CLASSICAL DARWINISM

"On the basis of data drawn from comparative anatomy, embryology, and the experience of breeders, classical Darwinism asserted that the progression from the early species to the later ones ... was a process of actual physical descent governed by natural selection through such agencies as the struggle for existence, survival of the fittest, sexual selection, and adaptation, all of which worked in small cumulative steps through vast periods of relatively undisturbed time...." --Norman Macbeth

In 1973, a retired lawyer by the name of Norman Macbeth published an book titled Darwin Retried--An Appeal to Reason. The thesis of the book is that classical Darwinism has been abandoned by the professionals. Classical Darwinism is, in Macbeth's words, "no longer considered valid by qualified biologists." [1] At the same time, Macbeth observes with some amazement, no one has notified the public of the demise of the standard evolutionary theory. "Why hasn't anyone bothered to tell the public?" Macbeth asks. Let us rephrase Macbeth's question: Why hasn't anyone told the public that the scientific vision of biology and evolution on which contemporary Western civilization is built is no good? Who will be the first to tell the Emperor that he has no clothes? Not the biologists. Indeed, in 1976, just a few years after the publication of the Macbeth book, Harvard Darwinist Ernst Mayr declared that after a century and a quarter, Darwinism had at last

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fully established itself as The Authority on the subject of the "moving force" behind evolution. "Among specialists," Mayr writes, "almost complete agreement has been reached in recent decades. Whether they are botonists or geologists, paleontologists or geneticists, all.... interpret the results of the evolutionary process in the same manner and find the same causal connections." [2] What does this consensus-of-scientists regard as the ordering principle in evolution? Natural Selection. The key doctrine in classical Darwinism. Who is correct?--Norman Macbeth? or Ernst Mayr? Before we can even begin to answer this question, we need a brief refresher on the subject of classical Darwinism. What is it exactly?

Charles Darwin was born in 1809, the year in which Lamarck published his Philosophie Zoologique. At age fifteen, Darwin was sent off the University of Edinburgh to study medicine. Finding the lectures intolerably boring, he transferred after two years to Christ's College, Cambridge, where he began the study of theology and (on the side) zoology. He distinguished himself early as an avid member of a club devoted to the study of beetles. Darwin's interest in the very new sciences of zoology and geology drew the attention of one Professor Henslow. Some years later, Professor Henslow recommended young Charles to the captain of the H.M.S. Beagle as a good choice for the position of ship's naturalist. The captain was looking for a young naturalist with the potential for finding in nature the proof of the Biblical story of creation. In 1831, when the Beagle set off on its famous five-year voyage, no one could have guessed that the very conventional Charles Darwin would one day become a major paradigm shifter ... the new paradigm's equivalent of Jesus Christ. The only thing at all radical about Darwin was an epic poem he brought along--Paradise Lost, by John Milton. First published in 1667, Paradise Lost presents a Puritan version of the Genesis story. -2-

According to Catholic canon, the children of the outcasts of Eden have only one hope, and that is in gaining the intercession of the Church. Milton advanced the idea that through the example of Christ, human beings have the opportunity of evolving spiritually. On board the Beagle and off, Darwin amassed over five years a very large collection of notes and sketches. These served as an important part of the data base underlying his 1859 opus--On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection or The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. This book is the foundational text of "classical Darwinism" Classical Darwinism involves, as the title suggests, three major themes: (1) Speciation (the "origin of species"), (2) "Natural Selection," which is viewed by Darwinists even in our own day as the only ordering principle in nature; and (3) "Struggle for Existence." Let's consider briefly these three themes.

SPECIATION Speciation is defined by Ernst Mayr as "the multiplication of species, that is, the division of one parent species into several daughter species. It is this process that is responsible for the extraordinary diversity of the organic world...." [3] For many years, Mayr continues, the question of speciation was the dominant subject in Darwin's notebooks. The scientific reason, Mayr indicates, is that "for Darwin the origin of new species was the key problem of evolution. Pre-Darwinian authors ... considered the origin of new species inconceivable, and thus speciation became the real touchstone of evolutionary thought." [4] Mayr represents Lamarck incorrectly as not being concerned with the problem of speciation. "His concept of species was vague and in his work he nowhere discusses the multiplication of species," Mayr writes. Let us recall the Lamarck quotation which heads the first chapter: "After long succession of generations, these individuals originally -3-

