ANNIVERSARY: Today is the day in 1858 that Charles Darwin ...

... received a manuscript by Alfred Russel Wallace on evolution, which prompted him to publish his theory.

In 1864, before Darwin had publicly addressed the subject—though others had—Wallace published a paper, The Origin of Human Races and the Antiquity of Man Deduced from the Theory of 'Natural Selection', applying the theory to mankind.

Wallace subsequently became a spiritualist, and later maintained that natural selection cannot account for mathematical, artistic, or musical genius, as well as metaphysical musings, and wit and humor; and that something in "the unseen universe of Spirit" had interceded at least three times in history: 1. The creation of life from inorganic matter. 2. The introduction of consciousness in the higher animals. 3. The generation of the above-mentioned faculties in mankind.

He also believed that the raison d'être of the universe was the development of the human spirit. (See Wallace (1889)). These views greatly disturbed Darwin in his lifetime, who argued that spiritual appeals were not necessary and that sexual selection could easily explain such apparently non-adaptive phenomena.

In many accounts of the history of evolution, Wallace is relegated to a role of simply being the "stimulus" to Darwin's own theory. In reality, Wallace developed his own distinct evolutionary views which diverged from Darwin's, and was considered by many (especially Darwin) to be a chief thinker on evolution in his day whose ideas could not be ignored. He is among the most cited naturalists in Darwin's Descent of Man, often in strong disagreement.

In spite of Wallace's spiritual enlightenment, one cannot ignore previous statements such as ...

In a letter to a relative in 1861, Wallace wrote: "I think I have fairly heard and fairly weighed the evidence on both sides, and I remain an utter disbeliever in almost all that you consider the most sacred truths... I can see much to admire in all religions... But whether there be a God and whatever be His nature; whether we have an immortal soul or not, or whatever may be our state after death, I can have no fear of having to suffer for the study of nature and the search for truth...."

Not being a member of the scientific community, I cannot state the truth but it does appear to me the lesser thinker is given far too attention, while the greater thinker gets very little.

TAGS: Alfred Wallace, Anniversaries,
Christianity, Creationism, Darwin,
Evolution, Naturalism, Religion, Science