Sede Amministrativa: Università degli Studi di Padova Dipartimento di filosofia ___________________________________________________________________ CORSO DI DOTTORATO DI RICERCA IN FILOSOFIA CICLO XXXI TITOLO TESI DARWIN’S CONTRIVANCES: ORCHIDS, EVOLUTION AND SCIENTIFIC ETHICS IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE OF XIX CENTURY Coordinatore: Ch.mo Prof. Francesca Menegoni Supervisore: Ch.mo Prof. Fabio Grigenti Dottorando : Antonio Danese INDEX 0 INTRODUCTION 5 0.1 Topic 5 0.2 Why Orchids? 9 0.3 Structure of the work 12 1 THE DARWINIAN THEORY 14 1.1 The origin of the origin of species 14 1.2 The first concept of species 16 1.3 The renouncement of immutability and the problem of classification 18 1.4 Variation 23 1.5 The ecological context and the tree of life 26 1.6 New way of observing nature 28 2 FORERUNNERS OF DARWIN IN THE BOTANICAL FIELD 29 2.1 Cell and transmutation 31 2.2 The molecular basis for the development of life sciences 31 2.3 The starting points for Darwinian botany 33 3 THE WORK ON PLANT SCIENCES 35 3.1 The botanist Darwin 36 3.2 The movements of climbing plants 40 3.3 The insectivorous plants 43 3.4 Cross-self fertilisation 45 3.5 The different forms of flowers on plants of the same species 46 3.6 The power of movement in plants 49 4 ORCHIDS IN VICTORIAN AGE 52 4.1 Classification of new species of orchids 53 4.2 Linnaeus 54 4.3 Orchids, society, and literature 56 4.4 Darwin and orchids 59 5 THE ORIGIN OF On the Various Contrivances by Which British and Foreign Orchids Are Fertilised by Insects and on the Good Effects of Intercrossing 62 5.1 The beginning of a paper 63 5.2 Aims of the book 67 6 CLASSIFICATION IN On the Various Contrivances by Which British and Foreign Orchids Are Fertilised by Insects and on the Good Effects of Intercrossing 74 6.1 Different way of classifying 75 6.2 The limits of morphological analysis 83 6.3 Doctrine of homologies 87 6.4 Three genera in one species 96 6.5 Conclusion 104 7 CONTRIVANCES IN COEVOLUTIONARY CONTEXT 108 7.1 The development of the concept in the book 109 7.2 Adaptation, natural selection e observational predictions 112 8 TELEOLOGY 117 8.1 The debate 118 8.2 Contrivances 120 8.3 New explanatory possibilities opened by the presence of randomness 122 8.4 Change of function over time 124 8.5 Conclusion 127 9 SPRENGEL 130 9.1 Brown 131 9.2 Sprengel’s observations 134 9.3 Darwin on Sprengel 137 10 THE USE OF IMAGES IN On the Various Contrivances by Which British and Foreign Orchids Are Fertilised by Insects and on the Good Effects of Intercrossing 140 10.1 The work inside the book 140 11.2 Differences from the previous tradition 145 11 THE MISTAKES OF The Origin of Species 147 11.1 First judgements 148 11.2 Inductives and analogical mistakes 151 11.3 The weakness of transmutational theories 155 11.4 The Darwin’s inductive malpractice 158 11.5 The reasons of those who thought of it as did Sedgwick 161 11.6 First attempts of defence of Darwinian method 166 12 THE CONVERSION OF BOTANISTS 169 12.1 Orchid book 170 12.2 Miles Joseph Berkeley 172 12.3 Joseph Hooker 173 12.4 Charles Lyell 175 12.5 Asa Gray 176 12.6 George Bentham 179 12. 7 Charles Giles Bridle Daubeny 183 12.8 John Hutton Balfour 186 12.9 Philip Henry Gosse 187 12.10 William Henry Harvey 189 12.11 James Anderson 192 12.12 Charles Grant Blairfindie Allen 194 12.13 Daniel Oliver 197 12.14 John Lubbock 198 12.15 John Scott 201 12.16 John Traherne Moggridge 203 12.17 Mordecai Cubitt Cooke 205 12.18 John Ellor Taylor 206 12.19 Thomas Frederic Cheeseman 208 12.20 Hermann Müller 209 12.21 Friedrich Hildebrand 211 12.22 Federico Delpino 213 12.23 Fritz Müller 216 12.24 Roland Trimen 223 13 CONCLUSION 226 14 BIBLIOGRAPHY 228 INTRODUCTION Topic My research deals with the historical and scientific context that frames the reception of the book On the Various Contrivances by Which British and Foreign Orchids Are Fertilized by Insects and on the Good Effects of Intercrossing.1 The historical study of this work carried out in this thesis shows the traditions of thought that shaped natural history in the nineteenth century and reconstructs the lines of evolutionary research that converge in Darwin and depart from him, being later synthesised in the works of countless other botanists. Indeed, in the second half of the nineteenth century, Darwin placed himself at the centre of a group of botanists including Fritz Müller,2 Federico Delpino,3 Asa Gray,4 Friedrich Hildebrand,5 Joseph Dalton Hooker,6 the Swedish Severin Axell7 and later Herman Müller.8 1 Darwin, 1877. 2 Johann Friedrich Theodor Müller (1821–1897) studied at universities in Berlin and Greifswald and obtained a doctoral degree in biology. He then started to study medicine, but after the failure of the Prussian Revolution, to avoid dangerous complications for his life and career, he emigrated in 1852 to Brazil, where he dedicated himself to studying life in Atlantic forests and to teaching. 