The Structure of Evolutionary Theory

CHAPTER ONE

Defining and Revising

the Structure of Evolutionary Theory

Theories Need Both Essences and Histories

In a famous passage added to later editions of the Origin of Species, Charles
Darwin (1872, p. 134) generalized his opening statement on the apparent absurdity
of evolving a complex eye through a long series of gradual steps by reminding his
readers that they should always treat "obvious" truths with skepticism. In so doing,
Darwin also challenged the celebrated definition of science as "organized common
sense," as championed by his dear friend Thomas Henry Huxley. Darwin wrote:
"When it was first said that the sun stood still and world turned round, the common
sense of mankind declared the doctrine false; but the old saying of Vox populi, vox
Dei [the voice of the people is the voice of God], as every philosopher knows,
cannot be trusted in science."
Despite his firm residence within England's higher social classes, Darwin took
a fully egalitarian approach towards sources of expertise, knowing full well that the
most dependable data on behavior and breeding of domesticated and cultivated
organisms would be obtained from active farmers and husbandmen, not from lords
of their manors or authors of theoretical treatises. As Ghiselin (1969) so cogently
stated, Darwin maintained an uncompromisingly "aristocratic" set of values
towards judgment of his work—that is, he cared not a whit for the outpourings of
vox populi, but fretted endlessly and fearfully about the opinions of a very few key
people blessed with the rare mix of intelligence, zeal, and attentive practice that we
call expertise (a democratic human property, respecting only the requisite mental
skills and emotional toughness, and bearing no intrinsic correlation to class,
profession or any other fortuity of social circumstance).
Darwin ranked Hugh Falconer, the Scottish surgeon, paleontologist, and
Indian tea grower, within this most discriminating of all his social groups, a panel
that included Hooker, Huxley and Lyell as the most prominent members. Thus,
when Falconer wrote his important 1863 paper on American fossil elephants (see
Chapter 9, pages 745-749, for full discussion of this incident), Darwin flooded
himself with anticipatory fear, but then rejoiced in his critic's generally favorable
reception of evolution, as embodied in the closing
1

2 THE STRUCTURE OF EVOLUTIONARY THEORY