- Paperback: 432 pages
- Publisher: Pocket Books (1 April 2010)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1847393098
- ISBN-13: 978-1847393098
- Product Dimensions: 12.9 x 3.7 x 19.9 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 574,671 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Darwin's Armada
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Product Description
Product Description
Darwin's Armada tells the stories of Charles Darwin, Thomas Huxley, Joseph Hooker and Alfred Wallace, four young amateur naturalists from Britain who voyaged to the southern hemisphere during the first half of the nineteenth century in search of adventure and scientific fame. It charts their thrilling voyages to the strange and beautiful lands of the southern hemisphere that reshaped the young mariners' scientific ideas and led them, on returning to Britain, to befriend fellow voyager Charles Darwin. All three crucially influenced the publication and reception of his Origin of Species in 1859, one of the formative texts of the modern world. For the first time the Darwinian revolution of ideas is seen as a genuinely collective enterprise and one that had its birth in a series of gripping and human travel adventures. Many of the most urgent ecological and social issues of our times are seen to be prefigured in this compelling story of intellectual discovery.
About the Author
Iain McCalman is currently Professor and Director of the Humanities Research Centre, Australian National University, and Deputy Director of the Australian Research Council's Centre for Cross-Cultural Reasearch. His books include The Seven Ordeals of Count Cagliostro and The Last Alchemist: Count Cagliostro, Master of Magic in the Age of Reason.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is an excellent book which outlines the voyages, adventures and scientific contributions of Darwin, Wallace, Huxley and Hooker.
But I strongly disagree with the conspiracy theory put forward by another reviewer (but NOT put forward in this book!) that "Hooker and Huxley ... organised the greatest scam in British scientific history in promoting Darwin at the expense of Wallace - the true discoverer of evolution."
From the book, "The Foundations of The Origin of Species: Two Essays Written in 1842 and 1844", and from Darwin's notebooks, it can be clearly seen that Darwin had developed the theory long before Wallace independently came up with the same idea.
And at a meeting of the Linnaean Society Society in 1908 Wallace himself said this:
"Since the death of Darwin in 1882, I have found myself in the somewhat unusual
position of receiving credit and praise from popular writers under a complete
misapprehension of what my share in Darwin's work really amounted to. It has been
stated (not unfrequently) in the daily and weekly press, that Darwin and myself
discovered "natural selection" simultaneously, while a more daring few have declared
that I was the first to discover it, and that I gave way to Darwin!
In order to avoid further errors of this kind (which this Celebration may possibly
encourage), I think it will be well to give the actual facts as simply and clearly as
possible.
The one fact that connects me with Darwin, and which, I am happy to say, has never
been doubted, is that the idea of what is now termed "natural selection" or "survival
of the fittest", together with its far-reaching consequences, occurred to us
independently, and was first jointly announced before this Society fifty years ago.
But, what is often forgotten by the press and the public, is, that the idea occurred to
Darwin in October 1838, nearly twenty years earlier than to myself (in February
1858); and that during the whole of that twenty years he had been laboriously
collecting evidence from the vast mass of literature of Biology, of Horticulture, and
of Agriculture; as well as himself carrying out ingenious experiments and original
observations, the extent of which is indicated by the range of subjects discussed in
his "Origin of Species", and especially in that wonderful store-house of knowledge
- his "Animals and Plants under Domestication", almost the whole materials for
which works had been collected, and to a large extent systematised, during that,
twenty years."
Incidentally, Darwin became a great friend not only of Huxley and Hooker, but of Wallace, too.
But I strongly disagree with the conspiracy theory put forward by another reviewer (but NOT put forward in this book!) that "Hooker and Huxley ... organised the greatest scam in British scientific history in promoting Darwin at the expense of Wallace - the true discoverer of evolution."
From the book, "The Foundations of The Origin of Species: Two Essays Written in 1842 and 1844", and from Darwin's notebooks, it can be clearly seen that Darwin had developed the theory long before Wallace independently came up with the same idea.
And at a meeting of the Linnaean Society Society in 1908 Wallace himself said this:
"Since the death of Darwin in 1882, I have found myself in the somewhat unusual
position of receiving credit and praise from popular writers under a complete
misapprehension of what my share in Darwin's work really amounted to. It has been
stated (not unfrequently) in the daily and weekly press, that Darwin and myself
discovered "natural selection" simultaneously, while a more daring few have declared
that I was the first to discover it, and that I gave way to Darwin!
In order to avoid further errors of this kind (which this Celebration may possibly
encourage), I think it will be well to give the actual facts as simply and clearly as
possible.
The one fact that connects me with Darwin, and which, I am happy to say, has never
been doubted, is that the idea of what is now termed "natural selection" or "survival
of the fittest", together with its far-reaching consequences, occurred to us
independently, and was first jointly announced before this Society fifty years ago.
But, what is often forgotten by the press and the public, is, that the idea occurred to
Darwin in October 1838, nearly twenty years earlier than to myself (in February
1858); and that during the whole of that twenty years he had been laboriously
collecting evidence from the vast mass of literature of Biology, of Horticulture, and
of Agriculture; as well as himself carrying out ingenious experiments and original
observations, the extent of which is indicated by the range of subjects discussed in
his "Origin of Species", and especially in that wonderful store-house of knowledge
- his "Animals and Plants under Domestication", almost the whole materials for
which works had been collected, and to a large extent systematised, during that,
twenty years."
Incidentally, Darwin became a great friend not only of Huxley and Hooker, but of Wallace, too.
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This book should have been called "The Evolution Armada"as the present title gives far to much credit to Darwin who was only a small part in the evolution saga.
The book details the contributions of Darwin,Huxley,Hooker and Wallace to the eventual publication of the book" The Origin Of Species"
It was Hooker and Huxley who organised the greatest scam in British scientific history in promoting Darwin at the expense of Wallace - the true discoverer of evolution.
A well balanced book that for the first time puts the various investigators in their place and vindicates wallace.
The book details the contributions of Darwin,Huxley,Hooker and Wallace to the eventual publication of the book" The Origin Of Species"
It was Hooker and Huxley who organised the greatest scam in British scientific history in promoting Darwin at the expense of Wallace - the true discoverer of evolution.
A well balanced book that for the first time puts the various investigators in their place and vindicates wallace.
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