Evolution and The Island of Doctor Moreau

Have you ever wondered about why Charles Darwin was so important? Charles Darwin was an amazing scientist. Born February 12, 1809. He grew up in a small town in Shrewsbury, England with six other siblings. He was the second youngest. His father was a doctor and was hoping that he would do the same when he got older, but it wasn’t for him. So he was always a risk-taker because even though his dad would’ve been mad he still went for his own way studying nature. He went to Christ's college in Cambridge and graduated from there. Darwin was always interested in nature, so when he went on a voyage. This tells us about how Darwin was always been interested by nature.

The documentary, “Darwin’s Dangerous Idea” tells the story of Charles Darwin’s conception of his theory of natural selection, and how it explains the evolutionary process and species adaptation. The story begins with a brief overview of his 5-year stint on the HMS Beagle as the ship's naturalist, during her South American voyage. The film shows how Mr. Darwin collected fossils and many species of animals and birds from many different regions especially the Galapagos Islands. It portrays Mr. Darwin’s return to England and his struggle between the mainstream religious beliefs and his personal beliefs of how different species came to be. Additionally, the documentary covers his presentation of fossils and ideas to the scientific community,

Darwin’s theory of evolution was a ground-breaking discovery for the study of life. Although Darwin gets most of the credit for the discovery his influences Charles Lyell, the father of geology and Erasmus Darwin, a pre-Darwinian evolutionist, made great contributions to the theory. The majority of the scientific community was quite receptive to Darwin’s evolution by natural selection theory because it provided an explanation for many things that the current origin of life theory, special creation, did not. The scientific community did have some trouble accepting his work because it did not describe how the evolving genes were transferred from generation to generation which was a very important piece of information that would solidify his for

Darwin began to form his ideas when he served as official naturalist on a world voyage on HMS Beagle from 1831 to 1836 and spent the rest of his life back in England developing them (Singh 2). When his famous book The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selections was published in 1859, he received a lot of violent reactions. In his book, Darwin challenged the Bible’s account of creation and explained that human beings are descended from an ape-like ancestor (Singh). However, Charles Darwin received backlash from many critics. After Darwin's book was published, he obtained many letters criticizing his idea of evolution due to people's religious beliefs. Darwin wasn't only criticized by the church, but also by scientists. He also received letters from scientists such as Adam Sedgwick and St. George Mivart, rejecting Darwin's natural selection hypothesis. Although he received a lot of backlash for his beliefs, he stayed true to his claims. Other world renowned naturalists such as Alfred Russell Wallace developed similar ideas as Darwin, expanding on evolution. To this day, evolution is still taught in many classes and is a theory that most scientists refer to.

However, his passion for natural science never swayed. It was this intricate fascination that brought Charles about meeting Professor John Stevens Henslow. Henslow was a specialist in botany. Overtime Henslow and Charles became quite close friends. In the article titled: “Charles Darwin: man behind monkey” author Christine Dao further explained the following events after the fact that Charles and Henslow became close friends. Henslow had the opportunity to accompany Captain Robert Fitzroy to the Americas as a naturalist. He extended this opportunity to the “novice” naturalists Charles. Dao’s article states, “Henslow proposed that Darwin take his place on the HMS Beagle journey to the Americas as an unpaid naturalist and gentleman companion to Captain Robert Fitzroy. Darwin was almost a complete novice, his experience based only on rudimentary geological studies, beetle-collecting, and the dissection of marine

Darwin was the British naturalist who became famous for his theories of evolution and natural selection. Like several scientists before him, Darwin believed all the life on earth evolved over millions of years from a few common ancestors. From 1831 to 1836 Darwin served as naturalist aboard the H.M.S. Beagle on a British science expedition around the world. In South America Darwin found fossils of extinct animals that were similar to modern species. On the Galapagos Islands in the Pacific Ocean he noticed many variations among plants and animals of the same general type as those in South America. The expedition visited places around the world, and Darwin studied plants and animals everywhere he went, collecting specimens for further study.

