Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin was born on February the 12^th 1809, Shrewsbury England and passed away on April the 19 1882at the Down House in Kent. His parents were Robert and Susannah Darwin. Charles Darwin’s father (Erasmus Darwin) had also been a doctor/ physician. Erasmus made his real name by being a poet of the natural world. Susannah Wedgewood (Darwin’s mother) family were potters which is how her father (Josiah Wedgewood) made his fortune. Although their professions may be different both sides of Darwin’s family had liberal politics and felt indifferent about their religion.

            Charles Darwin was home schooled with his sister (Caroline) up until the age of eight when his mother died. He spent the next year attending day school until he was transferred to boarding school. His academic ability was acceptable but highly average. At the age of sixteen his father sent him to the University of Edinburgh where he was to study medicine.

He spent a lot of time hunting and collecting instead of completing his medicine study, this is when he began to learn how to study and collect beetles. During this time he was taken under the wing of biologist Robert Grant. After two years of university Darwin was not to become a doctor. Darwin’s father showed a level of understanding and aided him in his transfer to the University of Cambridge; where he then began his study to be a clergy of the Anglican Church. This is where he met friend and botanist John Henslow.

Not long after his graduation in 1831, Darwin was offered a job on board the HMS Beagle; where he would be mapping the coast of South America. The voyage took five years, according to records and notes Darwin’s most important years were spent at the Galapagos Islands; this is where he found never seen before animals and plants. He took notes and samples which he would send to his friend Henslow in England to be kept safe.

Upon Darwin’s return to England, he was greeted with the excitement and fascination of geologist, zoologist, and botanists as the variety and never before send specimens which had collected. Following this he spent ten years cataloguing and describing all the discoveries he made. By doing this he wrote books upon books about coral reefs, volcanic islands, various papers and a journal about his voyage.

By doing this he encourage himself to think and look deeper into the origin of these new wonderful species. He began his first notebook regarding this topic in 1837; eventually he gained the confidence to share his theory “evolution by natural selection” 20 years later.

In 1839, Darwin married his cousin Emma Wedgewood and moved to London to focus on his work. Unfortunately, they had to relocate again due to Darwin’s health problems. They resided in a village which was quiet, peaceful and the perfect place for Darwin to finish his work.

Upon completing his work on the results of the HMS Beagle Voyage, he was yet to publish his thoughts on his theory of evolution. He chose to focus his theory on a small thing such as the different kinds of barnacles, although the project seemed small at first it grew fast and gradually turned into four volumes of dissection and description. This task took him eight years. Once complete he turned his attention back to his evolutionary theory.

In 1857, Darwin’ theories correlated with a paper regarding the evolution of species, this paper was sent to him by Alfred Russell Wallace (whom shared an extremely similar view). Darwin presented a picture to coincide with Wallace’s paper to the Linnean Society. To prevent someone else taking credit for his extrodinary work Darwin published an abstract from his book which he had been currently working on.

The abstract was published in 1859 as On the Origin of Species, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. It immediately took off and completely sold out of the first prnting of it within a day. It sparked debates across many of its subject area and Darwin decided to isolate himself from it all and made no comments on any of the topics. His theory undergone many critisms and skeptical judges, yet his friends Joseph Hooker (botanist) and Thomas Henry Huxley (zoologist) defended him even though he did not defend himself and continued with his research.

Darwin had five main theories;

1.      Evolution: “Species come and go through time, while they exist they change”

2.      Common Descent: “organisms are descended from one, or several common ancestors and have diversified from his original stock”

3.      Species Multiply: “the diversification of life involves populations of one species diverging until they become two separate species; this has probably occurred billions of times on earth”

4.      Gradualism: “evolutionary change occurs through incremental small changes within populations; new species are not created suddenly”

5.      Natural Selection: “evolutionary change occurs through variation between individuals; some variants give the individual an extra survival probability”

Darwin believed these theories to be part of one big theory which all works together, and all occur together. Scientist took time to see what Darwin did, what Darwin could see then took scientist until the 1930s-1940s to see.

To prove he was correct in his theories he collected evidence and data to support his hypothesis. He researched reports from others to support as well as his own work and observations. Still unable to convince people of what we now know to be the truth he demonstrated it using artificial selection using domestic animals and plants.

Charles Darwin was an enthusiastic with an obsession and rigorous need to research and collect facts. No animal was to escape his notice; domestic animals were dissected ad the drawn highlighting differences. In the picture shown below is a section from his book regarding rabbits.

“I shall in this volume treat, as fully as my materials permit, the whole subject of variation under domestication. We may thus hope to obtain some light, little though it be, on the causes of variability, - on the laws which govern it, such as the direct action of climate and food, the effects of use and disuse, and of correlation of growth, - and on the amount of change to which domesticated organisms are liable. We shall learn something on the laws of inheritance, on the effects of crossing different breeds, and on that sterility which often supervenes when organic beings are removed from their natural conditions of life, and likewise when they are too closely interbred. During this investigation we shall see that the principle of selection is all important. Although man does not cause variability and cannot even prevent it, he can select, preserve, and assimilate the variations given to him by the hand of nature in any way which he chooses.” Charles Darwin, introduction to Variation.

Charles Darwin worked on three during the 1860s, one contained information about variation under domestication, and he saw this as a parallel representation of the wild species. The second was about the evolution of humanity and the roles of sexual selection. The third and final book was about the expression of emotions. His second book which he had worked on was named “The Descent of Man” and was published in 1871.

The book did not do as well as Darwin had planned, he expected it to be in high demand and cause a massive sensation with the public, his claims that humans are descendants should have done as he so wished, however, due to the “Origins” the thunder had been stolen 12 years ago. In 1872, “The Expression of Emotions in Animals and Man” was published. In this he showed the similarity and differences between animals and humans one of his pictures were of an embryo of a human and one of a dog.

Throughout the last ten years of his life, Charles Darwin removed himself from evolution and focused on his gardens. He researched climbing plants and the geological role of earthworms. He proceeded to turn his workshop into a fully functioning greenhouse, which led to him creating several more books. The illness which began at the start of his marriage began to take over making him weaker but no less determined to continue work and enjoying his elderly age.

By the year 1877, his theories still sparked their original controversies; however, he had the respect of the University of Cambridge and did him the honour of giving him a doctorate. In 1882, his condition became even worse and he passed away 19^th April 1882 at home (Down House) and was buried in Westminster Abbey.