belonging to one species become at length transformed into a new species distinct from the first." This quotation, from the Philosophie Zoologique, is quite familiar to Mayr, who cites it in his Evolution and the Diversity of Life. [5] Now the catastrophist position, as represented by Baron Cuvier, was that all species were created by God In The Beginning. Over time, catastrophies destroyed many of the species, the remains of which we find in the Fossil Record. Cuvier denied the possibility of special (divine) creation following catastrophies. Against this orthodox theory, Lamarck advanced the theory that new, distinctly different species grow out of (transform from) parental species. The power of creation is thus immanent in nature. It was Lamarck, not Darwin, who gave the first cogent scientific answer to the "problem of speciation." Mayr confers upon Darwin an honor that belongs to Lamarck. Darwin first became aware of Lamarck's Transformism while a medical student in Edinburgh. Circa 1826, Darwin attended a lecture by a Dr. R.E. Grant, who ."clearly adopted the view that species are descended from other species" and who "burst forth in high admiration of Lamarck and his views on evolution." [6] In 1831, as indicated above, young Darwin set sail on the H.M.S. Beagle, which was bound on a five-year mission to map the coastlines of South America and certain Pacific islands. In 1832, Darwin received a very important book--Volume II of Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology. The book, sent by its author, contains a long exposition of Lamarckism. In the Galapagos Islands and elsewhere, Darwin had an excellent opportunity to observe and record the results of "speciation." The Lamarckian premise (that species come from other species) became for him a simple truism. The mystery lay in the "how?" How does speciation occur? What is the mechanism or mechanisms? Geography had something to do with it, Darwin knew. Each island he visited sported versions of the same finch .... What was it that caused the differentiation? -4-

For many, many years, this question was to obsess Darwin. "Biology" was a brandnew science (the word itself was coined by Lamarck). Cell biology, genetics--these fields did not even exist at the time Darwin was trying to figure out the mechanics of speciation. All he had was the evidence of his eyes. All he could know for sure was that the mechanism had something to do with the environment (natural) and that the mechanism involved a process of selection. Even twenty years after his famous voyage on the Beagle, Darwin was not prepared to offer his views regarding the mechanism of speciation. Only when another naturalist, Alfred Wallace, offered the idea that the mechanism of speciation is "Natural Selection" did Darwin rush to put his work into print. With the assistance of Charles Lyell and others in the Royal Society, he was able to establish priority (over Wallace). [7} For some time following the publication of the Origin, classical Darwinism was known as the "Darwin-Wallace theory." Had Wallace been as affluent and wellconnected as Darwin, he would now be the "step-father" of modern evolutionary theory. (Lamarck was the father.) "Wallacism" would be our present subject. What strength Darwinism has is in the first premise, the Lamarckian premise of the evolutionary transformation of one species into others. Wallace made a very significant contribution to the premise. Lacking sufficient (taxonomical) data, Lamarck viewed the evolutionary line as strictly linear. Species A produces B, B produces C, C produces D, and so on. In 1855, Wallace re-articulated the premise, arguing that the evolutionary line may be branched, i.e., Species A may produce C as well as B, B may produce D, E and F, etc. Further, Wallace argued, the evolutionary steps are not necessarily "progressive" (more and more perfect), as Lamarck had maintained. The Wallace position came to be known as "the Sarawak Law." When the LamarckWallace premise fell into Darwin's hands, it was in pretty good shape scientifically, supported by much evidence. -5-

Natural Selection The second premise of classical Darwinism is that "Natural Selection" is the cause of divergence in species, i.e., the origin of species. The first published mention of the idea of Nature-as-selector is in Rousseau's "Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality Among Men" (1755). In a discussion of the conditions of life in ancient Sparta, Rouseau writes, "Nature used them precisely as did the law of Sparta the children of her citizens. She rendered strong and robust those with a good constitution and destroyed all the others." [8] A more immediate source was the evolutionary theory of Alfred Wallace. In June of1858, Wallace submitted to Darwin an unpublished work titled "On the Tendency of Varieties To Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type." Shortly thereafter, Darwin wrote to Lyell, "Your words have come true with a vengeance--that I should be [could be] forestalled. You said this when I explained to you here very briefly my views on Natural Selection depending on the struggle for existence. I never saw a more striking co-incidence; if Wallace had my M.S. [manuscript] written out in 1842, he could not have made a better short abstract! Even his terms now stand as heads of my chapters...." [9] Darwin's understanding of Natural Selection derived from his work with breeding. The breeding of plants and animals Darwin called "artificial selection;" the breeding that occurs in the "wild" he called "natural selection." (The capitalized Natural Selection refers to the Darwinian doctrine). Early in the Origin, Darwin defines Natural Selection in these (anthropomorphic) terms: "Natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing.... every variation, even the slightest; rejecting that which is bad, preserving and adding up all that is good; silently and insensibly working.... at the improvement of each organic being...." [10] In effect, Darwin replaces the traditional belief that order in nature is the

