Catch Hold Of The Origin Of Species / The Descent Of Man Designed By Charles Darwin Provided As Digital Version

weird how influential On the Origin Of Species is, at least in circles i care about, yet if you ask around very few people have actually read it.
most people shrug it off saying they know what it's about so don't need to read it, strangely it's a lot like The Bible how many people actually sit down amp read it cover to cover, so i figured it was high time i heard it straight from the horse's mouth especially as i just recently read the Bible the The Dead Sea Scrolls version i figured it was only fair.
you might think people don't read On the Origin of Species because it's all archaic amp unreadable, when in fact it's wellwritten amp easy to read.
it reads almost like it was written yesterday, to truly appreciate it you have to consider the time in which it was written amp what a leap of faith it must've been to come up with an idea like natural selection.
it almost seems common sense now, given all the evidence that has been accumulated, but back in Darwin's time they didn't even have cameras, so all his evidence was either direct observation both of animals amp fossils, illustrations, or reading other's observations, reading On the Origin of Species is the closest you can get to being in the mind of a man who came to the realization of the single most profound idea on this planet, who discovered the underlying mechanism not only of why were are here, but how we amp all animals turned out how we did amp how us animals continue to propagate often blindly amp are driven to fill every available niche on this planetit's in our nature.


Rest of "review" here:
sitelink comamalfi. htm Not worth reading, Most of the ideas have been proven false, Every educated being on the planet should read this book, Especially fundamentalists who will be surprised that Darwin believes in a God just not a Genie, A brilliant man records his theories based on observation, I'm a Catholic and I thank God my religion readily accepts the obvious instead of maintaining unsupportable mythical positions, God gave us brains to think! We fulfill our destiny through thinking, Also, fundamentalists, we did not evolve from apes or monkeys, It's that we have common ancestors, Perhaps the most readable and accessible of the great works of scientific imagination, The Origin of Species sold out on the day it was published in.
Theologians quickly labeled Charles Darwin the most dangerous man in England, and, as the Saturday noted, the uproar over the book quickly "passed beyond the bounds of the study and lectureroom into the drawingroom and the public street.
" Yet, after reading it, Darwin's friend and colleague T, H. Huxley had a different reaction: "How extremely stupid not to have thought of that, "
Based largely on Darwin's experience as a naturalist while on a fiveyear voyage aboard H, M. S. Beagle, The Origin of Species set forth a theory of evolution and natural selection that challenged contemporary beliefs about divine providence and the immutability of species.
A landmark contribution to philosophical and scientific thought, this edition also includes an introductory historical sketch and a glossary Darwin later added to the original text.


Charles Darwin grew up considered, by his own account, "a very ordinary boy, rather below the common standard of intellect, " A quirk of fate kept him from the career his father had deemed appropriatethat of a country parsonwhen a botanist recommended Darwin for an appointment as a naturalist aboard H.
M. S. Beagle fromto. Darwin is also the author of the fivevolume work Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagleand The Descent of Man,


From the Trade Paperback edition, I'm ashamed to admit that this is the first time I have read this book all the way through considering I have a Masters in Anthropology with a focus on early hominid stone tools and now work in a Biology Lab for a professor who studies the evolution of the genome.
I actually listened to it at work Librivox rocks and it was pretty slow going, However, I ultimately enjoyed it immensely and was very impressed with all of the wonderful examples, I'm looking forward to reading it and being able to savor the rich detail also to look at the graphs, . . which just don't work for an audio book :, God is redundant Loyola University, being a Jesuit University in its foundation, served as a training center for what the order called "collegians", most of whom studied theology or philosophy at the graduate level.
Consequently, teaching assistantships mostly went to them while seculars like myself were generally assigned research assistantships,
Personally, I enjoyed my assignments, although more experience with teaching would have been more helpful, professionally speaking, There was a three year limit on such positions, a limit I was fortunate enough to extend through three school years and three summers thanks to the good offices of the first faculty member I was assigned to, Bill Ellos.

Although I worked for several professors during that period, I began and ended with Bill, Indeed, during a number of semesters I had a split assignment, supposedly spending half my time with him, half with another,
The years with Bill were occupied by two major topics: Wittgenstein and evolutionary theory, Bill's dissertation had been on the former, his primary teaching experience had been as regards the latter, Working with him led me to read most of Wittgenstein and the most important works of Wallace and Darwin, cooriginators of modern evolutionary theory.

As regards Wallace and Darwin, Bill basically told me to read as much as possible, starting with the foundational works of both authors, recording and indexing everything either wrote about particular topics relevant to his own work and publications.
Naturally, this was quite the pleasant exercise as I read a lot anyway and had long intended to read Darwin,
In studying Darwin one would be wise to start chronologically with the Beagle journals, followed by 'The Origin of Species' and then 'The Descent of Man'.
His autobiography makes for a good terminal overview, The other works, and there are many, tend to be either more personal his correspondence and the like or specialized earthworm studies and the like.
The Origins of Species was written for nonspecialist readers which led to its widespread interest upon publication, making science accessible for those that werent involved in the field.
As Darwin was an eminent scientist himself, his findings were taken seriously and the evidence he presented led to meaningful scientific, philosophical, and religious discussions.
Within two decades of initial publication, the book led to the widespread scientific agreement that evolution, with a branching pattern of common descent, had occurred, speaking volumes to the influence and talents of Darwin himself.
Read only the conclusion of "The descent of man" for my MOOC:
, . "It must not be supposed that the divergence of each race from the other races, and of all from a common stock, can be traced back to any one pair of progenitors.
On the contrary, at every stage in the process of modification, all the individuals which were in any way better fitted for their conditions of life, though in different degrees, would have survived in greater numbers than the less wellfitted.
The process would have been like that followed by man, when he does not intentionally select particular individuals, but breeds from all the superior individuals, and neglects the inferior.
He thus slowly but surely modifies his stock, and unconsciously forms a new strain, So with respect to modifications acquired independently of selection, and due to variations arising from the nature of the organism and the action of the surrounding conditions, or from changed habits of life, no single pair will have been modified much more than the other pairs inhabiting the same country, for all will have been continually blended through free intercrossing.

