Reports

Animal Biology

Cristina Jiménez

Corresponsal London

Darwin’s year (part 1)

The British naturalist converted in a 'universal truth' that all species have a common origin

23 September 2009

Cristina Jiménez, Londres

What do a hamster and a man have in common? A great genetic similarity and some common ancestors. It is an indisputable fact in the present. But the same question made 200 years before would have had a very different answer. It is thanks to the British naturalist Charles Darwin that it is a ‘universal truth’ to think that all species on Earth have a common origin. So to celebrate the bicentennial birth of the scientist who defended the evolution’s theory in his book The Origen of Species (1859) is more than justified.

Since February, coinciding with the month of his birth, many events and tributes to the figure of Darwin have invaded museums, libraries and cinemas in London. The madness will end the 22nd of November, moment of the 150th anniversary of the publication of the book that Darwin quickly wrote and presented publicly, as he had been warned that other scientists had similar enquiries.

The most powerful initiative that pays homage to Darwin is without doubt Darwin200, started by the natural History Museum (NHM) of London, which owes Darwin so much. The most recent in Darwin200 has been the inauguration of a new building of 89 million Euros in the museum, the Darwin Centre, the Cocoon. It is a building of impossible forms that treasures one of the most extended insect collection of the world. The inauguration was celebrated in style last week. Prince William was there as was the second most famous naturalist of the world David Attenborough, known not only because of his scientific theories but because of his BBC documentaries.

I haven’t yet had the opportunity to visit the exposition in the Cocoon, but I will go soon (it’s free). I have gone to the main event of Darwin200: Darwin - Big Idea big exhibition, also in the NHM. It finished in April and it is the most detailed exposition of Darwin’s life and work ever done until now. Currently it is travelling along the Americas. The exposition had an enormous success in London (and it wasn’t for free). Such was the demand that tickets could only be bought online, carefully reserving a visiting time slot. I tried to go on a Saturday and a Sunday but couldn’t: fully booked.

¿What is it that makes Darwin so special amongst his profession colleagues as well as for any other citizens? I went to see the exposition with a palaeontologist friend and seeing me astonished about a science exposition he reminded me: “Darwin meant to say that humans are no more than naked monkeys”.

“Mmm”, I thought. It is not strange that Darwin is a popular scientist. Whilst the implications of the relativity theory for the day to day, more common than we might think, may be difficult to understand, Darwin’s theory has two lectures close to anyone: it unties the man to the need for a supernatural creator and also dethrones humans from their pedestal: we are just monkeys with a bit less hair.

Especially during his middle age, Darwin, never declared himself an atheist. When Darwin was writing his autobiography, around 1879 he received a letter where he was asked if he believed in the existence of God, and if theism and evolution were compatible. The scientist answered: “a man can be an ardent theist and an evolutionist”. About his position he said “he had never been an atheist in the sense of denying the existence of a God”. In fact, he always considered himself agnostic.

Everyone uses Darwin for their own purposes. Richard Dawkins, for example, a renowned British evolutionary theorist, very popular and fundamentally atheist. Dawkins has no doubt in saying that “Darwin’s idea was the most opportune in the history of mankind”. However, his documentary The Genius of Charles Darwin (winner of the best documentary in the British Broadcast Awards 2009), has been criticized by some scientists because, more than paying tribute to Darwin, it seems like he uses the footage to attack the belief in the existence of God.

It’s not bad that a naturist is the protagonist for once. If climatologists, physicians, chemists or engineers try to find ways of stopping climate change and avoiding the Earth’s deterioration, zoologists and naturists try to go further in the knowledge of the origin of man and life. To know better where to go it might also be important to know a bit more from where we come from.

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