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result of a divine influence (God) with the idea it is the result of a natural influence (Natural Selection). For the anti-Creationists of Darwin's century and our own, the great value of the Natural Selection hypothesis lay in the fact that it sent a liberating message to humankind.... there is a "natural explanation" for all the wonders of nature. No Godhypothesis necessary. The idea of Natural Selection as cause of divergence (origin of species by means of Natural Selection) is an "empty generalization." It is not incorrect; it is simply too general to be of value. If I were to tell you that the cause of divergence in species is the "environment," would you find that explanation adequate? No, of course not. We need to know what it is, specifically, in the environment that causes divergence. "Natural Selection" is really no more specific than "environment." Darwin himself was uneasy with the term. In the sixth and last edition of the Origin, Darwin says that "survival of the fittest" is a "more accurate" expression of what he had previously called natural selection. [11] "Survival of the fittest" has more specificity. It

at least refers to a criterion of selection, i.e. degree of organismal adaption to the environment. Interestingly, the phrase "survival of the fittest" was coined not by Darwin, but by philosopher-evolutionist Herbert Spencer some seven or eight years before the publication of the Origin. By 1872, the phrase had become the common catchword (slogan) for Darwinism. Naturally, Darwin laid claim to it ("selected" it, we should say), preferring it over the meaningless "Natural Selection." Further, the concept of Natural Selection was tied too closely to Alfred Wallace, the talented young evolutionist who was totally eclipsed by Darwin. "Survival of the fittest" was the product of one of Darwin's most ardent apostles.

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Once Darwin committed himself to the idea that Natural Selection is the "means" of speciation (and by implication evolution), he required a proper setting for the operation of Natural Selection. The job of Natural Selection is to select. We need options, options to select from. Variations. "Nothing at first can appear more difficult to believe," he writes , "than that

the more complex organs and instincts should have been perfected, not by means superior to, though analogous with, human reason, but by the accumulation of innumerable slight variations, each good for the individual possessor...." [12] Further, we require an

opportunity for Natural Selection to do its work of selecting the "fittest" of the variations. Life, Darwin tells, presents a continuing opportunity for selection, in that everything living is involved in a continuing "struggle for existence." Our difficulty in believing that complex organs and organisms are the result of the accumulation of slight variations vanishes, Darwin assures us, once we accept the following propositions: {1} "That gradations in the perfection of any organ or instinct, which we may consider, either do now exist or could have existed, each good of its kind,-[2] that all organs and instincts are, in ever so slight a degree, variable,--[3] and lastly, that there is a struggle for existence leading to the preservation of each profitable deviation of structure or instinct." [13] The first two propositions concern variations and are truisms. The third proposition is invalid. It represents a case of "begging the question," of stating as a truism that which is to be proven. Where is the proof that "struggle for existence" leads to the "preservation of each profitable deviation"? Darwin offers no proof. He apparently does not see the need for proof. Apparently, he does not see the difference between a truism and a theory. Darwin's blindness in this regard stems from his uncritical acceptance of the "conventional wisdom" of his time, that life is synonymous with struggle. "The life of man on Earth is warfare." in the words of late nineteenth century novelist Henry James. -8-

In part, this idea of life as incessant struggle was an inheritance from the Biblical paradigm. In part, it reflected the dark philosophy of the Rev. Thomas Malthus (17661834), famous "pessimist" and a major influence on Darwin. In the view of Malthus, "all animated life [tends] to increase beyond the nourishment prepared for it," and thus there can never be real progress for humankind. Give humans a little more bread than usual, and they'll breed more than usual, wiping out their little gains. Populations, Malthus asserts, increase by geometrical progression, while the means of sustinence increase by only mathematic progression. Humanity is thus doomed to procreate itself into destitution. Malthus, one of the primary reasons why the "dismal science" (economics) is so dismal, painted pictures of a future filled with starving and diseased multitudes. In "Malthusianism," Darwin found all that he had been seeking in the way of a fitting context for the work of Natural Selection. In his autobiography, Darwin had been reading Malthus "for amusement" one day when it struck him that the "struggle for existence" was not just a prevailing condition in life, it was the necessary condition of evolution. Nature, in Darwin's view, is not unlike a gladiatorial arena in which organisms of every kind fight for survival. Those with a bit of an advantage tend, naturally, to win ... and to gain the opportunity to breed the next generation. Darwin adopted the Malthusianism lock, stock and barrel: "A struggle for existence inevitably follows from the high rate at which all organic beings tend to increase," Darwin writes. "Every being ... must suffer destruction ... otherwise, on the principle of geometrical increase, its numbers would become so inordinately great that no country could support the product. Hence, as more individuals are produced that can possibly survive, there must in every case be a struggle for existence, either one individual with another of the same species, or with the physical conditions of life. It is the doctrine of Malthus applied with manifold force to the whole animal and vegetable kingdom...." [14] The "Malthus doctrine" became the third premise of classical Darwinism. -9-

The doctrine of Malthus was "doctrine" by virtue of the fact that a great many powerful people considered it true. In fact, the doctrine does not have any scientific merit. It is based upon misunderstanding, misinterpretation of data, and upon personal eccentricities and animosities. The doctrine of Malthus is so important, so fateful for Western civilization, it is necessary to consider it at greater length, to give it a chapter unto itself.

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