The Alfred Russel Wallace Website

By George Beccaloni 

Q. Why do most people think that Darwin was the sole originator of the theory of natural selection?

Letter from the Royal Society to Wallace 1890. Copyright Wallace Literary Estate, The Natural History Museum, Fred Edwards

A. This is a tricky one, because the explanation has to take into account that during Wallace's lifetime he was widely acknowledged to be the co-discoverer of the theory. In fact natural selection was often called the Darwin-Wallace theory and the highest possible honours of the land were bestowed on him by the scientific establishment for his role as its co-discoverer. These include the Darwin–Wallace and Linnean Gold Medals of the Linnean Society of London; the Copley, Darwin and Royal Medals of the Royal Society (Britain's premier scientific body); and the Order of Merit (awarded by the ruling Monarch as the highest civilian honor of Great Britain). It was only in the 20th century that Wallace became totally eclipsed by Darwin. My working hypothesis to explain this is as follows: In the late 19th and early 20th century natural selection as an explanation for evolutionary change became very unpopular, with most biologists adopting alternative theories such as neo-Lamarckism, orthogenesis, or the mutation theory. It was only with the modern evolutionary synthesis of the 1930s and 1940s that natural selection became the widely accepted mechanism of evolutionary change. However, by then the history of the discovery had largely been forgotten (there was a new generation of biologists) and when interest in the theory revived many wrongly assumed that the idea had first been published by Darwin in his book The Origin of Species. Thanks to the 'Darwin Industry' of recent decades Darwin's fame has been rising exponentially, overshadowing the important contributions of his contemporaries, like Wallace.

Q. Was Wallace really more Darwinian than Darwin himself?

A. Yes, if by "Darwinian" we mean an acceptance that most evolutionary change is driven by the process of natural selection. Wallace vigorously rejected Lamarckism (the inheritance of acquired characteristics), beginning with his seminal essay of 1858. He correctly insisted throughout his long life that natural selection is the primary mechanism of evolutionary change. Darwin, however, introduced Lamarckian ideas into the fifth and sixth editions Origin of Species, downplaying the role of natural selection (for more information see this paper). Thus, ironically, Wallace could be classed, in modern terminology, as being the first neo-Darwinian (i.e. Darwinism without Lamarckism)! Perhaps it would therefore be fitting if this term was replaced by "Wallacian".

Q. Were Darwin and Wallace the first to discover natural selection?

A. Perhaps not, although their 1858 papers were the first explicit well argued pronouncement of the idea. The theory of natural selection was first proposed by Patrick Matthew in 1831 in an appendix to his book On Naval Timber and Arboriculture, but the idea was not very well explained and none of his contemporaries picked up on it. He himself did not make any further mention of it in his writing, until 1860, when he wrote to the Gardeners' Chronicle and Agricultural Gazette to point out his priority of the idea (a fact which Darwin fully accepted). Thus the modern concept (= meme) of natural selection traces its origin to the 1858 papers by Darwin and Wallace, and not to Matthew's 1831 book.

For a long and emotive discussion of this subject see: https://richarddawkins.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=52968

Q. Did Wallace believe in Spiritualism, and if so, can he be taken seriously?

A. Wallace become a believer in Spiritualism when he was in his 40's. Many other intellectuals (e.g. Darwin's cousin, the scientist Francis Galton) also became interested in Spiritualism at around the same time - the 1860's (it was fashionable). Wallace's world view was gradually transformed from one which was scientific and materialistic, to (by the early 1900's) one in which everything in "the world of life" had been preordained by a supreme intelligence and effected through a host of spiritual beings. It is surely not coincidental that Wallace developed most of his best scientific ideas before his mind was possessed (pun intended) by Spiritualism!

