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The Rise and Fall of Darwin's First Theory of Transmutation

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The Rise and Fall of Darwin's First Theory of Transmutation The Rise and Fall of Darwin's First Theory of Transmutation GEORGE GRINNELL Department of History, McMaster University Hamilton, Ontario In the four "Transmutations Notebooks," which Darwin filled for two years while living in London after returning to England from the Beagle voyage, are a host of thoughts, observations, quotations from books he was reading and from conversations with friends, such that it is difficult to know exactly which of the ideas expressed in the note- books belong to Darwin as part of "my theory," and which are simply passing thoughts to be considered and then rejected, but a statistical study of the frequency with which Darwin uses certain words indicates that during the course of the two years there were three theories of transmutation which he considered to be "mine" and that the host of other ideas which he expressed contemporaneously were either sub- sidiary to these or of only passing interest (with one major exception). 1 The question is, were these three theories complementary or were they mutually exclusive? If they were complementary, then the implication is clearly in favor of the importance of the empirical data in shaping Darwin's thought, but if they were mutually exclusive, the implication is that Darwin approached the data with a prior world view which he attempted to superimpose on the data by means of various hypothetical models and mechanisms. This paper begins with an account of Darwin's dispute with Robert Fitzroy, captain of the Beagle, over the nature and origin of the Gal~pagos finches. It describes how the dispute is settled by John Gould, ornithologist of the Zoological Society of London, when he takes Fitzroy's side by declaring the finches to be real species. A brief description of Gould's career is given in order to clarify Darwin's rela- tionship to him. Next is shown how Darwin reconciles his interpreta- tion of the origin of the Gal~ipagos finches with Gould's classification of them by supposing that all species are mutable. This starts him off on the long quest for the secret of the origin of species. After watching 1. G.J. GrinneU, "The Darwin Case: A Computer Analysis is Scientific Creativity," unpub, diss, University of California, Berkeley, 1969. Journal of the History of Biology, vol. 7, no. 2 (Fall 1974), pp. 259-273. Copyright © 1974 by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht-HollantL GEORGE GRINNELL him construct a hypothetical model of the origin of the Gal~pagos species, we see him extrapolate this model to the general case by invent- ing island archipelagoes, land bridges, and continental movements, only to have the anomalies of geographic distribution inundate him and eventually force him to abandon the theory, or, at least, part of it. The significance of this study of Darwin's first theory of evolution is its revelation of Darwin's commitment to a philosophy of nature which enabled him to rearrange data creatively through an act of will, rather than inductively through research. On page 105 of the Origin of Species, Darwin wrote: "Hence an oceanic island at first sight seems to have been highly favourable for the production of new species, but we may thus greatly deceive ourselves. ''2 It was a deception which it took Darwin several years to penetrate; and it was not without great agony that he finally did so, for his first theory of evolution had proposed such a notion based on the Gal~pagos Islands case and it was precious to him. Its failure appears to have led him close to a nervous breakdown. Yet it is the mark of the great scientists that they can see their favorite theories destroyed by stub- born facts, and yet go on to create new ones. Two years after returning from the voyage on the Beagle, Darwin had opened a journal to record his life's work, in which is found an entry, written later, for July 1837, describing the origin of his first theory of evolution: "In July opened first notebook of 'Transmutation of Species' -Had been greatly struck from about month of previous March on character of S. American fossils- and species on Gal~pagos Archipelago. These facts origin (especially later) of all my views," he writes, a This statement is confirmed by the notebook to which he refers. In it .we find Darwin describing how species originate on islands owing to their isolation: "According to this view," he wrote, "animals on separate islands ought to become different if kept long enough apart. ''4 During their visit to the Gal~pagos Archipelago in the autumn of 2. Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species: A Facsimile of the First Edition, ed. Ernst Mayr (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, Mass.: 1964), p. 105. 