believed, as most Europeans believed, that Europeans had a manifestly higher degree of civilization than any other peoples of the earth. But Darwin and Wallace both argued against the prevailing notion that other races were of different species than human beings or were inherently "inferior" to Europeans in any way other than culturally. Wallace actually argued that "savages" (as everyone referred to non-Eurasians) were morally superior, and Darwin pointed out to Wallace during one of their later debates over the origin of consciousness, that Wallace's reports on the Papuans' sophisticated knowledge of their environment exhibited an intelligence superior to the average European's. (Jared Diamond says the same thing in the first chapter of Guns, Germs and Steel.)

So I would say that Darwinism itself didn't mesh at all with colonialism, and was one of the factors contributing to its demise in Europe, being a major step on the road toward the removal of European "man" from the center of the universe.