Many scientists have sought to denigrate Wallace by mocking his belief in Spiritualism, which is ironic considering that that paragon of scientific virtue, Charles Darwin, believed in an imaginary deity (= God). Darwin rejected Christianity in the latter part of his life but apparently believed in the existence of God until the end of his days, according to Darwin experts Janet Browne and James Moore. For more information see:-
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9316654 (interview with Browne)
http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/darwin/ (interview with Moore)

A person's scientific work should be judged on its merits - not in relation to other, possibly irrational, beliefs that that person may also hold/have held. Otherwise we would be on a slippery slope leading to the scientific equivalent of the Spanish Inquisition. Under this regime Sir Ronald A. Fisher, who Richard Dawkins once described as "the greatest of Darwin's successors", would have been (metaphorically) burnt at the stake for his devout Christian beliefs! People are entitled to their beliefs, and religious belief is not incompatible with science. Indeed thousands of people around the world of many different religions are doing excellent science all the time. Science is not a religion - it is a powerful method of investigating the natural world.

Scientists embrace many of Wallace's scientific ideas, such as warning colouration and natural selection, since they have withstood subsequent scientific scrutiny and have now become established scientific theories. However, Wallace's Spiritualistic beliefs are rejected by scientists, since they are untestable and therefore unscientific. Scientists don't simply believe everything another scientist, however famous and well respected, might say! Ideas are only of interest to Science if they are testable and if they withstand subsequent scientific investigation. Even in the case of Darwin, scientists now reject his ideas of Pangenesis and Lamarckism (because no evidence was found to back these ideas up) and his belief in God (since the existence of such a deity is scientifically untestable).

It should be remembered that it is always necessary to 'winnow the wheat from the chaff' with respect to the ideas originated by a human mind over the course of a lifetime. Whilst most people don't ever devise any ideas which are novel, scientifically valuable and enduring, Wallace originated many such thoughts and it is for these which he should be remembered.

Q. Did Wallace come to believe in Intelligent Design (ID)? A. Well, he was never a creationist and he certainly was not a Christian! The notion that the spirit world guides evolution (which Wallace developed when he was a very old man) is scientifically untestable and therefore falls outside the realm of Science. It is curious that believers in Christian Intelligent Design have adopted Wallace as their guru, even though Wallace was a pagan, 'table rapping' Spiritualist! My question to these people is: Why, if you think that Wallace was correct in believing that evolution is guided by spirits, don't you go the whole way and accept the mechanism he believed ran the system - and thus become Spiritualists rather than Christians?

See Wallace scholar Charles Smith's answer here and Michael Shermer's answer here.

MYTHS AND MISCONCEPTIONS CORRECTED

Misconception: Wallace sent Darwin a letter in which he briefly explained his idea of natural selection....

Correction: This is not actually true and it diminishes the importance of Wallace's contribution. Wallace actually sent Darwin an extensive and detailed scientific paper describing natural selection, together with a covering letter. Wallace's paper was published in its entirety in the Darwin-Wallace paper of 1858, together with some fragments of Darwin's writings which had not been originally written for publication. To see the paper Wallace sent to Darwin click here.

Misconception: Wallace's discovery of natural selection came from nowhere in a feverish flash in February 1858....

Correction: By Wallace's own admission the theory did occur to him whilst he was suffering from a fit of fever, but what is often not mentioned (perhaps in order to make it seem like Wallace's idea was a lucky guess!) is the fact that Wallace had been searching for the mechanism of evolutionary change since at least 1847 i.e. for eleven long years. Wallace become an evolutionist after reading Chamber's book Vestiges in 1845 and the main aim of his expedition to the Amazon with Bates in 1848 was to try to discover the mechanism driving evolution (for more information click here). Wallace had been actively thinking about and developing his ideas about evolution in a systematic fashion ever since 1847. He gained vital understanding of the distribution of organisms in space and time and of the variation between individuals of a species from his extensive reading and most importantly from his collecting work in Brazil and the Malay Archipelago. Indeed, he published a number of important papers on these subjects prior to his discovery of natural selection  - the best known being his famous 1855 "Sarawak Law" paper (his 1856 paper of the evolution of birds is also very important). The final piece of the puzzle fell into place when during his famous attack of fever, he remembered what he had read about the 'struggle for existence' in Malthus' book twelve years or so earlier. The picture was then complete: he had discovered natural selection.

Misconception: The Darwin-Wallace paper of 1858 generated very little interest after its publication.

