Article ID: CBB426710736

Progress in life's history: Linking Darwinism and palaeontology in Britain, 1860–1914 (2017)

unapi

This paper examines the tension between Darwinian evolution and palaeontological research in Britain in the 1860–1914 period, looking at how three key promoters of Darwinian thinking – Thomas Henry Huxley, Edwin Ray Lankester and Alfred Russell Wallace – integrated palaeontological ideas and narratives of life's history into their public presentations of evolutionary theory. It shows how engagement with palaeontological science was an important part of the promotion of evolutionary ideas in Britain, which often bolstered notions that evolution depended upon progress and development along a wider plan. While often critical of some of the non-Darwinian concepts of evolution professed by many contemporary palaeontologists, and frequently citing the ‘imperfection’ of the fossil record itself, Darwinian thinkers nevertheless engaged extensively with palaeontology to develop evolutionary narratives informed by notions of improvement and progress within the natural world.

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Authors & Contributors
McCalman, Iain
Flannery, Michael A.
Fallon, Richard
Alves, Abel
Tamborini, Marco
Juzda, E
Concepts
Evolution
Darwinism
Fossils
Paleontology
Biographies
Natural selection
Time Periods
19th century
20th century, early
Early modern
Modern
Places
Great Britain
Germany
Vienna (Austria)
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