conscious star stuff

It has often and confidently been asserted that man’s origin can never be known. Ignorance most frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.

- Charles Darwin

Exactly two hundred and two years ago, one of the most brilliant minds in the history of mankind was born: Charles Darwin.  Humanity is in enormous debt to him for it is through his meticulous observations and impeccable scientific work that we now know how it is that we came into existence.  I consider his theory of evolution by means of natural selection to be a perfect example of what human reason is capable of figuring out if one applies their self and is not afraid of going where the evidence leads.

Not many people know this, but there were a few others that had a similar idea to that of Darwin’s even thousands of years before him.  Ancient Greek “natural” philosopher Anaximander (c. 610 - 546 BCE) , for example is credited with the idea that humans originated from animals of another sort through gradual development because humans need fostering care for several years after being born and therefore would not have been able to maintain their existence.  Later on, the first notions of Darwinian thought were pushed forward by Empedocles, Epicurus, and Lucretius.  Empedocles’ hypothesis, for example, implied that body parts were assembled at random in nature -for example heads without necks and arms without shoulders- and that the combinations that were useful were the ones that ultimately survived.  This is a very rudimentary version of Darwinism, and as foolish as it may sound to us now, it had a remarkable characteristic: it attempted to explain the nature of the universe not by appealing to myths, magic or religion, but through material means.  This revolutionary phenomenon in human thought is now often referred to as the “Greek miracle”.  With hindsight, we can all say that Anaximander and Empedocles were on to something even if their specific hypotheses lacked any plausible mechanism to carry them out.  That had to wait until the mid-nineteenth century and the genius of Charles Darwin.  It was he who finally proposed a plausible mechanism through which nature could assemble living things through gradual changes.  It is now the only known mechanism that can create living things that give the appearance of design: natural selection.

Darwin came to this realization over many years of careful observation and investigation of living organisms which first started on his voyage to the Americas on The Beagle.  Even though he had his basic theory worked out as early as 1838, he withheld publication for several reasons.  He was constantly ill and he feared that the religious would persecute him, that he would offend the sensibilities of close friends and his own wife, Emma. On 1855, a man by the name of Alfred Russel Wallace came up with a theory very similar to that of Darwin’s even though it was not as detailed.  It is said that this was one of the reasons why Darwin decided to finally publish his own work so as to not be overtaken by Wallace. He finally published his full theory on November 24, 1859 under the title of On The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.

From that point on, Darwin’s theory slowly gained acceptance among the scientific community before being established as the unifying theory of biology as it stands today. Nothing in biology makes sense, except in the light of evolution. Even though there were many things that Darwin could only guess or speculate about in his time, his basic idea has been now repeatedly confirmed by a wide variety of disciplines like genetics, comparative anatomy, geology, biogeography, and paleontology.  Contrary to what many ill-intentioned people often espouse, both natural selection and speciation have been observed both in nature and in the laboratory.  A particularly awesome example is a recently discovered lizard transitioning from laying eggs to live birth.

Sadly, there are still many people that reject it on grounds that have absolutely nothing to do with science.  There are people who do not accept it because it conflicts with their magical fairy-tale conception of the world; others who cannot grow up and get over their “specialness” to accept that they are animals just like chimpanzees; and others who simply are ignorant of evolutionary theory.  The amount of people who reject evolution out of sheer ignorance of what they are rejecting is huge.  Just a couple of days ago, I overheard someone at my university making fun of a student for “believing in monkeys”.  This shouldn’t be so shocking in a country like Guatemala, I know, but it is one thing to listen to it from a random dude on the street than it is to listen to it from a student of Philosophy. You would think that aspiring philosophers would actually go to the trouble of informing themselves on subjects before talking about them, but alas, that is not the case.

If you are not familiar with the wonder that is evolution, I recommend that you look into it. Not only will your knowledge of how the world actually works increase significantly, you will also feel a deep sense of awe.  There is something quite mindfucking and very humbling about realizing that every living thing that has ever existed on this planet, including your beloved dog Sparky, is related to you.  2009 saw a surge of great books due to the commemoration of the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth and the 150th anniversary of the publication of The Origin.  I specially recommend Richard Dawkins’ The Greatest Show on Earth, Jerry Coyne’s Why Evolution Is True, and Neil Shubin’s Your Inner Fish.  Also recommended is a fantastic facsimile edition of The Origin of Species by James T. Costa with annotations on current scientific understanding of Darwin’s ideas.

As Darwin said at the close of The Origin:

“There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.”