Correction: This myth probably originated from one, or both, of two sources. The first was the famous disingenuous statement made by Thomas Bell, the President of the Linnean Society, in his presidential report published in 1859 i.e. that “The year which has passed [1858] has not, indeed, been marked by any of those striking discoveries which at once revolutionize, so to speak, the department of science on which they bear.” It seems likely that his comment was intended to be a slight aimed at the Darwin-Wallace paper, but many have taken it at face value. It is frequently quoted by writers who wish to downplay the significance of the 1858 paper. The second is a well known remark made by Darwin in his autobiography:- "...our joint productions excited very little attention, and the only published notice of them which I can remember was by Professor Haughton of Dublin, whose verdict was that all that was new in them was false, and what was true was old. This shows how necessary it is that any new view should be explained at considerable length in order to arouse public attention." Well, he would say that given that he was the author of a large book on the subject! Darwin's memory must have been failing him, since it is known that he discussed many of the comments published about his and Wallace's paper in letters to his friends and colleagues in 1858 and 1859 (see his published correspondence).

This is what Darwin expert Janet Browne has to say regarding the impact of the paper: "The double paper appeared in the Linnean Society Journal (in the zoological section) in August 1858. During the next two or three months it was reprinted either in full or in part in several popular natural history magazines of the day. A number of people made their views known in letters, reviews, and journals. There were more notices than usually assumed.

Richard Owen, for example, referred to the paper in his presidential address to the British Association for the Advancement of Science at Leeds in September 1858, praising Wallace's explanation of the way varieties replace one another, although hastily adding that there was no reason to think that this accounted for the origin of species. Owen's published address had a wide circulation.....Another acquaintance of Darwin's, the botanist Hewett Cottrell Watson, added an excitable word or two about the new theory to the next volume of his series on British plants, Cybele Britannica. And when extracts from Darwin's and Wallace's papers were reprinted in the popular magazine Zoologist, only a few correspondents raised their eyebrows....A young naturalist called Alfred Newton, a junior fellow at Magdalene College, Cambridge, sat up late into the night clutching his copy of the Journal. "I shall never forget the impression it made on me," he wrote afterwards. "Herein was contained a perfectly simple solution of all the difficulties which had been troubling me for months." Within a week he persuaded his college friend, a trainee ordinand, Henry Tristram, to agree, and Tristram prepared a short paper on the birds of North Africa for the influential ornithological journal Ibis....Hooker published comments on Darwin's and Wallace's evolutionary views in the substantial essay on Tasmanian plants that he was compiling....There, he announced his support for "the ingenious and original reasonings and theories by Mr. Darwin and Mr. Wallace." (Browne, J. 2002. The power of place. Vol. 2 of Charles Darwin. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press).

Misconception: Darwin and Wallace's theories of natural selection as published in the 1858 papers weren't the same (and Darwin's theory was nearer the truth!).

Correction: A number of people have suggested that the theories of natural selection devised by Darwin and Wallace were significantly different, but a number of other people have been quick to point out that these people were incorrect! Historian Peter Bowler, for example, has argued that Wallace was a group selectionist - that the "varieties" he spoke about in his 1858 essay were actually subspecies rather than variant individuals (aberrations or sports) within a population. Bowler's assertion has, however, been comprehensively rebuked by Malcolm Kottler (1985. Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace: Two decades of debate over natural selection. In David Kohn, ed., The Darwinian Heritage (Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press): 367-432). Wallace's paper would simply not make much sense if you replaced "subspecies" for "variety"! In any case, reading entries made in 1855 in his unpublished 'Species Notebook' in the Linnean Society leaves one in no doubt that by "variety" he meant one or more individuals in a population which differ in some way from the ancestral state. The current consensus is that Darwin and Wallace's concepts of natural selection were the same - which is exactly what Darwin and Wallace also thought! To read a recent paper comparing the two men's theories click here.

Misconception: Darwin has priority of the theory of natural selection, because he discovered it 20 years before Wallace.

Correction: The theory of natural selection was first published by Darwin and Wallace in August 1858 (15 months before Darwin's Origin of Species was printed), so Darwin and Wallace are co-discoverers of the idea (if we discount Patrick Matthew). In science publication is everything. It is irrelevant from the point of view of scientific priority that Fred Smith might have conceived the idea of natural selection four hundred years ago if he never got around to publishing it.

See http://webhostinggeeks.com/science/mythsmisconceptions-be for a Belorussian translation of this page by Martha Ruszkowski.