Encyclopedia of Evolution.pdf - Online Reading Center

0 Darwin, Charles
forever. It would not pay much, but Charles was in line to
inherit at least part of a small fortune. Then, at the last minute,
an unexpected opportunity arose. The captain of the
HMS Beagle (see Fitzroy, Robert) needed a companion
for a voyage around the world. It was a scientific expedition,
dedicated mainly to surveying the major ports of the world
(into which the British assumed they had unlimited access),
but also to every other aspect of scientific exploration. The
ship already had a naturalist, the ship’s surgeon, but the captain
wanted a fellow aristocrat with whom to share meals
and conversation. FitzRoy contacted Henslow, who told him
the perfect person for the job would be Charles Darwin. It
was hardly a job—Darwin had to pay his own way—but it
was an opportunity to see the wonders of creation around the
world in a way that, as it turned out, Darwin would never
have again. FitzRoy interviewed Darwin and offered him the
post. This voyage changed Darwin and changed the world.
FitzRoy chose Darwin despite misgivings about the shape of
Darwin’s nose. It is possible that never has such an important
event in history been determined by something so trivial.
Robert Darwin at first refused to pay for his son’s trip, but
his brother-in-law Josiah Wedgwood convinced Robert to
support Charles. When Charles accepted the appointment, it
came at considerable personal cost: while he was on the voyage,
he found that Fanny was not willing to wait for him to
return, and she married another man.
During the 1831–36 voyage of HMS Beagle, Darwin
was constantly putting his knowledge of natural history to
work and almost never used his college degree in theology.
The Beagle went down the east coast of South America, to
the west coast, then across to Australia, the Indian Ocean,
around Africa, and back to England. There were long periods
in which the ship remained in harbor for surveying
work, and during which Darwin was able to go ashore and
travel far inland. This was fortunate for him, for he suffered
constantly from seasickness. Darwin studied the geology of
islands and coastlines; he collected fossils, as well as plants
and animals. He took careful notes on everything and periodically
sent his specimens back to England. He visited tropical
rain forests and the heights of the Andes Mountains. The
rain forest was, for him, a particularly religious experience;
one could not look at the beauties of such a forest, he said,
without believing that there was more to man than merely
the breath of his body.
The voyage had more than spiritual inspiration for
him. He read the first volume of geologist Sir Charles Lyell’s
famous and controversial Principles of Geology (see Lyell,
Charles; uniformitarianism). While on the voyage he
received the other volumes and read them as well. He was
convinced that Lyell was correct about the long ages of Earth
history and their gradual changes. And many of the things
that Darwin saw made him question some aspects of his belief
in creation. He collected fossils and found that animal fossils
most nearly resembled the animals that were currently alive
in the region. For example, South America is where llamas,
capybaras, sloths, and armadillos now live; this is also where
what were then believed to be the fossils of extinct species of
llamas, capybaras, sloths, and armadillos are found. Australia
was the place to find most of the marsupials, and most
of the marsupial fossils, of the world. It suggested strongly
to him that the fossils represented ancestors of the animals
now present. And when he saw the animals of the Galápagos
Islands, he began to wonder if at least some species had
come into existence on the islands where they are now found
(see Darwin’s finches).
Darwin also had experiences with people on this voyage
that would influence his later thought. In particular,
one of the objectives of the Beagle voyage was to return
three Fuegian Native Americans to their tribes as missionaries.
Two men and one woman had been captured from
a Fuegian tribe and taught Christianity and English life.
Now they were going back to enlighten their tribe. Instead,
they converted back to their tribal ways. This made Captain
FitzRoy upset but made Darwin think about why the
people whom Europeans called “primitive” had levels of
intelligence nearly, or completely, equal to theirs. He also
saw slaves in Brazil (he did not visit the United States) and
developed a deep hatred of slavery and of violent and brutal
European colonialism. In particular, he was bothered by the
way slave owners used biblical passages to justify slavery.
Perhaps these experiences laid the groundwork for his later
rejection of Christianity.
Darwin returned to England, as he had left, still believing
in creationism, but his mind was prepared for rapid changes
of viewpoint. Upon his return, he found that he had become a
little famous among the scientific community, because of his
correspondence and his specimens. Lyell, instead of just being
a hero who wrote a book, became a friend. Darwin spent a
couple of years in London cataloging his specimens and writing
his travel notes, which became a popular book, The Voyage
of HMS Beagle.
While in London, living with his brother Erasmus,
Charles Darwin began to think about marriage. Since it
appeared that he would inherit much of a sizable fortune,
there was no need for him to marry, or to pursue any career.
Now that Darwin was moderately famous, his father no longer
considered him a disgrace and was willing to support him
in his scientific studies. Darwin’s life was to be characterized
by taking a scientific approach to everything, and marriage
was no exception. He listed his reasons for finding a wife
(such as companionship), and his reasons for remaining single
(such as solitude), and eventually reached a “Q.E.D.—Marry,
marry, marry!” He was attracted to Emma Wedgwood, who
also happened to be his cousin, and she liked him as well, and
they were married. They had six sons and four daughters.
One son later became a famous botanist, another a famous
astronomer, and another a member of Parliament.
Emma was very firmly religious. Even before marriage
Darwin had already begun to entertain doubts about the
religious view of the world. In later years, as Darwin developed
his evolutionary theories, he had an ever more difficult
time reconciling them with Christianity, even though some
of his friends (especially the Harvard botanist Asa Gray; see
Gray, Asa) managed to retain conventional Christian faith