Charles Robert Darwin

1
Charles Robert Darwin

• 12 Feb. 1809 - April 1882

2
Charles Darwin

• 1809
• Robert Fulton patented steamboat
• James Madison became President
• Napoleon defeated Austria
• Lamarck published Philosophie Zoologique

• Births
• Edgar Allen Poe, Jan. 19
• Felix Mendelssohn, Feb. 3
• Cyrus McCormick, Feb. 15
• Deaths
• Josef Haydn
• Thomas Paine
• Meriwether Lewis

3
Charles Darwin

• Family
• father, Robert Darwin, physician (1766-1848)
• mother, Susannah Wedgwood (1765-1817)
• 1 brother, 4 sisters
• Marianne Darwin (1798-1858),
• Caroline Sarah Darwin (1800-1888)
• married her cousin Josiah Wedgwood III
• Susan Elizabeth Darwin (1803-1866)
• Erasmus Alvey Darwin (1804-1881)
• Charles Robert Darwin (1809-1882)
• Emily Catherine Darwin (1810-1866)

4
Wedgwood

• Founder, Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795)
• Father of Susannah Wedgwood
• Grandfather to Charles Darwin
• Wedgwood Ltd. Today
• http//www.wedgwood.com/GB/home

5
Charles Darwin

• Education
• Classical, English public school
• Early interest in natural history
• Collector of plants, insects, shells, etc.
• Sent to Medical School at Edinburgh, age 16
• became ill seeing surgery, dropped out

6
Charles Darwin

• Education
• Sent to Cambridge to study for ministry.
• 3 years "largely wasted" (Autobiography)
• Disliked formal study, but graduated tenth in
  class Jan. 1831 (22 years old)
• Friendship with Rev. John Henslow, Prof. of
  Botany
• "Henslow's shadow"

7
Charles Darwin

• Summer 1831
• Charles home from Cambridge
• Riding, hunting, collecting,
• NOT looking for job !!

8
Charles Darwin

• Summer 1831
• Royal Navy preparing exploration mapping
  expedition to South America
• John Henslow invited on H.M.S. Beagle as
  naturalist
• Henslow 35 yrs. old, had wife family
• Henslow recommended Darwin

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H.M.S. Beagle

• Coffin brig
• Lieutenant Robert Fitzroy (1805 1865)
• Superb seaman navigator
• Later Governor of New Zealand
• Later established British Meteorological Office
• First to issue storm warnings and weather
  forecasts
• Biblical literalist creationist.

10
Voyage of the Beagle

• Beagle sailed 27 Dec. 1831
• Returned to England 2 Oct 1836
• Darwin aged 27

11
Charles Darwin

• Return to England
• Work on collections, specimens sent to British
  Museum during Beagle voyage
• Publication of results of research and
  collections
• Published Voyage of the Beagle (1839, 1845)

12
Charles Darwin

• Return to England
• Marriage to Emma Wedgwood (cousin)
• Frequently ill
• Chagas disease?, fibromyalgia ??
• Father of 10 children (7 lived to adult)
• contrast to Enrico Caruso (1873-1921)

13
Charles Darwin

• Return to England
• convinced of "MUTABILITY OF SPECIES"
• but how to explain ??
• Reading of Malthus, Essay on Population
• 1837-1858 Development of theory,
• gathering evidence, correspondence
• 1842 preliminary essay on "mutability of species"
• 1844 manuscript in ink, over 200 pp.
• money set aside for publication if he died.

14
Charles Darwin

• Publications on
• Coral Reefs,
• South American Geology,
• Barnacles (3 vol.)
• Secretary, Geological Society of London
• 3 year term

15
Charles Darwin

• 1858 Received manuscript from Alfred Russel
  Wallace
• Darwin had been scooped !

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Alfred Russel Wallace

• Youngest son of working class family,
• Surveyor
• School drawing instructor, met Henry Bates

17
Alfred Russel Wallace

• Expedition to Amazon with Bates
• Collecting specimens for wealthy amateurs in
  natural history
• Return to England ship burned sank,
• Specimens lost, passengers saved.

18
Alfred Russel Wallace

• New Expedition to Malay Archipelago
• Singapore, Indonesia, New Guinea, Philippines
• Flash of inspiration
• . . . it occurred to me to ask the question,
  Why do some die and some live?
• And the answer was clearly, that on the whole
  the best fitted live. From the effects of disease
  the most healthy escaped from enemies, the
  strongest, the swiftest, or the most cunning
  from famine, the best hunters or those with the
  best digestion and so on.

19
Alfred Russel Wallace

• Quickly wrote 20 pages manuscript,
• Sent to Darwin for review, critique.

20
Charles Darwin

• Darwin was stunned!
• Someone else had the idea he had worked on 20
  years
• Victorian gentleman
• Darwin was ready to let Wallace take full credit
• Charles Lyell Joseph Hooker knew of Darwins
  1844 manuscript
• Lyell Hooker presented Wallace manuscript
  Darwins papers to Linnaean Society of London,
  July 1, 1858

21
Charles Darwin

• 1859 (Nov.) Origin of Species published
• Idea of descent with modification by natural
  selection accepted by scientific community.

22
Charles Darwin

• Later works
• 1862 On the Various Contrivances by which
  British and Foreign Orchids are Fertilised by
  Insects
• 1868 Variation of Plants and Animals Under
  Domestication
• 1871 The Descent of Man, and Selection in
  Relation to Sex
• 1872 The Expression of Emotions in Man and
  Animals
• 1875 Movement and Habits of Climbing Plants
• 1875 Insectivorous Plants
• 1876 The Effects of Cross and Self-Fertilisation
  in the Vegetable Kingdom
• 1877 The Different Forms of Flowers on Plants of
  the Same Species
• 1880 The Power of Movement in Plants
• 1881 The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through
  the Action of Worms
• 1887 Autobiography of Charles Darwin (Edited by
  Francis Darwin)

23
Charles Darwin

• died April 1882 (age 73)  
• Buried in Westminster Abbey near
• Isaac Newton
• George Frederic Handel
• Ralph Vaughn Williams
• Geoffrey Chaucer
• Alfred Tennyson
• William Gladstone
• Rudyard Kipling
• David Livingston