Bold Biology for 2009 — February 1st, 2009 by Douglas Axe
It’s a big year for all things Darwin. This month, two centuries after his birth, we commemorate the man and his accomplishments. And in November, a century and a half after On the Origin of Species was published, we commemorate the beginnings of the theory by which we all know him.
But how exactly should we think of his theory? Is it to be remembered the way we remember the man—as an important part of the past? Or is it to be remembered as something more than that—as an intellectual seed that grew into something that thrives to this day?
Many, of course, would like to think of Darwin’s theory in these flourishing terms. But the growth of something else makes this view increasingly hard to hold. We refer here to the seldom discussed but steadily expanding body of peer-reviewed scientific work that refuses to square with Darwinism.