Did Jenkin's swamping argument invalidate Darwin's theory of natural selection?

British Journal for the History of Science

Volumn 37, Issue 3, 2004, Pages 281-297

  Bulmer, Michael ^a  

^a Old Vicarage   (United Kingdom)

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[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 6344239456     PISSN: 00070874     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0007087404005850     Document Type: Review

References (65)

1. [H. C. F. Jenkin], 'The Origin of Species', North British Review (1867), 46, 277-318; reprinted in Darwin and His Critics (ed. D. L. Hull), Cambridge, MA, 1973, 302-44. A recent biography of Jenkin is G. Cookson and C. A. Hempstead, A Victorian Scientist and Engineer: Fleeming Jenkin and the Birth of Electrical Engineering, Aldershot, 2000. See also C. Smith and M. N. Wise, Energy and Empire: A Biographical Study of Lord Kelvin, Cambridge, 1989, 536-7, 580-1, 637-8.
2. [H. C. F. Jenkin], 'The Origin of Species', North British Review (1867), 46, 277-318; reprinted in Darwin and His Critics (ed. D. L. Hull), Cambridge, MA, 1973, 302-44. A recent biography of Jenkin is G. Cookson and C. A. Hempstead, A Victorian Scientist and Engineer: Fleeming Jenkin and the Birth of Electrical Engineering, Aldershot, 2000. See also C. Smith and M. N. Wise, Energy and Empire: A Biographical Study of Lord Kelvin, Cambridge, 1989, 536-7, 580-1, 637-8.
3. [H. C. F. Jenkin], 'The Origin of Species', North British Review (1867), 46, 277-318; reprinted in Darwin and His Critics (ed. D. L. Hull), Cambridge, MA, 1973, 302-44. A recent biography of Jenkin is G. Cookson and C. A. Hempstead, A Victorian Scientist and Engineer: Fleeming Jenkin and the Birth of Electrical Engineering, Aldershot, 2000. See also C. Smith and M. N. Wise, Energy and Empire: A Biographical Study of Lord Kelvin, Cambridge, 1989, 536-7, 580-1, 637-8.
4. [H. C. F. Jenkin], 'The Origin of Species', North British Review (1867), 46, 277-318; reprinted in Darwin and His Critics (ed. D. L. Hull), Cambridge, MA, 1973, 302-44. A recent biography of Jenkin is G. Cookson and C. A. Hempstead, A Victorian Scientist and Engineer: Fleeming Jenkin and the Birth of Electrical Engineering, Aldershot, 2000. See also C. Smith and M. N. Wise, Energy and Empire: A Biographical Study of Lord Kelvin, Cambridge, 1989, 536-7, 580-1, 637-8.
5. C. Lyell, Principles of Geology, 3 vols., London, 1830-3, 2, 23. On Kelvin's timescales see, for example, Smith and Wise, op. cit. (1), 497-611.
6. C. Lyell, Principles of Geology, 3 vols., London, 1830-3, 2, 23. On Kelvin's timescales see, for example, Smith and Wise, op. cit. (1), 497-611.
7. G. Hardin, Nature and Man's Fate, New York, 1959; L. Eiseley, Darwin's Century: Evolution and the Men Who Discovered It, London, 1959.
8. G. Hardin, Nature and Man's Fate, New York, 1959; L. Eiseley, Darwin's Century: Evolution and the Men Who Discovered It, London, 1959.
9. P. Vorzimmer, 'Charles Darwin and blending inheritance', Isis (1963), 54, 371-90; idem, Charles Darwin: The Years of Controversy, London, 1972; S.W. Morris, 'Fleeming Jenkin and The Origin of Species: a reassessment', BJHS (1994), 27, 313-43.
10. P. Vorzimmer, 'Charles Darwin and blending inheritance', Isis (1963), 54, 371-90; idem, Charles Darwin: The Years of Controversy, London, 1972; S.W. Morris, 'Fleeming Jenkin and The Origin of Species: a reassessment', BJHS (1994), 27, 313-43.
11. P. Vorzimmer, 'Charles Darwin and blending inheritance', Isis (1963), 54, 371-90; idem, Charles Darwin: The Years of Controversy, London, 1972; S.W. Morris, 'Fleeming Jenkin and The Origin of Species: a reassessment', BJHS (1994), 27, 313-43.
12. J. Gayon, Darwinism's Struggle for Survival: Heredity and the Hypothesis of Natural Selection, Cambridge, 1998, 85-102.
13. S. J. Gould, Bully for Brontosaurus: Reflections in Natural History, London, 1991, 340-53 ('Fleeming Jenkin revisited').
14. [Jenkin], op. cit. (1), 286-94.
15. [Jenkin], op. cit. (1), 288 and Nature (1871), 5, 84 . Jenkin wrote 'hundred' in 1867 but corrected this to 'ten thousand' in 1871 in response to Studens, 'The genesis of species', Nature, 1871, 3, 347.
16. [Jenkin], op. cit. (1), 288 and Nature (1871), 5, 84 . Jenkin wrote 'hundred' in 1867 but corrected this to 'ten thousand' in 1871 in response to Studens, 'The genesis of species', Nature, 1871, 3, 347.
