TheConstitution of Manby George Combe (1828) was probably the most influential phrenological work of the nineteenth century. It not only offered an exposition of the phrenological theory of the mind, but also presented Combe's vision of universal human progress through the inheritance of acquired mental attributes. In the decades before the publication of Darwin'sOrigin of Species, theConstitutionwas probably the single most important vehicle for the dissemination of naturalistic progressivism in the English-speaking world. Although there is a significant literature on the (...) social and cultural context of phrenology, the role of heredity in Combe's thought has been less thoroughly explored, although both John van Wyhe and Victor L. Hilts have linked Combe's views on heredity with the transformist theories of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. In this paper I examine the origin, nature and significance of his ideas and argue that Combe's hereditarianism was not directly related to Lamarckian transformism but formed part of a wider discourse on heredity in the early nineteenth century. (shrink)

This paper analyzes the impact that Lamarckian evolutionary theory had in the scientific community during the period between the advent of Zoological Philosophy and the publication Origin of Species. During these 50 years Lamarck’s model was a well known theory and it was discussed by the scientific community as a hypothesis to explain the changing nature of the fossil record throughout the history of Earth. Lamarck’s transmutation theory established the foundation of an evolutionary model introducing a new way to research (...) in nature. Darwin’s selectionist theory was proposed in 1859 to explain the origin of species within this epistemological process. In this context, Charles Lyell’s Principles of Geology and Auguste Comte’s Cours de Philosophie Positive appear as two major works for the dissemination of Lamarck’s evolutionary ideology after the death of the French naturalist in 1829. (shrink)

Our paper aims at bringing to the fore the crucial role that habits play in Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution by means of natural selection. We have organized the paper in two steps: first, we analyse value and functions of the concept of habit in Darwin's early works, notably in his Notebooks, and compare these views to his mature understanding of the concept in the Origin of Species and later works; second, we discuss Darwin’s ideas on habits in the light (...) of today’s theories of epigenetic inheritance, which describe the way in which the functioning and expression of genes is modified by the environment, and how these modifications are transmitted over generations. We argue that Darwin’s lasting and multifaceted interest in the notion of habit, throughout his intellectual life, is both conceptually and methodologically relevant. From a conceptual point of view, intriguing similarities can be found between Darwin’s (early) conception of habit and contemporary views on epigenetic inheritance. From a methodological point of view, we suggest that Darwin’s plastic approach to habits, from his early writings up to the mature works, can provide today’s evolutionary scientists with a viable methodological model to address the challenging task of extending and expanding evolutionary theory, with particular reference to the integration of epigenetic mechanisms into existing models of evolutionary change. Over his entire life Darwin has modified and reassessed his views on habits as many times as required by evidence: his work on this notion may represent the paradigm of a habit of good scientific research methodology. (shrink)

The term “scientism” is often used as a denunciation of an uncritical ideological confidence in the abilities of science. Contrary to this practice, this article argues that there are feasible ways of defending scientism as a set of ideologies for political reform. Rejecting an essentialist approach to scientism as well as the view that ideologies have a solely negative effect on history, it argues that the political effect of ideologies inspired by a belief system (including scientism and various religions) must (...) be judged case by case—and that the appearance of complex politico‐scientific problems such as the climate problem in effect warrants some kind of ideological scientism. (shrink)

Historians tend to speak of the problem of the origin of species or the species question, as if it were a monolithic problem. In reality, the phrase refers to a, historically, surprisingly fluid and pluriform scientific issue. It has, in the course of the past five centuries, been used in no less than ten different ways or contexts. A clear taxonomy of these separate problems is useful or relevant in two ways. It certainly helps to disentangle confusions that have inevitably (...) emerged in the literature in its absence. It may, secondly, also help us to gain a more thorough understanding, or sharper view, of the history of evolutionary thought. A consequent problem-centric look at that history through the lens of various origin of species problems certainly yields intriguing results, including and particularly for our understanding of the genesis of the Wallace–Darwin theory of evolution through natural selection. (shrink)

This paper depicts Ian Hacking’s ‘styles of reasoning’ as conditions of possibility. After distinguishing between possibilities and causes, it articulates the implicit stratigraphical metaphor used to describe the relationship between different conditions of possibility, with ‘lower’ layers being necessary for ‘higher’ ones. It notes the use of this stratigraphical metaphor in the work of multiple scholars in history and in science studies. The paper suggests three ways in which this model can be useful: clarifying the definition and use of ‘context’ (...) in history of science; redefining counterfactuals as ‘possible historical worlds’; and thinking up new forms of ‘big picture’ histories of science. (shrink)

This paper draws on material from the dissertation books of the University of Edinburgh's student societies and surviving lecture notes from the university's professors to shed new light on the debates on human variation, heredity and the origin of races between 1790 and 1835. That Edinburgh was the most important centre of medical education in the English-speaking world in this period makes this a particularly significant context. By around 1800 the fixed natural order of the eighteenth century was giving way (...) to a more fluid conception of species and varieties. The dissolution of the ‘Great Chain of Being’ made interpretations of races as adaptive responses to local climates plausible. The evidence presented shows that human variation, inheritance and adaptation were being widely discussed in Edinburgh in the student circles around Charles Darwin when he was a medical student in Edinburgh in the 1820s. It is therefore no surprise to find these same themes recurring in similar form in the evolutionary speculations in his notebooks on the transmutation of species written in the late 1830s during the gestation of his theory of evolution. (shrink)

