Customer Reviews

Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution

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All of the books I have ever read about Darwin either extoll him a a perfect, God-like creature, or vilify him as a demon. This book provides a comprehensive view of Darwin as he was, that is, as he saw himself and as others saw him. I was surprised to read that Darwin had many predecessors in the development of his theory, and that the flaws of the theory (which are significant) were generally recognized long before the challenges of modern science pointed them out. If you want your fancies about Darwin tickled, read others. If you want the facts, read Himmelfarb. I strongly recommend this book.

Like all books by Himmelfarb, this one is erudite, well written, informative, insightful and sure to upset the politically correct which for me makes it five stars.

In first presenting the historical information about Darwin and his theory and then analyzing their historical and cultural effects, the author does a comprehensive job in presenting a balanced picture. However it is just this evenhandedness which will incite those secularists who hold Darwin up as the destroyer of God and the founder of the Scientific view of creation for Himmelfarb shows that Darwin himself never made these kind of claims, and that indeed the theory is just that- almost a pure thought hypothesis that has NEVER been experimentally verified, for in all the millions of fossils discovered to date there has never been an example of one species "evolving" into another, the cornerstone of what Darwin was trying to explain. While excuses abound for why this is so, nonetheless it is a fact which glaringly highlights that, while Darwin postulated A scenario for evolution, it may not be THE scenario.

Another interesting fact the author reveals is that many of the original defenders of the theory did so less from being convinced of its truth than for the "freedom" it offered from religious constraints on scientific inquiry, again highlighting the fact that it was more a philosophical revolution and less a scientific one that Darwin initiated.

As for the popular Liberal claim that God was no longer necessary because of natural selection, well, anytime science attempts to deal with metaphysical questions of "why" as opposed to how, it runs into problems which it cannot, almost by definition, answer. Specifically in this case, the claim that mutations are random is impossible to verify scientifically. How can we prove there was no underlying reason for the way change occurred, even if natural selection vetted these alterations and picked winners and losers? Even Richard Dawkins, the acclaimed scientist and radical atheist, believes evolution is geared to complexity. If it were truly random, why would this be so?

In dealing with these and other aspects of the debate the author is enlightening and informative, assuming you are not so closed minded that any detour from the Liberally approved path is forbidden. Himmelfarb is a brilliant historian and thinker who presents the facts and allows the reader to draw his own conclusions. It is the kind of refreshing attitude that Darwin's supporters once prized, before Darwin himself became ossified as dogma for many of his current day followers who mistakenly consider themselves openminded.

This is an excellent book written by a brilliant author. It details the line of progenitors leading up to Darwin's theory as well as the historical milieu in which Darwin swam during his lifetime and some of the forces, social and otherwise, that influenced him prior to Origin of Species and beyond. Himmelfarb gives an insightful criticism of Darwin's theory working simply from the internal organization of Darwin's thoughts. Himmelfarb is so brilliant in her analysis that my only criticism of the book is that she didn't critcize the theory in a more detailed fashion.

But it is a very readable and accessible book, and one that clearly points out some of the failings of Darwinian theory, many of which have been picked up by other critics over the years. However, I suspect that for the more sophisticated critic of Darwin, this book lacks sufficient scientific evidence--though it remains a fine history of the person, his theory, and its reception at the time of publication.

This fifty one year old book begins with a scholarly erudition informing us of intricate details of the biography and historical times of Darwin. It is replete with diachronic trivia to enliven the story telling. Then it ends. There is nothing worthwhile to follow. Himmelfarb must have been a great tutor to her son, William Kristol and this book could well have been used as a primer for propaganda methodology.

The author can turn a phrase that is alluring and distracting. The incautious reader could easily take for granted, the entire sham of a biography. How does she do this?

For starters she uses the straw dog fallacy of setting up the enemy as a larger force than it is and therefore in need of being cut down a peg or two. In this case she has elevated evolution outside of its scientific reality and into a widespread social and cultural revolution that has spawned the likes of Hitler. Without Darwin and his theory, we would not have seen a leader like Hitler rise up I suppose.

Earlier in the book she confined her problem with evolution to the singularity of its compelling force, that of Natural Selection. That notion fell to her sword because it failed to define many unrelated conditions. In fact during Darwin's day evolutionary forces were already being uncovered including sexual selection and mimicry. Today evolution has gone through the "new synthesis", evo/devo and sociobiology to name a few. There are countless methods to study while using an evolutionary premise. There are basically no methods that work without it.

Even Himmelfarb described the early gainsayers of evolution as being obliged to make their case from a philosophical perspective. Then she herself did exactly that.

Essentially she sees the problem from a perspective of tradition and morals rather than scientific efficacy. For humans to have morality and civilization, they need religion according to her. Yet in demanding that we require this morality she utilized all of the tricks of the anti-evolution trade to addle the reader. She conflated issues that cannot be arguable merged when it was convenient. She broadened issues to become far outside the realm of the theory when that was convenient. She used the Piltdown Hoax and Kettlewell's experiments with moths as proof of the error of evolution all the while ignoring that evolution has guided the sciences for a century and a half. The various subterfuges that Himmelfarb used amounted to lying and that is the immorality of propaganda.