Thomas Henry Huxley: The Evolution of a Scientist [Hardcover]

Sherrie L. Lyons (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1999

English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-95) was the foremost advocate of Darwin's theory of evolution, which he was 'prepared to go to the stake' to defend. The controversies surrounding Darwin in the Victorian age became a vehicle for Huxley to gain power in intellectual, institutional, and political arenas. Yet in this investigation of Huxley's motivations in science, Sherrie L. Lyons uncovers Huxley's scepticism of two basic tenets of Darwin's theory - natural selection and gradualism. His criticism of Darwinian science as being too simplistic led to a strengthening of evolutionary theory, rather than a weakening of it. A self-appointed defender of truth, Huxley developed his own research program, examining philosophy prior to Darwin in an effort to fill the holes in evolutionary theory. Lyons also looks at Huxley's conversion from salutation to gradualism, and his views on progression and the fossil record. As Huxley's interest in developmental morphology continues to be crucial in studying problems in comparative anatomy, embryology, palaeontology, and evolution, this book is essential to students of Darwin, Huxley, and the scientific enterprise.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...eminently readable, a tribute to the author, editors, and various reviewers..." -- Ecology

"...provides interesting information and insights for students of Huxley, Darwin, and the scientific enterprise." -- Southeastern Naturalist

"...worth reading to gain an understanding of Huxley from a different, philosophical perspective." -- Journal of the History of Biology

"This book is essential to students of Darwin, Huxley, and the scientific enterprise." -- Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society

"provides a wealth of valuable insights as to Huxley's career and its place in the evolution of 19th century biology" -- History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences

Product Details

• Hardcover: 339 pages
• Publisher: Prometheus Books (November 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1573927066
• ISBN-13: 978-1573927062
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,640,633 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best biography on Thomas Henry Huxley to date, June 5, 2004

By 

John Kwok (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Thomas Henry Huxley: The Evolution of a Scientist (Hardcover)

This splendid, relatively terse, tome on the life and career of Thomas Henry Huxley, the celebrated 19th Century English biologist, is a masterpiece of splendid scholarship and prose by its author, Sherrie L. Lyons. Lyons makes a persuasive case showing how Huxley's strict adherence to the scientific method led eventually to the acrimonious feud between him and Richard Owen, the eminent anatomist of the mid 19th Century. Lyons shows how Huxley gradually shifted his allegience from the German structuralist view championed by Owen to Charles Darwin's theory of evolution via natural selection, but at the same time recognizing some major pitfalls to Darwin's theory, most notably the significance of hybrid sterility. Huxley's legitimate criticisms of natural selection led Darwin to embark upon an ambitious research program - with the assistance of other leading British scientists - to study hybrid sterility, among others, resulting in a further strengthening - not weakening - of Darwin's original concept of natural selection. Lyons notes how the discoveries of important fossils in the 1860's with ample evidence of gradual transitions between species eventually led to Huxley's shift from a strict saltationalist view of the origin of species that was greatly at odds with natural selection to fully embracing Darwin's concept of natural selection as a gradual evolutionary process. She also points out that Huxley, long before Darwin himself, was willing to seize the initiative and note the strong kinship of the great apes with Man, making this point in public lectures, popular articles and finally, a book published in 1864, seven years prior to Darwin's "The Descent of Man". Last, but not least, Lyons notes how Huxley's original concerns regarding natural selection are still being investigated by evolutionary biologists - most notably paleontologists and developmental biologists - today.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A superbly researched and engagingly written biography., March 3, 2000

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Thomas Henry Huxley: The Evolution of a Scientist (Hardcover)

Sherrie L. Lyons' Thomas Henry Huxley provides an excellent history of the English biologist who was the foremost defender of Darwin's theory of evolution. His scientific background and contributions are revealed in an excellent survey.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Biography of an early Darwin critic..., January 11, 2001

By 

John C. Landon "nemonemini" (New York City) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Thomas Henry Huxley: The Evolution of a Scientist (Hardcover)

This fascinating and important biography of T.H.Huxley shows almost another Huxley from the one we associate with the Darwinian tradition. Huxley is an important figure, for in many ways he saw more clearly than Darwin, and current biology is catching up with him. The author begins by noting that 'while Huxley enthusiastically accepted the idea of descent with modification, he was critical of the two central components of Darwin's theory: gradualism and natural selection'. As the author notes, Huxley warned Darwin on the eve of publication that he had burdened his theory unnecessarily with the dictum, natura non facit saltum. This eye opening account reveals a Huxley who could step from a time machine into the contemporary debates on evolution, as the issues that were clearly in the background to Darwin's public triumph resurface with renewed force. Indeed, we discover that Huxley was close also to the developmental tradition with his interest in morphology and considerations of type.

It is a strange testimony to the telescoped pictures we have as non-specialists dependent on hurried summaries that this alternate side of Huxley should have remained unclear throughout the whole Darwin debate. And it is a reminder that the debate is one of selective emphasis of issues that were present from the beginning and never enter the mythical accounts of the Wilberforce debate. This biography, from Prometheus books no less, seems a bellwether for a paradigm in transition. Must reading.

Cf. also Adrian Desmond's Huxley, for a fuller picture of the nineteenth century background of culture and ideology.