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San Francisco, 6:33 PM
Sun Nov 8
12 posts in the last 24 hours
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07/24/09
"If I have to see another one of these sessile muthafuckas, Charlie gonna have to cut a bitch!"
Or words to that effect. True story.
07/24/09
Darwin was worried that for such a controversial theory, he didn't have enough evidence....specifically, he knew that mutation happened, but he couldn't explain *why* it happened....he had no knowledge of genetics....of course, it was obvious that thinks DID mutate (well, "deviations from the average")
However, then some other guy wrote him a letter saying he'd basically come up with the theory of evolution on his own; Darwin was about to get scooped (this happens all the time in biology research)....thus, Darwin then went to the publishers with his CURRENT version of "Origin of Species" which he was still kind of uncomfortable with.
THAT is what was going on in the year before.
***The irony of ironies is that Mendel discovered genetics, including recessive genes and punett squares...at the SAME TIME as Darwin. Darwin struggled for years and was very embarrassed that the religious community would disregard his theory as quackery because he couldn't explain genetic inheritance and mutation...and someone else had ALREADY DISCOVERED It.
Mendel was a botanist so his research was published in plant journals; infamously, Darwin cut out of the journal and read an article on a topic unrelated to genetics, underlining parts (it was on flowers or something), and even held onto the article gluing it into his journal......never realizing that *ON THE EXACT OPPOSITE SIDE OF THE PAGE* was Mendel's published theory of genetics!
It's just one of those historical ironies.
The result was that Mendel's work was ignored for decades, and Darwin's (while not ignored) was ridiculed for lack of evidence.
Think of what we could have ACCOMPLISHED if Darwin had read that article: Evolution would have been more accepted, and large-scale genetic research would have started 40 years earlier than it did.
07/24/09
I’ve always felt kind of bad for Wallace - he gets no credit. Where’s his movie?
07/24/09
Turn off your damn 700 Club and let it rip with some ALL CAPS rants already!
07/24/09
How was that?
I tried to do it in all-caps, I really did. But it just looked so . . . wrong.
07/24/09
Well, it's PBS and National Geographic. *Maybe* they won't lard the thing up with unnecessary interpersonal angst. Maybe they'll cover the emotional state of a hugely private man who knows that he's about to make the biggest noise in science in a hundred years. Maybe they'll even discuss his medical issues.
On the other hand, this has got to be one of the most unfilmable bits of Darwin's life. The majority of his communication beyond his family at the time was via letters, and I don't think I've ever seen an epistolary TV special. His medical issues are equally Not Ready For Prime Time - intestinal troubles being, you know, not the most cinematic of things. If they were doing it right, they'd have ninety minutes of Darwin walking around Down House looking glum, writing letters, and having really miserable times on the commode. This being television, though, I dread what they WILL have.
07/24/09
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02/12/09