Advance of Science in the Last Half-Century, The

“The most obvious and the most distinctive features of the History of Civilisation, during the last fifty years, is the wonderful increase of industrial production by the application of machinery, the improvement of old technical processes and the invention of new ones, accompanied by an even more remarkable development of old and new means of locomotion and intercommunication. By this rapid and vast multiplication of the commodities and conveniences of existence, the general standard of comfort has been raised, the ravages of pestilence and famine have been checked, and the natural obstacles, which time and space offer to mutual intercourse, have been reduced in a manner, and to an extent, unknown to former ages. The diminution or removal of local ignorance and prejudice, the creation of common interests among the most widely separated peoples, and the strengthening of the forces of the organisation of the commonwealth against those of political or social anarchy, thus effected, have exerted an influence on the present and future fortunes of mankind the full significance of which may be divined, but cannot, as yet, be estimated at its full value.”

ScienceHistoryInfluenceMankindIgnoranceDevelopmentComfortCivilizationFutureIncreasePrejudiceFortuneValueObstaclesImprovementInventionSignificanceAnarchyMachineryConvenienceFaminePestilenceProductionForcesLocomotionIntercommunication

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“An interesting contrast between the geology of the present day and that of half a century ago, is presented by the complete emancipation of the modern geologist from the controlling and perverting influence of theology, all-powerful at the earlier date. As the geologist of my young days wrote, he had one eye upon fact, and the other on Genesis; at present, he wisely keeps both eyes on fact, and ignores the pentateuchal mythology altogether. The publication of the 'Principles of Geology' brought upon its illustrious author a period of social ostracism; the instruction given to our children is based upon those principles. Whewell had the courage to attack Lyell's fundamental assumption (which surely is a dictate of common sense) that we ought to exhaust known causes before seeking for the explanation of geological phenomena in causes of which we have no experience.”

ScienceInfluenceExperienceMythMythologyTheologyCommon SenseScience And ReligionSupernaturalFactSuperstitionGenesisGeologyNaturalismScience Vs ReligionOstracismPentateuchMethodological NaturalismIllustriousCharles LyellLyellBiblical MythologyPrinciples Of Geology

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“Wherever sufficiently numerous series of the remains of any given group, which has endured for a long space of time, are carefully examined, their morphological relations are never in discordance with the requirements of the doctrine of evolution, and often afford convincing evidence of it. At the same time, it has been shown that certain forms persist with very little change, from the oldest to the newest fossiliferous formations; and thus show that progressive development is a contingent, and not a necessary result, of the nature of living matter.”

MatterScienceNatureDevelopmentEvolutionLivingEvidenceRemainsBiologyFossilsConvincingRequirementMorphologyExamineContingent

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“Lyell and Poulett Scrope, in this country, resumed the work of the Italians and of Hutton; and the former, aided by a marvellous power of clear exposition, placed upon an irrefragable basis the truth that natural causes are competent to account for all events, which can be proved to have occurred, in the course of the secular changes which have taken place during the deposition of the stratified rocks. The publication of 'The Principles of Geology,' in 1830, constituted an epoch in geological science. But it also constituted an epoch in the modern history of the doctrines of evolution, by raising in the mind of every intelligent reader this question: If natural causation is competent to account for the not-living part of our globe, why should it not account for the living part?”

TruthScienceNaturalHistoryPowerEvolutionIntelligentDoctrineSecularGeologyNaturalismMarvellousCausationExpositionHuttonJames HuttonCharles LyellLyellGeorge Julius Poulett ScropeIrrefragablePoulett ScropeScropeThe Principles Of Geology

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“There can be no doubt that the existing Fauna and Flora is but the last term of a long series of equally numerous contemporary species, which have succeeded one another, by the slow and gradual substitution of species for species, in the vast interval of time which has elapsed between the deposition of the earliest fossiliferous strata and the present day.”

ScienceTimeDoubtEvolutionSpeciesBiologyExtinctionGeologyFloraFlora And FaunaFaunaFossilStrata

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“The question of the position of man, as an animal, has given rise to much disputation, with the result of proving that there is no anatomical or developmental character by which he is more widely distinguished from the group of animals most nearly allied to him, than they are from one another.”

ScienceAnimalDevelopmentEvolutionBiologyAnatomyResultHuman EvolutionDistinguishDisputation

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“The careful observations and the acute reasonings of the Italian geologists of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; the speculations of Leibnitz in the 'Protogaea' and of Buffon in his 'Théorie de la Terre;' the sober and profound reasonings of Hutton, in the latter part of the eighteenth century; all these tended to show that the fabric of the earth itself implied the continuance of processes of natural causation for a period of time as great, in relation to human history, as the distances of the heavenly bodies from us are, in relation to terrestrial standards of measurement. The abyss of time began to loom as large as the abyss of space. And this revelation to sight and touch, of a link here and a link there of a practically infinite chain of natural causes and effects, prepared the way, as perhaps nothing else has done, for the modern form of the ancient theory of evolution.”

ScienceTimeSpaceHistoryEvolutionCarefulObservationReasoningAbyssNaturalismCausationLeibnizBuffonHuttonJames HuttonGeologistsGottfried LeibnizGottfried Wilhelm LeibnizComte De BuffonGeorges Louis LeclercGottfried W Leibniz

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“But anyone who is practically acquainted with scientific work is aware that those who refuse to go beyond fact, rarely get as far as fact; and anyone who has studied the history of science knows that almost every great step therein has been made by the 'anticipation of Nature,' that is, by the invention of hypotheses, which, though verifiable, often had very little foundation to start with.”

ScienceNatureHistoryInventionAnticipationHypothesisFactAdvanceVerifiable

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“In the beginning of the eighteenth century, De Maillet made the first serious attempt to apply the doctrine [of evolution] to the living world. In the latter part of it, Erasmus Darwin, Goethe, and Lamarck took up the work more vigorously and with better qualifications. The question of special creation, or evolution, lay at the bottom of the fierce disputes which broke out in the French Academy between Cuvier and St.-Hilaire; and, for a time, the supporters of biological evolution were silenced, if not answered, by the alliance of the greatest naturalist of the age with their ecclesiastical opponents. Catastrophism, a short-sighted teleology, and a still more short-sighted orthodoxy, joined forces to crush evolution.”

ScienceEvolutionScience And ReligionOrthodoxyScience Vs ReligionGoetheJohann Wolfgang Von GoetheCuvierErasmus DarwinGeorges CuvierLamarckBenoit De MailletBenoît De MailletDe MailletJean Baptiste LamarckTreviranus

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