17. [Jenkin], op. cit. (1), 288 and Nature (1871), 5, 84 . Jenkin wrote 'hundred' in 1867 but corrected this to 'ten thousand' in 1871 in response to Studens, 'The genesis of species', Nature, 1871, 3, 347.
18. [Jenkin], op. cit. (1), 289.
19. [Jenkin], op. cit. (1), 289-90.
20. P. Janet, Final Causes (tr. W. Affleck), Edinburgh, 1878.
21. A. S. Davis, 'The "North British Review" and the Origin of Species', Nature (1871), 5, 161. Arthur Sladen Davis entered Leeds Grammar School aged 13 in 1857, went up to Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge in 1861 and graduated in 1865, being ranked 20th Wrangler in the Mathematical Tripos out of 96 candidates in that year; he was thus a respectable mathematician. He returned to Leeds Grammar School as assistant mathematics master (1865-74), moving on to be assistant master at Cheltenham College and then headmaster of St George's School, Roundhay, Leeds. I am grateful to John G. Davies, headmaster of Junior School, Leeds Grammar School, and to Professor A. W. F. Edwards of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, for this information.
22. Davis, op. cit. (12).
23. Davis, op. cit. (12).
24. Davis, op. cit. (12).
25. J. Ball, 'The chance of survival of new varieties', Nature (1872), 5, 264-5.
26. The phrase 'paint-pot theory of heredity' was first used, in the context of Jenkin's swamping argument, by Hardin, op. cit. (3), 107.
27. [Jenkin], op. cit. (1), 290-1.
28. T. H. Huxley, Darwiniana: Essays, London, 1893, 34-7.
29. Morris, op. cit. (4), 337.
30. Morris, op. cit. (4), 338.
31. Morris, op. cit. (4), 339.
32. F. Darwin, The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, 3 vols., London, 1887, iii, 107; Morris, op. cit. (4), 318.
33. F. Darwin, The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, 3 vols., London, 1887, iii, 107; Morris, op. cit. (4), 318.
34. Morris, op. cit. (4), 318. Original emphasis.
35. Morris, op. cit. (4), 318.
36. The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin, A Variorum Text (ed. M. Peckham), Philadelphia, 1959, 55.
37. Origin, op. cit. (26), 176-7.
38. Origin, op. cit. (26), 177.
39. Origin, op. cit. (26), 178.
40. Origin, op. cit. (26), 178-9.
41. Origin, op. cit. (26), 178.
42. Origin, op. cit. (26), 180.
43. Hardin, op. cit. (3), 107-11; Eiseley, op. cit. (3), 210.
44. Hardin, op. cit. (3), 107-11; Eiseley, op. cit. (3), 210.
45. Gayon, op. cit. (5).
46. E. Mayr, Introduction to the Facsimile of the First Edition of On the Origin of Species, Cambridge, MA, 1964.
47. Morris, op. cit. (4).
48. Vorzimmer, 'Charles Darwin and blending inheritance', op. cit. (4).
49. C. Darwin, On the Origin of Species, London, 1859, 3.
50. E. Mayr, Evolution and the Diversity of Life, Cambridge, MA, 1976, 120-8; F. J. Sulloway, 'Geographical isolation in Darwin's thinking: the vicissitudes of a crucial idea', Studies in History of Biology (1979), 3, 23-65.
51. E. Mayr, Evolution and the Diversity of Life, Cambridge, MA, 1976, 120-8; F. J. Sulloway, 'Geographical isolation in Darwin's thinking: the vicissitudes of a crucial idea', Studies in History of Biology (1979), 3, 23-65.
52. Darwin, op. cit. (38), 102-3.
53. G. J. Romanes, 'Physiological selection: an additional suggestion on the origin of species', Journal of the Linnean Society (1886), 19, 337-411. Original emphasis.
54. Romanes, op. cit. (41), 343; Origin, op. cit. (26), 179-80.
55. Romanes, op. cit. (41), 343; Origin, op. cit. (26), 179-80.
56. F. Galton, Natural Inheritance, London, 1889, 12.
57. F. Galton, 'President's Address', Journal of the Anthropological Institute (1887), 16, 400-2.
58. M. Bulmer, 'The development of Francis Gallon's ideas on the mechanism of heredity', Journal of the History of Biology (1999), 32, 263-92; M. Bulmer, Francis Galton: Pioneer of Heredity and Biometry, Baltimore, 2003, 119-46.
59. M. Bulmer, 'The development of Francis Gallon's ideas on the mechanism of heredity', Journal of the History of Biology (1999), 32, 263-92; M. Bulmer, Francis Galton: Pioneer of Heredity and Biometry, Baltimore, 2003, 119-46.
60. R. A. Fisher, The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection, Oxford, 1930.
61. J. L. King, 'Natural selection and blending inheritance', Evolutionary Theory (1984), 7, 41-3.
62. Fisher, op. cit. (46), 3. Original emphasis.
63. F. Darwin, Foundations of the Origin of Species, London, 1909, 2.
64. Bulmer, Francis Galton, op. cit. (45), 108-13.
65. P. G. Fothergill, Historical Aspects of Organic Evolution, London, 1952, 132.