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J. B. S. Haldane's Darwinism in its religious context

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2009

Gordon McOuat  and
Mary P. Winsor
Gordon McOuat
Affiliation:
Department of Contemporary Studies, University of King's College, Halifax, Nova Scotia B3H 2A1, Canada.
Mary P. Winsor
Affiliation:
Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology, University of Toronto, Ontario MSS 1A1, Canada.
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Extract

Early in this century, only a few biologists accepted that natural selection was the chief cause of evolution, until the independent calculations of John Burdon Sanderson Haldane (1892–1964), Sewall Wright and R. A. Fisher demonstrated that ideal populations subject to Mendel's laws could behave as Darwin had said they would. Evolutionary theorist John Maynard Smith, a student of Haldane's, has raised the question of why Haldane, who was no naturalist, took up the subject of evolution, and he suggests that the answer may have to do with Haldane's lively interest in religion. In fact Maynard Smith's answer has much more evidence in its favour than he knew.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal for the History of Science , Volume 28 , Issue 2 , June 1995 , pp. 227 - 231
Copyright
Copyright © British Society for the History of Science 1995

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References

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