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The rise and fall of Darwin's second theory

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Conclusion

“The difficulty of discussion between people brought up in different frameworks is to be admitted,” Karl Popper writes. “But nothing is more fruitful than such a discussion; than the culture clash which has stimulated some of the greatest intellectual revolutions.”71 Certainly Kirby and Darwin were brought up in different cultures — Kirby with his Anglican-Tory orientation, Darwin with his Whig-liberal background — and certainly the clash generated some interesting theories; but it also resulted in the revival of Lamarck's discredited habit theory, which took another century of careful experimentation to weed out.

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  1. History Department, McMaster University, L8S 4L9, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

    George James Grinnell

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James Grinnell, G. The rise and fall of Darwin's second theory. J Hist Biol 18, 51–70 (1985). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00127957

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