3 Federico Delpino (1833–1905) was an Italian botanist and assistant professor to Giuseppe Parlatore. In 1871, he became professor of natural sciences and decided to become the naturalist for the battleship Garibaldi in a research voyage around the world. From 1875 to 1884, he was professor at university of Genua, and then he moved to Napoli as headmaster of faculty of sciences. 4 Asa Gray (1810–1888) was a great American botanist and professor of botany at Harvard university: He graduated in medicine and later became a naturalist. From 1836 to July of 1838, he was involved in United States Exploring Expedition, and then, although the expedtition had been a difficult experience, he continued to travel around Europe to examine American flora in Europe’s herbarium, to find books and documents, and to build international relations with other eminent botanists and professors. He received the honorary degree of Master of Arts in 1844 and Doctor of Laws in 1875 from Harvard, as well as Doctor of Laws from Hamilton College at New York in 1860, from McGill University in 1884, and from the University of Michigan in 1887. The most famous of his numerous pubications was the Manual of the Botany in the Northern United States, known as “Gray’s Manual”, a landmark in the botanical taxonomy of North America. As a professor at Harvard, he devoted himself to building up and looking after plant collections and what is still today called the “Gray Herbarium”. He was one of Charles Darwin’s contemporaries, and they exchanged opinions and information that proved useful for Darwin’s work. After the publication of The Origin of Species, Gray became a staunch defender’s of Darwin’s theory of evolution and natural selection, even publishing a collection of essays called Darwiniana. In this book, as well as promoting the theories of evolution, he also expressed the hope that there would be reconciliation between these theories and orthodox Christian beliefs, which at that time were considered to be mutually exclusive. 5 Hildebrand was a German botanist (1835–1915), a teacher at Bonn University (1859), and later a professor in Fribourg from 1868 to 1907. He developed several branches of botany, in particular of flower ecology. One of the most important work was Die Lebensverhältnisse der Oxalis-Arten (1884). 6 Hooker (1817–1911) was an internationally renowed botanist and one of the first British men of science to become a full-time professional. The son of Sir William Jackson Hooker, director of the Royal Kew Gardens in London, he worked with his father from a very young age, collecting plants and taking part in expeditions. Followed his father’s path, he become the director of the Royal Botanical Gardens in Kew, and he was involved in several voyages: to the Antarctic (1839–1843), Himalayas and India (1847–1851), Palestine (1860), Marocco (1871), and in the western United States (1877). He is renowned as the founder of geographical botany. He was made a baronet for the publication of his massive encyclopaedia on plants: in 1865 he was appointed director of Kew Gardens, and from 1873 to 1878, he was president of the Royal Society. He was a close friend and early supporter of Charles Darwin. 7 Axell (1843–1892), after earning a degree in medicine, studied botanical sciences. To complete his PhD, he wrote the dissertation De Fanerogama Vaxternas Befruktning, a pivotal dissertation, being one of the first in Sweden to deal with impollination of flowers in sophisticated detail and, at the same time, a book inspired by Darwin’s work on orchids. 8 Hermann Müller was professor in the Realschule at Lippstadt in Westphalia, born at Mühlberg in Thuringia on September 23, 1829, died at Prad in the Tyrol on August 25, 1883. At this point in history, Darwin becomes the centre of an international network concerning pollination ecology: He pays for translations of works of foreign scientists9 and becomes the conductor of an international network made up of different philosophical and religious orientations underlying the works of the various authors. It was a tradition of international research that dealt with the understanding of the floral morphology and ecological interactions between pollinating insects and plants from an evolutionary point of view. This tradition of scholars began to publish their work according to an evolutionary perspective after Darwin sent two communications to the Linnean Society10 and then published his book on orchids.11 However, others almost immediately preceded and followed these more illustrious names.