ArgumentDuring the second quarter of the nineteenth century, an argument raged about the identity of a small freshwater fish: was the parr a distinct species, or merely the young of the salmon? This “Parr Controversy” concerned both fishermen and ichthyologists. A central protagonist in the controversy was a man of ambiguous social and scientific status: a gamekeeper from Scotland named John Shaw. This paper examines Shaw’s heterogeneous practices and the reception of his claims by naturalists as he struggled to find (...) a footing on the “gradient of attributed competence” (Rudwick 1985). The case demonstrates the context-specific nature of expert-lay boundaries and identities and explores a range of material and linguistic resources available for negotiating them. Arguing for a view of Shaw’s trajectory as simultaneously one of being a “practical man” and of becoming a naturalist, the paper explores both the permeability of social hierarchies in knowledge production and their effective role in the regulation of competency. (shrink)

SUMMARYThe duck-billed platypus, or Ornithorhynchus, was the subject of an intense debate among natural historians in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Its paradoxical mixture of mammalian, avian and reptilian characteristics made it something of a taxonomic conundrum. In the early 1820s Robert Jameson, the professor of natural history at the University of Edinburgh and the curator of the University's natural history museum, was able to acquire three valuable specimens of this species. He passed one of these on to (...) the anatomist Robert Knox, who dissected the animal and presented his results in a series of papers to the Wernerian Natural History Society, which later published them in its Memoirs. This paper takes Jameson's platypus as a case study on how natural history specimens were used to create and contest knowledge of the natural world in the early nineteenth century, at a time when interpretations of the relationships between animal taxa were in a state of flux. It shows how Jameson used his possession of this interesting specimen to provide a valuable opportunity for his protégé Knox while also helping to consolidate his own position as a key figure in early nineteenth-century natural history. (shrink)

This paper sheds new light on the prevalence of evolutionary ideas in Scotland in the early nineteenth century and establish what connections existed between the espousal of evolutionary theories and adherence to the directional history of the earth proposed by Abraham Gottlob Werner and his Scottish disciples. A possible connection between Wernerian geology and theories of the transmutation of species in Edinburgh in the period when Charles Darwin was a medical student in the city was suggested in an important 1991 (...) paper by James Secord. This study aims to deepen our knowledge of this important episode in the history of evolutionary ideas and explore the relationship between these geological and evolutionary discourses. To do this it focuses on the circle of natural historians around Robert Jameson, Wernerian geologist and professor of natural history at the University of Edinburgh from 1804 to 1854. From the evidence gathered here there emerges a clear confirmation that the Wernerian model of geohistory facilitated the acceptance of evolutionary explanations of the history of life in early nineteenth-century Scotland. As Edinburgh was at this time the most important center of medical education in the English-speaking world, this almost certainly influenced the reception and development of evolutionary ideas in the decades that followed. (shrink)

In the space of four years, from 1826 to 1829, the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal published three anonymous articles seemingly advocating doctrines inspired by Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. Decades of scholarship have initially attributed the most outspoken of the three articles, the 1826 “Observations on the Nature and Importance of Geology,” to Robert Grant, and subsequently to Robert Jameson, thanks to a critical reassessment by James Secord. More recently, scholars have also ascribed to Jameson an article published in 1829, “Of the Continuity (...) of the Animal Kingdom by Means of Generation from the First Ages of the World to the Present Times.” A third short contribution, the 1827 “Of the Changes which Life has Experienced on the Globe” has been credited to the Franco-German Ami Boué. Research undertaken over several years has led to the identification of the three authors hiding behind the veil of anonymity. They were not the ones scholars have agreed upon, nor were they really “Lamarckians.” The discussion of the ways in which the three texts reached Edinburgh broadens our understanding of the daily working practices of contemporary periodicals and of the networks of circulation of texts at the Continental level. Finally, when considered within their proper conceptual and social context, the three articles throw light on the many ways in which, during the 1820s, European amateurs, naturalists, and journalists debated the succession of life forms throughout the history of the Earth. (shrink)

Historians tend to speak of the problem of the origin of species or the species question, as if it were a monolithic problem. In reality, the phrase refers to a, historically, surprisingly fluid and pluriform scientific issue. It has, in the course of the past five centuries, been used in no less than ten different ways or contexts. A clear taxonomy of these separate problems is useful or relevant in two ways. It certainly helps to disentangle confusions that have inevitably (...) emerged in the literature in its absence. It may, secondly, also help us to gain a more thorough understanding, or sharper view, of the history of evolutionary thought. A consequent problem-centric look at that history through the lens of various origin of species problems certainly yields intriguing results, including and particularly for our understanding of the genesis of the Wallace–Darwin theory of evolution through natural selection. (shrink)

On occasion Charles Darwin can seem our scientific contemporary, for the subjects he engaged remain engaging today, but in his role as author he belongs to the past. It is not customary today for scientists to write book after book, as Darwin did, or for these books to serve as the primary vehicle of scientific communication. For Darwin, however, the book was central. He wrote at least eighteen, depending on what one counts; in hisAutobiographyhe entitled the section describing his most (...) important work ‘An account how several books arose’; and in his personal Journal, begun in August 1838 after he had come to a mature sense of himself, he organized entries around his books. A characteristic entry is that for 1846: ‘Oct. 1st. Finished last proof of my Geolog. Observ. on S. America; This volume, including Paper in Geolog. Journal on the Falkland Islands took me 18 & 1/2 months:–’. Further, almost always he had a book under way: when one was complete, the next was begun. He called them the milestones to his life. (shrink)