Encyclopedia of Evolution.pdf - Online Reading Center

This encyclopedia, not surprisingly, is dedicated to Darwin,
but not to the Darwin you might expect. The author would
like to dedicate this volume to Emma Wedgwood Darwin,
wife of Charles Darwin, who remained Charles Darwin’s
supportive and loving companion throughout his life of
illness and hard work, even though she believed that he was
wrong about evolution and about religion. Without Emma
Darwin’s help, Charles Darwin would almost certainly have
failed to complete his most famous works. Of course, some
other scientist would eventually have discovered the evidence
and mechanism of evolution. Indeed, Alfred Russel Wallace
figured it out independently of Charles Darwin. Some other
scientists who championed evolution, such as Ernst Haeckel
and Herbert Spencer, proclaimed a violent and oppressive
version of evolution, in contrast to the Darwinian version
that allows for the evolution of altruism. It is possible that
evolution would have been an ugly and oppressive theory if it
had been presented to the world as Spencerism or Haeckelism.
Instead, evolution is Darwinism, and we have
Emma Darwin to thank for it.