Evolution in Modern Thought

Metadata

Gutenberg ID

22430

Title

Evolution in Modern Thought

Language

en

Book source

Project Gutenberg

Description max 80 words

A comprehensive anthology exploring the scientific and philosophical foundations of evolution, featuring seminal essays by Darwin's contemporaries and successors. This collection examines natural selection, heredity, and the descent of man, bridging biology with modern thought, sociology, and religious philosophy.

Summary up to 500 words

Evolution in Modern Thought presents a comprehensive critical survey of evolutionary theory, synthesizing contributions from leading scientists and thinkers of the era. The volume distinguishes Charles Darwin's specific contributions: popularizing the doctrine of descent, applying it to human origins, and elucidating natural selection. The text traces the history of the idea from ancient philosophers like Aristotle and Empedocles, who recognized ascending scales of life, to pioneers such as Buffon, Erasmus Darwin, and Lamarck. While the general concept of organic evolution is ancient, Darwin's genius lay in making it current intellectual coin and providing a rigorous mechanism for it. Central chapters detail the mechanisms of variation and selection, addressing the debate between gradualism and saltatory mutation. August Weismann defends the continuity of germ-plasm against the inheritance of acquired characters, arguing that transformations occur through minute steps augmented over generations. Ernst Haeckel explores Darwin's role as an anthropologist, while C. Lloyd Morgan investigates mental factors in evolution. The anthology extends the biological concept to broader domains, analyzing evolution's impact on philosophy, religious thought, history, and sociology. Through rigorous analysis of evidence from embryology, paleontology, and comparative anatomy, the contributors demonstrate how evolution serves as a unifying key to understanding the interrelations of all life forms and the development of human consciousness. The work emphasizes that while useful variations must present themselves, natural selection acts as the engine that preserves and augments them, regulating progress to the highest possible perfection.

LLM editorial rating

4.5/5

Download URL

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22430.epub.noimages

Local file path

data/epubs/pg22430.epub

Removed after upload

Downloaded at

2026-07-04 11:30 UTC

Categories

• Science