-
-
Darwin's Exposure to Continental Sciences
Charles Darwin did not flourish in the Anglian English public school system. Darwin's interest in science often led him to be condemned by his headmasters and ridiculed by his classmates. Not until his father sent him to study medicine in Edinburg University did he experience a free thinking environment where deviant thought was welcomed. From this exposure, Darwin's observations into the natural world evolved and were influenced by his mentors such as Robert Edmond Grant. -
The Beagle Voyage
At the young age of 22, Charles Darwin set out on a transoceanic voyage which would turn and mold him into the naturalists he was destined to become. The rainforests of South America left his mind in a 'chaos of delight', fossils raised more questions than answers and in the end he accrued over 1,700 pages worth of notes and 12 drawn catalogues of skins, bones and carcasses. In 1836 the excursion came to an end after six years abroad, Darwin had amassed enough problems to last him a lifetime. -
Dissent of the Social Order
As Darwin and several radical freethinking naturalists dissented the supernatural creation of life as gospel, his observation and notes piled up. Soon he was forced to live a double life as clerics from Cambridge University called his 'transmutation' work an abomination, blasphemous or heresy that would lead to the corruption of mankind and breakdown of social order. -
On the Origin of Species
The turning of the tides for Darwin began during this timeframe as England became more accepting of his theory. As Darwin completed a quarter of a million words, he released an abstract 'Natural Selection', which led to 'The Origins of Species'. The published work distressed Cambridge patrons marginally thanks to their acceptance of science by 1859. The word 'evolution' was not mentioned in his publications until the last edition was published in 1872, prior to that 'decent' was the word used. -
The Decent of Man
Throughout Darwin's adult life and his publications society began accepting and applying natural selection, what would later be described as a paradigm shift. This paradigm shifted belief away from the theological creation of man to an evolutionary theory that all mankind is part of nature, not above it, who descend from ancestors. The publication Descent of Man was the first to discreetly discuss the evolution of civilization from 'old world monkeys' in volume one.
