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Why Darwinism matters
- Thread starter ttechsan
- Start date
painted wolf
Grey Muzzle
Darwin can be kind of heavy... he was a decent enough writer for his time, but the time difference can make his books a bit of a slog.
Still, if you want to learn about the early ideas being discussed and Darwin's personal intellectual "evolution" you can't get a much better source. It's really enlightening to see how Darwin pushes himself to the edges of his Victorian sensibilities. He has some very heterodox ideas (full humanity for all humans) but can't quite seem to bring himself all the way to modern thinking.
wa:do
*edit... I should add that if you are going to start with Darwin, you should start with On the Origin of Species. You will have a better idea of his concepts of evolutionary theory that he uses as a basis for The Decent of Man.
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Reading Darwin is not really a good source for information about modern science.
Click on the link in my signature.
SLAMH
Active Member
Yes, I'm interested on the thought from which he established his theory.
Thanks.
fantôme profane;3034268 said:
Thank you so much
, but I think I'm going to start with Darwin's books.
painted wolf
Grey Muzzle
True, but it is a good source for what Darwin actually said.fantôme profane;3034268 said:
There are several good books on modern evolutionary theory that would be more informative on the science as it stands today.
Ken Miller is always a good place to start... as is Carl Zimmer, who I really can't recommend enough.
Amazon.com: The Tangled Bank: An Introduction to Evolution (9780981519470): Carl Zimmer: Books
wa:do
Yes, I'm interested on the thought from which he established his theory.
Thanks.
Thank you so much
I wouldn't want to discourage anyone from reading Darwin. I found Descent and Origin both very readable once I got into them. But he is not going to find anything about genetics from Darwin, and that is an important part of understanding evolution.
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painted wolf
Grey Muzzle
Anytime, but be warned that Darwin was an extremely prolific writer as well. He wrote several books as well as papers on subjects from the eating habits of worms to the care of pigeons to fossil mammals of South America and all of them are important in his intellectual development.
But if you want to really understand his ideas on Evolution... Origin is the best place to start.
There are also some very good books out there on Darwin and how he developed his ideas. They include his discussions on the subject that don't appear in his published works... such as his correspondences, journals and so on.
wa:do
painted wolf
Grey Muzzle
Very true... but once you know Darwin's ideas you can see how genetics was able to substantiate nearly all of Darwin's ideas.fantôme profane;3034310 said:
It also gives you a great appreciation of just how much Darwin got right based on observation alone.
wa:do
McBell
Resident Sourpuss
Very interesting?
Hells bells, I have to wonder how the author was able to stay awake long enough to finish writing it.
If your friend wants to read about the Theory of Evolution, there's plenty very good scientific literature.
The link provided by the OP is to an organisation found both by the scientific community and by the courts as being non-scientific, but religious. Not doing science. Thus, not scientific.
Yet, that organisation keeps on lying to people, pretending that they are "scientific". Pseudoscience.
That's why I said there's no need to keep reading past the first paragraph. They lie about everything.
adi2d
Active Member
After raising three kids!,having five gandkids and reading GEAH 186,656,402 times it is still my fave book. Thanks for the reminder. The oldest grandboys are 18 and 19 so its about time to get a new copy
tumbleweed41
Resident Liberal Hippie
*sigh*
Another ttechsan "hit and run".
Another ttechsan "hit and run".
ImmortalFlame
Woke gremlin
I think you're giving him too much credit.
Is there such a thing as a "miss and run"?
McBell
Resident Sourpuss
Seconded
johnhanks
Well-Known Member
Thirded (or as a biblical literalist might have it, pi'd).
David M
Well-Known Member
Buy him a good dictionary and have him look at the definition of "Scientific Theory", then he may learn that words can have more than one meaning (e.g. "can").