Darwin’s Presence as Proof in The Origin of Species-1

“Thus, as I believe”: Darwin’s Presence as Proof in The Origin of Species 2013 Abstract The task that Charles Darwin faced in compiling “On the Origin of Species” (1859) is what Gillian Beer describes as the writing of “imaginative history.” Describing processes of variation in organisms and selection of favorable traits in the whole economy of nature meant arguing for processes that were beyond Darwin’s powers of observation. Through a focus on microcosms of domestic selection, Darwin establishes what empirical proofs he can. However, in order to speak for general laws of nature, Darwin must extend his empiricism to address processes he cannot directly witness. Through the use of imaginary illustrations, analogy, personified agents, and poetic metaphors to address processes beyond observation, Darwin combines the empirically observed with the imagined and poeticized. As his argument moves between empiricism and poeticism—between the visible evidence he has observed, the evidence he has collected from others, and the evidence he has more broadly imagined or inferred— Darwin’s distinct presence is a crucial mechanism in creating a sense of identification with his readers, assuring readers of his repeated conviction, and appealing to readers’ own trust in the arguments being made. Because the natural processes he describes require explanations that cannot be directly witnessed and must instead be imagined and held in mind, Darwin’s perspective, as the source from which the imagined illustrations are formed, is crucial. From his introduction, Darwin establishes himself as an impressionistic being capable of awe, frustration, and surprise. This point of view that is carried throughout the text, and is one that allows him to create a rapport and sense of familiarity with his readers. In addition, his personal point of view and repeated assurance of belief in the minute and infinitely complex connections between living beings balances elements of the empirical and more broadly literary. This thesis firstly seeks to explore how, uniquely combining science and poetry, Darwin shifts from visible, empirical proofs to analogous and imaginative illustrations form his larger arguments for natural selection. More specifically, however, this thesis focuses on the necessity of Darwin’s presence—his intimate, personal point of view—in persuading readers to believe in the natural processes he describes. Over the course of revision, we see Darwin bow to critical responses to his personal presence in the work, and remove himself from the argument at great lengths. “I am strongly inclined to believe” becomes “there is reason to believe,” and even “there is reason to believe” becomes “there is good evidence.” This thesis will attempt to illustrate how the pressures on and development of his text point to a more objective, scientific stance that separates itself from more distinct uses of literary techniques. While Darwin’s presence is reduced during revision, this thesis argues that his attempt towards objectivity contributes, in various instances, to a sense of uncertainty and qualification within his arguments. His testimony of personal belief and assertion of conviction is, in this way, crucial to the arguments he is making. What Darwin’s absence in his revised work exposes, this thesis would argue, is the crucial importance of his presence to begin with. CONTENTS Figures..............................................................................................................................................i Introduction......................................................................................................................................1 Chapter One: Webs of Evidence, Appeals to Trust.........................................................................7 I. Darwin’s “I”.....................................................................................................................7 II. Unique Empiricist.........................................................................................................12 III. Trusting Darwin..........................................................................................................16 Chapter Two: Authority of a Poet.................................................................................................27 I. Imagined Evidence........................................................................................................27 II. Darwinian Time............................................................................................................32 III. “What the mind cannot grasp”....................................................................................36 Conclusion: Agency, Revision, and Loss of Voice.......................................................................43 Works Consulted...........................................................................................................................52 1 Introduction Men can do nothing without the make-believe of a beginning. Even Science, the strict measurer, is obliged to start with a make-believe unit, and must fix on a point in the stars' unceasing journey when his sidereal clock shall pretend that time is Nought. His less accurate grandmother Poetry has always been understood to start in the middle; but on reflection it appears that her proceeding is not very different from his. —George