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It’s interesting that Darwin is characterized as shy in this article: the chapter I gave a link to, above, says, in:

Subtheory 4: Natural Selection (Inbreeding)

DARWIN’S MARRIAGE:

(Paragraphs 10 & 11)

I quote: “If Darwin was not a good biologist, he was an original thinker with an encyclopedic mind. He could catalog vast groups of biological data, even if he couldn't draw correct conclusions from that data. Darwin was not afflicted with shyness as was Newton, Orville Wright, Einstein, Edison or Steinmetz. Darwin's traits rather were presumptiveness, self-assertiveness, and audacity, among others. His presumptiveness, allied with his increasing atheism and the admiration he received from others, merged into an interesting and fairly predictable complex. His uniformitarian friends began to consider Darwin as the new Copernicus of biology, and Darwin was disposed to agree with them.

He was quick to act the part and play the role to the full. He was not one to wait and check results, investigate and analyze, while others might move into this dashing role which he thoroughly anticipated. And others, including Gray, Hooker, Huxley, Lyell, Spencer, and Wallace were working with this same thesis.”

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History Explored's avatar

Thanks for this, most interesting - best regards David M

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According to this book Darwin and Lyell knew each other, and designed their hypothetical models to support each other. (Wow, I guess I can’t post a screenshot … I’ll try a link to the chapter.)

The book has an extensive bibliography

Https://www.creationism.org/patten/PattenBiblFlood/PattenBiblFlood10.htm

See: 1. . Geological Catastrophism and Darwinism

Subtheory 1: Geological Uniformitarianism.

Under this subheading, the second “developed” paragraph that has the words: “Lyell's ideas relative to time were at least as poor as Ptolemy's, but Ptolemy, with his lack of data, had a better excuse for error. Darwin, who was intimately associated with Lyell for about two decades, worked as his assistant for several years following his excursion on the H.M.S. Beagle (and prior to his marriage) He was coached carefully by Lyell in uniformitarianism. It was during this era (1837-1839) that Darwin's hypothesis took its essential form.”

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History Explored's avatar

Thanks for this, very interesting- best David M

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In a footnote (the 8th one) there it’s noted the influence of Lamarck on Darwin:

“8 In Darwin's Origin of Species, 23% of his paragraphs relate to matters Lyellian in theme whereas 77% relate to matters Lamarckian. In his second most famous work, The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871), about 8% of his subject matter is Lyellian and 92% is Lamarckian. Although the relationship between Lyell and Darwin was very close, the relationship between Lamarck's ideas and Darwin's, when studied objectively, can hardly be minimized. After Darwin published his work Origin of Species in 1859, Lyell followed with a work in 1863 entitled The Antiquity of Man which allows, through comparison, for the Lyellian theme to be factored out of Darwinian thought. Most of Darwin's discussion, including all relating to biological function, are Lamarckian.”

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