Luck, or Cunning, as the Main Means of Organic ModificationButler, Samuel
Philosophy
Luck, or Cunning, as the Main Means of Organic Modification
Butler, Samuel
Evolution; Natural selection
The accumulation of accidental variations which owed nothing to mind
either in their inception, or their accumulation, the pitchforking, in
fact, of mind out of the universe, or at any rate its exclusion from all
share worth talking about in the process of organic development, this was
the pill Mr. Darwin had given us to swallow; but so thickly had he gilded
it with descent with modification, that we did as we were told, swallowed
it without a murmur, were lavish in our expressions of gratitude, and,
for some twenty years or so, through the mouths of our leading
biologists, ordered design peremptorily out of court, if she so much as
dared to show herself. Indeed, we have even given life pensions to some
of the most notable of these biologists, I suppose in order to reward
them for having hoodwinked us so much to our satisfaction.
Happily the old saying, _Naturam expellas furcâ_, _tamen usque recurret_,
still holds true, and the reaction that has been gaining force for some
time will doubtless ere long brush aside the cobwebs with which those who
have a vested interest in Mr. Darwin’s reputation as a philosopher still
try to fog our outlook. Professor Mivart was, as I have said, among the
first to awaken us to Mr. Darwin’s denial of design, and to the absurdity
involved therein. He well showed how incredible Mr Darwin’s system was
found to be, as soon as it was fully realised, but there he rather left
us. He seemed to say that we must have our descent and our design too,
but he did not show how we were to manage this with rudimentary organs
still staring us in the face. His work rather led up to the clearer
statement of the difficulty than either put it before us in so many
words, or tried to remove it. Nevertheless there can be no doubt that
the “Genesis of Species” gave Natural Selection what will prove sooner or
later to be its death-blow, in spite of the persistence with which many
still declare that it has received no hurt, and the sixth edition of the
“Origin of Species,” published in the following year, bore abundant
traces of the fray. Moreover, though Mr. Mivart gave us no overt aid, he
pointed to the source from which help might come, by expressly saying
that his most important objection to Neo-Darwinism had no force against
Lamarck.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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