Eliot, Daniel Deronda In his quiet study at Down House, surrounded by volumes on natural history and specimens of curiosity, Charles Darwin shuffled through his notes and journals. Carefully, from documentation of his years of travel, study, and observation of the natural world, Darwin extracted what would famously be called an “Abstract” of his findings: On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life, first published in 1859. Contained in the English countryside, amid his domesticated plants and pigeons, Darwin boldly sought to address a natural world run by processes beyond his powers of observation. Broadly, Darwin’s text—“one long argument” (362)—describes the ways in which organisms produce observable, unique variations and how the usefulness in nature of these inheritable variations determines the organisms’ opportunities to survive. George Levine, in his introduction to Darwin’s text, describes the challenge of this task: “Having demonstrated that domestic animals produced variations and that humans could select variations for inheritance, Darwin still had to prove that these conditions existed in nature, that ‘nature gives successive variations’ not only to domestic animals but to wild ones” (The Origin of Species, xxxviii). Unable to directly observe the processes of modification and selection in the infinite expanse of nature, Darwin begins through the microcosmic view of domestic selection, asserting: It is…of the highest importance to gain a clear insight into the means of modification and coadaptation. At the commencement of my observations it seemed to me probable that a careful study of domesticated animals and of cultivated plants would offer the best 2 chance of making out this obscure problem. Nor have I been disappointed…I may venture to express my conviction of the high value of such studies, although they have been very commonly neglected by naturalists. (13) Arguing that the “careful study of domesticated animals and of cultivated plants” has provided him with evidence illuminating larger processes in nature, Darwin begins a practice that is carried throughout his text; he takes what empirical evidence he has collected and extends it to speak for general laws of nature that are beyond the powers of empirical observation. More specifically, the presence of Darwin’s point of view, his assurance that “it seemed to me probable” and, similarly, “Nor have I been disappointed,” becomes the crucial way in which he persuades readers of his larger arguments. He grounds his larger claims in intimate, human perceptions, foregrounding his personal point of view as a persuasive means of presenting his evidence and larger claims. Furthermore, establishing his argument, Darwin explains: Although much remains obscure, and will long remain obscure, I can entertain no doubt, after the most deliberate study and dispassionate judgment of which I am capable, that the view which most naturalists entertain, and which I formerly entertained—namely, that each species has been independently created—is erroneous. (15) Boldly declaring what “will” remain obscure and, similarly, that the view of independent is “erroneous,” Darwin is deeply present in the claims—exposing the necessity of his presence in the arguments he forms. He demonstrates simultaneous humility and authority, acknowledging he has studied and judged as well as he is “capable,” while firmly stating “I can entertain no doubt.” Similarly, his own admission that the view of independent creation was once one he shared, Darwin uses personal testimony and point of view as persuasive mechanisms in correcting a flawed view. Gillian Beer explains: “Evolutionary theory emphasizes human awareness of the past and obliges us to study a world from whose history we are largely absent. We must survey an antiquity in which we have no place” (21). Darwin must, in this way, insert himself into 3 arguments about forces in nature that he cannot witness. His empirical findings must lend themselves to broader analogies, metaphors, and even imaginary illustrations in an attempt to illustrate natural processes beyond Darwin’s domestic microcosm. A combination of empiricism with imagination, Darwin’s argument becomes a unique blend of science and poetry. Darwin, confined in the present and absent from a past that his argument attempted to re-envision, was faced largely with the cognitive task of accumulating empirical proofs and combining them with imagined evidence. “Nothing is easier than to admit in words the truth of the universal struggle for life, or more difficult—at least I have found it so—than constantly to bear this conclusion in mind,” Darwin confesses. “Yet,” he asserts, “unless it be thoroughly engrained in the mind, I am convinced that the whole economy of nature, with every fact on distribution, rarity, abundance, extinction, and variation, will be dimly seen or quite misunderstood.” As Darwin emphasizes the importance of bearing in mind the struggle for life, we are reminded, too, that in order to better comprehend the “whole economy of nature,” what we are faced with is not the ability to directly witness the “universal struggle for life,” but to engrain it in the mind. In this way, Darwin’s argument must be, in large part, imagined. At both moments of empirical findings and imagined or metaphoric illustrations, however, Darwin’s distinct perspective and personal point of view is present, appealing to readers’ trust, quietly and assuredly