Book contents
- Darwin Mythology
- Darwin Mythology
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction: Myths and Darwin
- Myth 1 That Myths Are Simple Falsehoods
- Myth 2 That Most European Naturalists Before Darwin Did Not Think That Species Change Was Possible
- Myth 3 That Charles Darwin Was Not Directly Influenced by the Evolutionary Views of His Grandfather Erasmus
- Myth 4 That Darwin Always Rejected the Argument from Design in Nature and Developed His Own Theory to Replace It
- Myth 5 That Darwin Converted to Evolutionary Theory During His Historic Galápagos Islands Visit
- Myth 6 That Darwin’s Galápagos Finches Inspired His Most Important Evolutionary Insights
- Myth 7 That Darwin Was a Recluse, and a Theoretician Rather Than a Practical Scientist
- Myth 8 That Darwin Rejected Lamarck’s Ideas of Use and Disuse and of the Inheritance of Acquired Traits
- Myth 9 That Darwin’s Theory Was Essentially Complete Once He Came Up with the Idea of Natural Selection
- Myth 10 That Darwin Delayed the Publication of His Theory for Twenty Years, Being Afraid of the Reactions It Would Cause
- Myth 11 That Wallace’s and Darwin’s Theories Were the Same, and That Darwin Did Not Reveal Wallace’s 1858 Letter and Theory Until He Ensured His Own Priority
- Myth 12 That Huxley Was Darwin’s Bulldog and Accepted All Aspects of His Theory
- Myth 13 That Huxley Defeated Wilberforce, and Ridiculed His Obscurantism, in the 1860 Oxford Debate
- Myth 14 That Darwin’s Critics Such as Owen Were Prejudiced and Had No Scientific Arguments
- Myth 15 That Natural Selection Can Also Be Accurately Described As the Survival of the Fittest
- Myth 16 That Darwin Banished Teleology from Biology
- Myth 17 That Darwin’s Success Depended on Undermining “Aristotelian Essentialism”
- Myth 18 That Darwin’s Theory Would Have Become More Widely Accepted Immediately Had He Read Mendel’s 1866 Paper
- Myth 19 That Darwin Faced a Conspiracy of Silence in Lamarck’s Country
- Myth 20 That Hitler Endorsed and Was Influenced by Darwin’s Theory
- Myth 21 That Sexual Selection Was Darwin’s Afterthought to Natural Selection
- Myth 22 That Darwin’s Hatred of Slavery Reflected His Beliefs in Racial Equality
- Myth 23 That the Discovery of Australopithecus in 1925 Belatedly Confirmed Darwin’s 1871 Scientific Prediction of African Human Origins
- Myth 24 That Darwin’s Theory Brought an Instant and Immediate Revolution in the Life Sciences
- Conclusion: What Inferences About Science Can We Draw from Charles Darwin’s Life and Work?
- Further Reading
- Index
Myth 15 - That Natural Selection Can Also Be Accurately Described As the Survival of the Fittest
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 May 2024
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Book contents
- Darwin Mythology
- Darwin Mythology
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction: Myths and Darwin
- Myth 1 That Myths Are Simple Falsehoods
- Myth 2 That Most European Naturalists Before Darwin Did Not Think That Species Change Was Possible
- Myth 3 That Charles Darwin Was Not Directly Influenced by the Evolutionary Views of His Grandfather Erasmus
- Myth 4 That Darwin Always Rejected the Argument from Design in Nature and Developed His Own Theory to Replace It
- Myth 5 That Darwin Converted to Evolutionary Theory During His Historic Galápagos Islands Visit
- Myth 6 That Darwin’s Galápagos Finches Inspired His Most Important Evolutionary Insights
- Myth 7 That Darwin Was a Recluse, and a Theoretician Rather Than a Practical Scientist
- Myth 8 That Darwin Rejected Lamarck’s Ideas of Use and Disuse and of the Inheritance of Acquired Traits
- Myth 9 That Darwin’s Theory Was Essentially Complete Once He Came Up with the Idea of Natural Selection
- Myth 10 That Darwin Delayed the Publication of His Theory for Twenty Years, Being Afraid of the Reactions It Would Cause
- Myth 11 That Wallace’s and Darwin’s Theories Were the Same, and That Darwin Did Not Reveal Wallace’s 1858 Letter and Theory Until He Ensured His Own Priority
- Myth 12 That Huxley Was Darwin’s Bulldog and Accepted All Aspects of His Theory
- Myth 13 That Huxley Defeated Wilberforce, and Ridiculed His Obscurantism, in the 1860 Oxford Debate
- Myth 14 That Darwin’s Critics Such as Owen Were Prejudiced and Had No Scientific Arguments
- Myth 15 That Natural Selection Can Also Be Accurately Described As the Survival of the Fittest
- Myth 16 That Darwin Banished Teleology from Biology
- Myth 17 That Darwin’s Success Depended on Undermining “Aristotelian Essentialism”
- Myth 18 That Darwin’s Theory Would Have Become More Widely Accepted Immediately Had He Read Mendel’s 1866 Paper
- Myth 19 That Darwin Faced a Conspiracy of Silence in Lamarck’s Country
- Myth 20 That Hitler Endorsed and Was Influenced by Darwin’s Theory
- Myth 21 That Sexual Selection Was Darwin’s Afterthought to Natural Selection
- Myth 22 That Darwin’s Hatred of Slavery Reflected His Beliefs in Racial Equality
- Myth 23 That the Discovery of Australopithecus in 1925 Belatedly Confirmed Darwin’s 1871 Scientific Prediction of African Human Origins
- Myth 24 That Darwin’s Theory Brought an Instant and Immediate Revolution in the Life Sciences
- Conclusion: What Inferences About Science Can We Draw from Charles Darwin’s Life and Work?
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
In 1866 Alfred Russel Wallace, Herbert Spencer, and Thomas Henry Huxley teamed up to urge Darwin to replace ‘natural selection’ with ‘survival of the fittest’ in future editions of the Origin. They felt that the purely ex post facto process suggested by this phrase would undercut the creationist objection that natural selection is haunted by intentional design. However, this is inaccurate. Thinking of natural selection as survival of the fittest leads to confusions between Darwin’s theory and the closely related but different accounts of Wallace, Spencer, and Huxley. Darwin’s own conceptual framework relied on comparing natural selection to the artificial selection of plant and animal breeders to argue for a trans-generational process in which natural selection gradually shape chance variant traits of individuals into adaptations. The notion of survival of the fittest changed that to perceiving natural selection primarily as the executioner of unfit organisms, in the process allowing it to serve as backing for unrestricted capitalism (‘social Darwinism’), racist imperialism, and eugenics.
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- Darwin MythologyDebunking Myths, Correcting Falsehoods, pp. 171 - 180Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024