In high school, I went on a field trip to, well, a field, and there was a local wildflower in full bloom. Our teacher told us to go out and collect observations about them. We did that for a bit, then gathered back in to talk about what we found.
One of the more outdoorsy students noted it was unusual that these flowers were, in fact, blooming in October; they normally bloom in summer. That was it! In this valley, they bloom in fall for some reason. Our teacher explained that this is one common way that speciation occurs, because these plants could effectively no longer breed with the rest of the population and would begin to genetically drift away.
Mendel’s work played almost no role in the acceptance of the theory of natural selection. While the work was contemporaneous, Mendel did not publish widely and the work was not well known. Darwin’s work was defended and beaten into scientific orthodoxy by Thomas Henry Huxley who was known as “Darwin’s Bulldog”. He would appear at the Royal Society and take on all comers while Darwin mooned around in Kent. Mendel’s work was never cited in Darwin’s work, and Huxley was also unaware of it. As a matter of fact almost no one knew about it.
Mendel’s work was independently discovered at the turn of the 20th century, and Mendel was given scientific priority retrospectively. In science we describe that kind of thing as a “premature discovery”. Because something was found, and was true, but had little impact at the time.
Calm down tricornking. The basic history of the situation isn’t exactly difficult to explain.
Calm down tricornking, it’s not that impressive
tricornking is wrong there, the meme was not used to get broader acceptance of the theory but of broader understanding of how the acceptance was developed. I can understand the mistake, they look like the same picture but they forgo the fact the broad acceptance happened long before the internet meme was invented.
This distinction might not matter to everyone, but since i appreciate it so much when others comment with facts relevant to the historical accuracy, it seemed wise for me to take advantage of the opportunity to add to the discussion since for once I have a good enough understanding of all relevant facts.
I think that there are two separate readings of the tricornkings statement.
[…] you effectively illustrated (how Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection became accepted by the wider public using a […] MEME), here is […]
[…] you effectively illustrated (how Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection became accepted by the wider public) using a […] MEME, here is […]
I imagine that the second statement was the original intention of the author as I do not think Darwin had access to Internet memes as means of spreading his theory.
This might seem obvious to some but it would be appreciated if people kept in mind how the language they use could be misinterpreted, especially in text.
Reading the second statement is indeed much more logical, i was so confused by the sarcasm i perceived. Thanks for taking the time to write that showing once again how much wisdom the people in this community poses.
“Let’s (cross)breed” - Gregor Mendel