persuading his readers to believe in the arguments he is making. Despite the magnitude of Darwin’s evolutionary theory and his arguments for general laws of nature, his text is firstly and deeply rooted in the accumulation of directly empirical, sensory evidence. Darwin marvels at the diversity of his domestic pigeons, the slave-making instincts of ants, and the intricate architecture of the beehive. “He must be a dull man,” he exclaims, “who can examine the exquisite structure of a comb, so beautifully adapted, without 4 enthusiastic admiration” (Darwin, 186). As the domestic and vivid examples Darwin presents to his readers become pieces of his larger arguments in favor of natural selection, so too does his familiar and personal narration become the persuasive means through which he presents his theories. The quality and reliance on point of view and subjective belief are evident as Darwin attempts to apply the same conviction he displays in his empirical findings to processes he must illustrate through different means. Turning to metaphor, analogy, and even personified agents like “Nature,” Darwin enters into imaginative and poeticized ways of arguing for processes that he cannot directly observe. His poetic illustrations help expand and illuminate for his readers complexities in the natural world, while they simultaneously provide Darwin’s own argument with a sense of authority and grandeur. Beyond the microcosms of pigeon keeping and gardening, Darwin’s point of view guides readers through descriptions of the endlessly complex and changing affinities in nature. Often adopting a poetic and, at moments, prophetic gaze, Darwin speaks with a continued sense of belief in his theories as they move from domestic, microcosmic examples to the greater processes in nature. Within the shifts from empirical certainty to analogous or imagined examples, Darwin’s intimate perspective and distinctively human voice serve to subtly remind readers of his firm conviction and belief in the processes he is describing. Readers are confronted with processes that Darwin has not always observed, but often imagined or inferred. As biographer Janet Browne describes: In an era when natural philosophers were consciously coming to rely on idioms of prediction, experiment, demonstration, and discovery, when accredited truths of nature were established by seeing and believing, Darwin’s approach was doubly unusual. He was inviting people to believe in a world run by irregular, unpredictable contingencies, as well as asking them to accept his solution for the simple reason that it seemed to work. (56) 5 Although Darwin establishes what proofs he can based on “seeing,” his use of analogy and imaginative illustrations in his broader arguments require readers, not only to accept “unpredictable contingencies,” but also to trust Darwin’s subjective perspective, his assurance of belief. Throughout the different means of addressing his argument, Darwin maintains his personal point of view, continually assuring his readers of his own trust in the theories being described, and encouraging them to trust. This thesis firstly seeks to explore the ways in which Darwin’s argument combines elements of empiricism and poeticism, and to show how such shifts from visible, empirical proofs to analogous and imaginative illustrations form his larger arguments for natural selection. Although the Origin is often described as scientific text with literary elements (metaphor, personification, analogy) embedded within it, I would like to consider the ways in which “science” and “literature” are interdependent when we look at the formation of Darwin’s arguments. Moving from what he has observed to what he can more broadly infer or imagine, Darwin combines the empirically observed with the imagined poeticized. Science, “the strict measurer,” as George Eliot describes, is uniquely combined with poetry and imagination, allowing Darwin to weave an argument largely based on natural processes he cannot empirically witness. In particular, this thesis seeks to show the intricate ways in which reliance on personal point of view gives Darwin his power in persuading readers to accept his arguments and believe in the greater theories he attempts to articulate. The necessity of Darwin’s persuasive personal testimony, his appeals to trust, and displays of confidence all function to infuse the natural processes he is arguing with a sense of vivid immediacy and believability. By the time Darwin published his final edition of the text in 1876, under the shortened title “The Origin of Species,” his personal presence and voice are greatly diminished in favor of 6 scientific objectivity. However, what this thesis attempts to show are the ways in which Darwin’s presence gives the Origin’s larger arguments their persuasive power. In other words, the very natural processes described in his text require, to a large degree, Darwin’s intimate perspective and subjective point of view. Articulating what he cannot empirically observe, Darwin uses conviction, testimony of belief, and appeals to for his readers to believe in order to infuse the natural processes in his argument with a sense of power and truth. Readers, like Darwin himself, are unable to directly witness the processes being described in the Origin; yet, they hear Darwin’s conviction and are even drawn into his perspective, as he attempts to make new—even make strange—the natural world and our understanding of it.