Charles Darwin's ideas weren't particularly new, per se, but he hit the highest, best notes of scholarship with his seminal work:
Darwin, C. 1859. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. London: John Murray, 1st edition
Through his scholarship, he helped become one of the unifiers of biology. In spite of the myriad of changes the modern synthesis has undergone since then, he remains relevant reading.
2 comments:
Happy Birthday to a great theorist.
Thanks for the comment on my blog and I really do appreciate and respect peoples opinions. I do take no offense at your words; after all, I am a graphic designer by trade, in which I a receive a myriad of critiques every week.
That being said, my intention was to raise questions of certain elements of science and not to disregard it. I know scientific theories are based on years of research and many theories have been demonstrated to be as much of a fact as can be proven. I personally haven't done any research and I have not seen any evidence because I do leave that job up to the trained professionals. Still, I have to take scientist's words on their honor when it comes to their findings.
I guess the point I was trying to make is that it would be at least a temptation to carry presupposed notions into research and overlook found discrepancies to save face our keep grants rolling. You mentioned that this rarely happens but how do we, the general public, really know. I am just throwing this in the air as an observation.
Heighdy Josh,
Incidentally, I'm also in the graphic arts profession (or was also; I've shifted into prepress pretty much exclusively now, save for my own projects).
Yes, that temptation exists. But by and large, few scientists are as interested in "saving face" as they are interested in revealing the way the universe works.
And how does one know anything? By getting involved, by doing background reading, and by learning for ourselves what science is and how it works. Otherwise, any observations you make will be, well, flawed for starters. If your goal is to raise questions, you might start with learning some of the basics first.
Some of us have found it enriches our art considerably by doing so. There's certainly no shortage of subject matter.
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