Darwin wanted to further his studies in plant and animal life, and he also became interested in the similarities of plant and animal species to those of the human species. He noticed that humans too also had to develop new characteristics that would help them adapt to their environments. This made him want to look further into where humans came from and also question the idea of creationism. He argued that men are animals because they have to adapt to their surroundings just as animals do. He suggested that the stronger animals have a better survival chance and they produce offspring that carry this trait. A whole new population of species can derive from these offspring and traits that have evolved from older generations and species. This became known as Darwin’s Theory of Evolution.

After the long five year voyage, Charles Darwin published his book, “The Voyage of the Beagle” in 1839 which showed his findings and observations while on the expedition. He would later publish a total of twenty-five books in his lifetime about the field of science. His ideas and theories were criticized by creationists who his ideas disproved and contradicted their belief of Creationism, or “the belief that the universe and the various forms of life were created by God out of nothing. It is a response to modern evolutionary theory, which explains the emergence and diversity of life without recourse to the doctrine of God or any other divine power” (Britannica.com 1). He would still, however, believe in his work until his death on April 19, 1882. By then, people have already accepted his ideas on evolution and natural selection, which would become to be known as

Throughout his university career, both at Edinburgh and at Cambridge, Darwin continued to receive offers to explore and go on expeditions with various mentors, colleagues, and teachers. On these trips, he collected marine animals from tidal pools (Darwin, p. 50), worked stuffing birds as an apprentice (Darwin, p. 51), and went on a voyage documenting fossils with Adam Sedgwick (Darwin, p. 70), among other excursions. He also developed an extensive collection of beetles and developed a system of capturing and documenting

A key factor of Darwin's evidence on the evolutionary process was the Finche. During his travels to the Galapagos Islands Finches became the main evidence to support his theory on the evolutionary process. Darwin was able to identify Finches that had various shaped beaks. Studying them more in depth he was able to establish the reasoning for these changes creating his theory of natural selection and gradual evolution over time. With the ability to draw and write, Darwin had little struggle documenting his findings during his time on the H.M.S. Beagle. Darwin was also able to ship species and labeled dried specimens back to his home land. At the time of Darwin believed his new founding to be very hard for the world to adjust to his new found

His degree had nothing to do with biology, which at the time had some controversy over whether it was an actual science or not. He also had a strong interest in Natural History, which compelled him to take John Henslow’s class three times. He spent so much time learning all that he could from Henslow’s knowledgeable and profitable expertise that Darwin got the nickname, the man who walks with Henslow.” Darwin was not properly trained in science, but he did have more of an extensive background in life sciences (P2, pg,

Imagine if Darwin became a doctor instead of a naturalist. Charles Darwin was going to become a doctor until he saw a surgery (back then there was no anesthesia or any modern techniques) and got scared by blood, resulting in him dropping out from medical school. Instead of becoming a doctor, Darwin became a naturalist, and at 22 years old, he set out on a five year voyage around the world on a cramped ship: the HMS Beagle. For many reasons, Darwin’s father objected to his voyage on the HMS Beagle, such as that he did not want his son to become a nobody. Due to his queasy stomach, Darwin was sick for the whole exploration. He brought his naturalist supplies: pickling jars and art supplies (to draw species).

During the time when Charles Darwin was alive (1809-1882) most of the Western culture believed that the world was created by God and only several thousand years old. They believed that our world was always like it was then. So when Darwin wrote The Origin of Species it shook up both the cultural and scientific views of his time. His views that evolution occurs by natural selection was one of the most radial theories during his time, yet today is widely accepted as a fact among most of the world.

     Darwin’s Theories upset the church, one of the things that he proposed was that all living things may have descended from the same species. Today it is believed that life may have started as replicating molecules. Darwin introduced the idea that life is not just evolving but the earth is also changing. This went against creationism, the Bible says that god created the world and all the animals. It also separated man from the animals because god created man in

Before the theory of evolution was a widespread theory in the world of science, Greek and Roman philosophers had their own theories about how life came to its present state and where it was going from there. One theory at the time was that all organisms are reflections of a “perfect” form and were coming closer to it all the time, although this was the less accepted theory even though it was closer to the truth proven hundreds of years after, while another was that all things were simply places on Earth in their present form, common to modern day Creationism. Even after this, Darwin was not the first to try explain evolution, he just provided convincing proof and published his ideas. The publishing of Darwin’s Theory of Evolution was