Darwin’s Early Work on the Theory of Evolution
I have seen that what we have understood by the word “origin” or “transmutation” of species before Darwin’s work were published, is the comparatively elementary inquiry whether the allied species of each genus had or had not been derived from one another and from some common ancestor, by the commonplace method of procreation and by ways of laws and terms still in process and capable of being soundly enquired. If any naturalist had been asked in Darwin’s time whether, theorizing that all the divergent species of each genus had been derived from some one ancestral species, and that a total and complete explanation were to be presented of how each minute difference in form, color, or structure might have originated, and how the several distinctive features of habit and of geographical dispersion might have been played aboutand if this were concluded, the “origin of species” would be named, the outstanding secret worked out, he would undoubtedly have answered in the affirmative. Our investigator would plausibly have summated that he never anticipated any such extraordinary discovery to be given in his life. Darwin has done this, not solely in the impression of his students and supporters, but by the admissions of those who refuted the completeness of his accounts. For virtually all their remonstrations and difficulties apply to those specific differences of opinion which divide genera, families, and orders from each other, not to those which distinguish a species from the species to which it is most closely aligned, and from the remaining species of the same genus. So are these dissents ubiquitous or only a case of incorrect identity?
I find it unusual to see that an Oprah Winfrey creationism controversy has been active since Spring 2008.