It’s Darwin day, too

It’s not just Lincoln’s birthday, y’ know

On this day in 1809, were born two men; Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin.  Each left the world a different, and better place.

What if the Beagle had sundered upon the rocks?  Others were working on the same questions.  The discovery would still have been made, sometime.  But Darwin carried the burden with care, and compassion for the upset it caused.  His life is well worth reading about. 

Posted by George on 02/12/07 at 06:04 AM
Geeky • History •

  1. that’s a pretty frakin sweet sketch.

    Posted by negativechris  on  02/12/07  at  10:34 PM

  2. Thanks!

    Posted by george.w  on  02/12/07  at  11:11 PM

  3. Right on.  Both men are personal heroes of mine.

    Posted by zilch  on  02/13/07  at  02:48 AM

  4. Actually, the discovery would be about the same time. Alfred Russel Wallace discovered evolution at about the same time as Darwin did. Darwin just published the book, so we remember him.

    Good for that, too. Wallace had a lot of crazy beliefs… would have taken it much longer for evolution to be accepted if he had published it.

    Posted by Scott  on  02/18/07  at  02:05 AM

  5. It’s hard to say what would have happened if Wallace had published without Darwin.  It would have been much harder for Wallace to get an audience for his ideas, not because of his crazy notions about spiritualism (which mostly developed after the Origin was published) and his radical political views, but because he was a lower-middle-class nobody at the time.  Not only that, but Wallace hadn’t documented his evolutionary theories to even a tenth of the extent that Darwin had.

    The most important thing that Wallace did was to force Darwin to get off his butt and publish.

    Posted by zilch  on  02/18/07  at  11:43 AM

  6. Update, DD 2008: I wish I’d have saved a copy of the Newsweek story, because the link has gone dead.

    Posted by george.w  on  02/11/08  at  10:24 PM

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