The high standard of our intellectual powers and moral disposition is the greatest difficulty which presents itself, after we have been driven to this conclusion on the origin of man.
But every one who admits the principle of evolution, must see that the mental powers of the higher animals, which are the same in kind with those of man, though so different in degree, are capable of advancement.
Thus the interval between the mental powers of one of the higher apes and of a fish, or between those of an ant and scaleinsect, is immense yet their development does not offer any special difficulty for with our domesticated animals, the mental faculties are certainly variable, and the variations are inherited.
No one doubts that they are of the utmost importance to animals in a state of nature, Therefore the conditions are favourable for their development through natural selection, The same conclusion may be extended to man the intellect must have been allimportant to him, even at a very remote period, as enabling him to invent and use language, to make weapons, tools, traps, etc.
, whereby with the aid of his social habits, he long ago became the most dominant of all living creatures, . A great stride in the development of the intellect will have followed, as soon as the halfart and halfinstinct of language came into use for the continued use of language will have reacted on the brain and produced an inherited effect and this again will have reacted on the improvement of language.
. The development of the moral qualities is a more interesting problem, The foundation lies in the social instincts, including under this term the family ties, These instincts are highly complex, and in the case of the lower animals give special tendencies towards certain definite actions but the more important elements are love, and the distinct emotion of sympathy.
Animals endowed with the social instincts take pleasure in one another's company,

warn one another of danger, defend and aid one another in many ways.
These instincts do not extend to all the individuals of the species, but only to those of the same community, As they are highly beneficial to the species, they have in all probability been acquired through natural selection,

A moral being is one who is capable of reflecting on his past actions and their motivesof approving of some and disapproving of others and the fact that man is the one being who certainly deserves this designation, is the greatest of all distinctions between him and the lower animals.
But in the fourth chapter I have endeavoured to shew that the moral sense follows, firstly, from the enduring and everpresent nature of the social instincts secondly, from man's appreciation of the approbation and disapprobation of his fellows and thirdly, from the high activity of his mental faculties, with past impressions extremely vivid and in these latter respects he differs from the lower animals.
Owing to this condition of mind, man cannot avoid looking both backwards and forwards, and comparing past impressions, Hence after some temporary desire or passion has mastered his social instincts, he reflects and compares the now weakened impression of such past impulses with the everpresent social instincts and he then feels that sense of dissatisfaction which all unsatisfied instincts leave behind them, he therefore resolves to act differently for the future,and this is conscience.
Any instinct, permanently stronger or more enduring than another, gives rise to a feeling which we express by saying that it ought to be obeyed.
A pointer dog, if able to reflect on his past conduct, would say to himself, I ought as indeed we say of him to have pointed at that hare and not have yielded to the passing temptation of hunting it.

The main conclusion arrived at in this work, namely, that man is descended from some lowly organised form, will, I regret to think, be highly distasteful to many.
But there can hardly be a doubt that we are descended from barbarians, The astonishment which I felt on first seeing a party of Fuegians on a wild and broken shore will never be forgotten by me, for the reflection at once rushed into my mindsuch were our ancestors.
These men were absolutely naked and bedaubed with paint, their long hair was tangled, their mouths frothed with excitement, and their expression was wild, startled, and distrustful.
They possessed hardly any arts, and like wild animals lived on what they could catch they had no government, and were merciless to every one not of their own small tribe.
He who has seen a savage in his native land will not feel much shame, if forced to acknowledge that the blood of some more humble creature flows in his veins.
For my own part I would as soon be descended from that heroic little monkey, who braved his dreaded enemy in order to save the life of his keeper, or from that old baboon, who descending from the mountains, carried away in triumph his young comrade from a crowd of astonished dogsas from a savage who delights to torture his enemies, offers up bloody sacrifices, practices infanticide without remorse, treats his wives like slaves, knows no decency, and is haunted by the grossest superstitions.
Man may be excused for feeling some pride at having risen, though not through his own exertions, to the very summit of the organic scale and the fact of his having thus risen, instead of having been aboriginally placed there, may give him hope for a still higher destiny in the distant future.
But we are not here concerned with hopes or fears, only with the truth as far as our reason permits us to discover it and I have given the evidence to the best of my ability.
We must, however, acknowledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his noble qualities, with sympathy which feels for the most debased, with benevolence which extends not only to other men but to the humblest living creature, with his godlike intellect which has penetrated into the movements and constitution of the solar systemwith all these exalted powersMan still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin.
".