Pancaldi, Giuliano (Author)
Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences
Volume: 110
Issue: 4
Pages: 680-700
Some of Darwin’s views on descent with modification were developed alongside his adoption of a number of concepts inspired by the domain that we would now call science and technology. Focusing on the period from Darwin’s circumnavigation journey to the publication of the Origin in 1859, this essay explores the rich manuscript and published documentation left by Darwin to trace in detail his exposure to contemporary technologies and notions of invention. It argues that the parallel Darwin established on several occasions between the history of life on earth and human inventions was more than a metaphor. According to Darwin’s radical evolutionary perspective, life and invention—including his own theory explaining descent with modification—belonged to the same domain. It further argues that Darwin’s technology of life approach allowed him to make room for a plurality of causes driving evolutionary change, while at the same time avoiding the question of the origin of life. This same approach helped him to mold his scientific persona, while marking his distance from a mixed population of naturalists that included materialists as well as exponents of speculative German natural philosophy, although these were all frequent sources of reflection during his most creative years.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Article
Ambrose, C. T.;
(2010)
Darwin's Historical Sketch---An American Predecessor: C. S. Rafinesque
(/isis/citation/CBB001031431/)
Article
Hull, David L.;
(2011)
Defining Darwinism
(/isis/citation/CBB001023980/)
Article
Carlson, Charles Royal;
(2013)
The Return of Experience: Reinterpreting Dewey for Contemporary Evolutionary Biology
(/isis/citation/CBB001201756/)
Article
J. H. van Hateren;
(2014)
Intrinsic estimates of fitness affect the causal structure of evolutionary change
(/isis/citation/CBB316372448/)
Article
Tavernier, Johan De;
(2014)
Morality and Nature: Evolutionary Challenges to Christian Ethics
(/isis/citation/CBB001201354/)
Article
Friedman, William E.;
Diggle, Pamela K.;
(2011)
Charles Darwin and the Origins of Plant Evolutionary Developmental Biology
(/isis/citation/CBB001320692/)
Chapter
Sober, Elliott;
(2005)
Comparative Psychology Meets Evolutionary Biology: Morgan's Canon and Cladistic Parsimony
(/isis/citation/CBB000772880/)
Article
Archibald, J. David;
(2012)
Darwin's Two Competing Phylogenetic Trees: Marsupials as Ancestors or Sister Taxa?
(/isis/citation/CBB001251350/)
Chapter
Aldo Fasolo;
Davide Lovisolo;
(2015)
"The Cell in Development and Inheritance", centoventi anni dopo. E.B. Wilson, la teoria cellulare e il tassello mancante: la membrana plasmatica
(/isis/citation/CBB288072174/)
Book
Caporael, Linnda R.;
Griesemer, James R.;
Wimsatt, William C.;
(2014)
Developing Scaffolds in Evolution, Culture, and Cognition
(/isis/citation/CBB001510224/)
Thesis
Emily Margaret Kern;
(2018)
Out of Asia: A Global History of the Scientific Search for the Origins of Humankind, 1800-1965
(/isis/citation/CBB346835522/)
Article
Bowler, Peter J.;
(1976)
Malthus, Darwin, and the concept of struggle
(/isis/citation/CBB000011623/)
Book
Barbara Larson;
Sabine Flach;
(2013)
Darwin and Theories of Aesthetics and Cultural History
(/isis/citation/CBB412176834/)
Book
Duncan Porter;
Peter Graham;
(2015)
Darwin's Sciences
(/isis/citation/CBB157464904/)
Book
J. David Archibald;
(2017)
Origins of Darwin's Evolution: Solving the Species Puzzle Through Time and Place
(/isis/citation/CBB621122134/)
Chapter
Roberts, Jon H.;
(2010)
Religious Reactions to Darwin
(/isis/citation/CBB001031850/)
Book
Johnson, Curtis N.;
(2015)
Darwin's Dice: The Idea of Chance in the Thought of Charles Darwin
(/isis/citation/CBB001551961/)
Article
Breuer, Hans-Peter;
(1987)
Darwinism in Victorian letters
(/isis/citation/CBB000041151/)
Article
Hajo Greif;
(2015)
The Darwinian tension: Romantic science and the causal laws of nature
(/isis/citation/CBB515135796/)
Article
Pan, Jixing;
(1984)
Charles Darwin's Chinese sources
(/isis/citation/CBB000010428/)
Be the first to comment!