History, Humanity and Evolution
History, Humanity and Evolution
$53.99
USDHistory, Humanity and Evolution brings together thirteen original essays by prominent scholars in the history of evolutionary thought. The volume is intended both to represent the best of today's research in the field and also to celebrate the work of the distinguished historian, John C. Greene, whose historical writings have had a unique influence on this volume's contributors as well as the field as a whole. Using contemporary sources as diverse as medicine, literature, and natural history tableaux, and drawing on the resources of publishing history, feminist scholarship, and the histories of politics, sociology, and philosophy, the contributors offer new perspectives not only on familiar figures such as Erasmus and Charles Darwin, Lamarck, Chambers, Huxley, and Haeckel, but also on many lesser known participants in the evolutionary debates. The volume contains a fascinating introductory conversation with John C. Greene and an afterword by him that responds to the contributors' essays.
Reviews & endorsements
"...the first collective work on evolutionary thought in 30 years. Interests and interpretations in the field have undergone a fundamental shift, and the history of evolutionary thought is no longer written as a triumphal progression of scientific truth with the focus on Charles Darwin... The book is aimed at the general academic reader as well as at those concerned with the religious, moral, and political aspects of evolution." Geotimes
"The present collection of essays stands along with David Kohn's earlier volume on Darwin as one of the two best series of articles on the current state of research. It should receive a wide audience not only among scholars but also in graduate and undergraduate classes on the history of science. it is required reading for scholars in any field concerned with evolutionary thought in the nineteenth century." Frank M. Turner, ISIS
"The disciplined focus on a class of problems that remain, to this day, identified with the human implications of various scientific world views, is what distinguishes this collection from the usual assemblage of loosely associated essays. The essays are uniformly of the highest quality of scholarship in evolutionary studies that are being carried out today, and there is an abundant evidence of inspired editorial planning and guidance." James G. Paradis, Quarterly Review of Biology
"...discuss topics that will prove particularly interesting to theologians and church historians intrigued by the recurring theme of the interdependence of science and religion....this volume is an extraordinarily valuable contribution...." Samuel C. Pearson, Church History
Product details
October 2002Paperback
9780521524780
444 pages
229 × 152 × 25 mm
0.72kg
Available
Table of Contents
- Preface
- Introductory conversation
- 1. Erasmus Darwin: Doctor of Evolution? R. Porter
- 2. Nature's powers: a reading of Lamarck's distinction between creation and production L. Jordanova
- 3. Lamarckism and democracy: corporations, corruption, and comparative anatomy in the 1830s A. Desmond
- 4. The nebular hypothesis and the science of progress S. Schaffer
- 5. Behind the veil: Robert Chambers and Vestiges J. A. Secord
- 6. Of love and death: why Darwin 'gave up Christianity' J. R. Moore
- 7. Encounters with Adam, or at least the Hyaenas: nineteenth-century visual representation of the deep past M. Rudwick
- 8. Huxley and woman's place in science: the 'woman question' and the control of Victorian anthropology E. Richards
- 9. Ideology, evolution, and late-Victorian agnostic popularizers B. Lightman
- 10. Ernst Haeckel, Darwinismus, and the secularization of nature P. Weindling
- 11. Holding your head up high: degeneration and orthogenesis in theories of human evolution P. J. Bowler
- 12. Evolution, ideology, and world view: Darwinian religion in the twentieth century J. R. Durant
- 13. Persons, organisms, and … primary qualities R. M. Young
- Afterword John C. Greene
- Index.