3. "Darwin's Journal," ed. Sir Gavin de Beer, Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History) Historical Series, 2, no. 1. (1959), entry for July 1837. 4. I, 7. Darwin's four "Transmutation Notebooks," edited by 'Sir Gavin de Beer, have been published in the Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History) 260 The Rise and Fall of Darwin's First Theory of Transmutation 1835, Charles Darwin and Robert Fitzroy, the young captain of the Beagle, had fallen into one of their numerous disputes, this time over the origin of a group of brownish-black birds resembling finches. Darwin surmised that their ancestors had been blown out from the mainland, and that successive generations had adapted-themselves to their new environment by their own resources. Having done so, they should, he believed, be considered only varieties rather than new species, and hence were not worth collecting carefully. Fitzroy, on the other hand, believed them to be new, hitherto undiscovered, species and had a special collection made for himself. Fitzroy had noted that the shape of the beaks varied from group to group such that each was created for the type of island on which it had been placed. "This appears to be one of those admirable provisions of Infinite Wisdom by which each created thing is adapted to the place of which it was in- tended," he wrote in his account of the voyage, and concluded there- from that these species were created by God. s Thus the dispute between Darwin and Fitzroy arose. Its revolutionary significance did not become apparent to Darwin until after these finches had been turned over to the ornithologist of the Royal Zoolo- gical Society, John Gould (1804-1881), who declared Fitzroy correct in supposing them real species, and, in so doing, threw Darwin into an intellectual turmoil. Gould's paper had been read on January 10, 1837, at a meeting of the Zoological Society, in which he named the finches, Geospiza, and declared them an endemic genus, consisting of eight Historical Series, vo. 2, nos. 2 through 5. No. 6 of this series contains "Addenda and Corrigenda." Vo. 3, no. 6 (1967), contains the recovered pages excise by Darwin. The designation I, 7, refers to "Darwin's First Notebook on Trans- mutation of Species," p. 7 of his pagination; fall citations to the "Transmutation Notebooks" will be given in this form. I do not use British Museum pagination except when referring to one of their footnotes. Unfortunately, the excised pages were not recovered until after I had run the expurgated edition through the computer, but after studying carefully these recovered pages, I believe that they would not!seriously alter the computer's results except to reinforce conclusions already drawn from tlae data. 5. Robert Fitzroy, Narrative of the Sureveying Voyages of his Majesty's Ships Adventure and Beagle (London, 1839), II, 503. For a full description and beatiful illustrations of these birds see "Birds" by John Gould in The Zoology of the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, under the Command of Robert Fitzroy, R.N. (London, 1841), part 3, pp. 98-103, plates 36-39. For a more modern description and for references to subsequent literature see: David Lack, Darwin's Finches (New York: Harper Torchbook, 1961). 261 GEORGE GRINNELL species and three subgenera, Omarhynchys, Cactornis, and Certhidea, which, in turn, consisted of five additional species. 6 A few months later, in March 1837, Darwin was going over his orni- thological notes with Gould in order to learn the names of the various specimens he had collected, 7 for he was in the process of writing up his diary of the trip for publication. His own collection of the Gal~pagos species being incomplete, they were studying Fitzroy's samples, s Apparently his old argument with Fitzroy of a year and a half earlier came back to him, and he began wondering whether Gould had really been right in classifying the Gal~ipagos specimens as distinct species. In rewriting his ornithological notes, he suggests once again that the finches of the Gahipagos are only varieties: "When I see these Islands in sight of each other and possessed of but a scanty stock of animals, tenanted by these birds but slightly different in structure and filling the same place in Nature, I must suspect they are only varieties, ''9 he declares in defiance of Gould's classification, for this trivial detail of taxonomy was of overwhelming importance because of what it implied. It implied that God, the creator of species, but not of varieties, so governed nature as to personally oversee the origin of even so minute a detail as the beak of the Galhpagos finches. Darwin could believe in some abstract first.principle God, but not in the paternalistic, interfer- ing GOd implied by Fitzroy's and Gould's clasification of Geospiza, Something had to give.
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