Samantha Allison: Captain’s Log

Date: June 30, 1860

Location: Oxford University Museum

Today has been a day of nail-biting tension, hair pulling frustration, and all in all a mind-blowing experience. This combination is becoming a trend with the time travel business, and I can’t say I’m thrilled about it. Ever since Professor Bump convinced me to build this time machine[1] -- with the primary goal of experiencing the Victorian era firsthand, and the second, not entirely unrelated, goal of passing his class -- my life has been a series of ups and downs…literally. Why just this morning, a hardware malfunction left me up a tree in a decidedly equatorial region of who-knows-where. I say this morning because it was since I have last slept, yet it feels like it was millions of years ago…literally. As I balanced on a branch trying to duct tape my ship back together and cursing the lack of university funding for this project, I was forced to make a hasty retreat into the cockpit at the approach of some sort of wild ape. I just managed to seal the airtight compartment (read: giant Tupperware lid) when the ape began to beat on the outside with his fists. As the machine sputtered to life, the monkey, who I now realize looked suspiciously like my uncle Harry[2], grinned at me, and the next thing I knew I was here at Oxford University, in the Lecture Room[3] of the Natural History Museum,[4], just in time to hear Archbishop Samuel Wilberforce call Thomas Huxley’s ancestors apes, to the gasps and jeers of the crowd. This rapid turn of events confused me at the time, but I have since been able to sit down with some library books and sort things out. The event I unknowingly witnessed was the famous debate of Huxley and Wilberforce over the concept of evolution, which took place at Oxford in 1860. Before I go further, let me give some background on Huxley, Wilberforce, and Darwin’s newly proposed theory of evolution. In this context, the details of the debate will mean more to my readers than they did to me this afternoon.

*Thomas Huxley* [5]

Thomas Henry Huxley was born on May 4, 1825 in Ealing, Middlesex to George and Rachel Huxley. He received a degree in medicine from the University of London in 1845. From 1846 until 1850, he served in the Royal Navy as a surgeon on HMS Rattlesnake. During this stint, Huxley had the chance to extensively observe and research marine life in the seas around Australia and Asia. On his return to England in 1850, Huxley was made a Royal Society fellow. In 1854, he became a professor at the Royal School of Mines in London, in natural history and paleontology.[6] Huxley was a surgeon, biologist, professor, artist, and lecturer. His extant research notes contain hundreds of detailed drawings of organisms he observed. He avidly supported agnosticism, a term he is said to have coined, because he could not accept the philosophy of Creationism. He studied Lamarck’s principles of Transmutation in detail, but failing to align the theory with his own conclusions, he ended up discarding it as not having enough evidence. Huxley was also a paleontologist, and his studies of fossil records showed a genetic link between reptiles and birds. When Charles Darwin published Origin of the Species in 1859, Huxley found a theory that did not conflict with his beliefs or personal findings. He became known as “Darwin’s bulldog,” and in a letter to Darwin himself, Huxley wrote:

I trust you will not allow yourself to be in any way disgusted or annoyed by the considerable abuse and misrepresentation which, unless I greatly mistake, is in store for you. Depend upon it, you have earned the lasting gratitude of all thoughtful men. And as to the curs which will bark and yelp, you must recollect that some of your friends, at any rate, are endowed with an amount of combativeness which (though you have often and justly rebuked it) may stand you in good stead. I am sharpening up my claws and beak in readiness.[7]
 
 Huxley also engaged in a series of debates with Richard Owen during his lifetime[SAM1] , demonstrating, among other things, a close similarity between the cerebrums of gorillas and humans. In a way, the 1860 debate was a continuation of this rivalry, since many hold that Owen coached Wilberforce in the precepts of Darwinism. Huxley’s Evidence as to Man’s Place in Nature in 1863 summed up his refutation of Owen once and for all. Ironically, Huxley was not entirely convinced by Darwin’s theories at the time of the 1860 debate.  He took Darwin’s side for a variety of outside reasons, including resentment of the control of scientific information by the upper class and the Anglican church, and resentment of Owen himself, who was considered self-righteous and hard to get along with by many contemporaries. For these reasons, Huxley agreed to champion Darwin’s cause in public, and demonstrate his stance on the political issues of the day. Huxley was also a paleontologist, and his studies of fossil records determined a link between reptiles and birds. 

*Charles Darwin[8] and the Theory of Evolution* [9]

I was taught evolution in public school, but in case my readers were not, let me summarize the theory that sparked such heated controversy. The basis for the theory is that organisms gradually evolve through a process of natural selection.[10] Darwin backed up this claim with research he collected during his years in the 1830s on the HMS Beagle. He noticed that species tend to produce many offspring, yet the relative population of the species stays constant. Food sources are also limited but tend to remain constant. Due to the scarcity of resources, it follows that individuals must struggle to survive. He also noticed that in sexual reproduction, no two individuals are alike. However, traits are inherited from one generation to the next. Based on these observations, Darwin concluded that the organisms with the “best” characteristics are most likely to survive the battle for resources, and that these “good” traits will be passed on to their offspring. These traits will become dominant, whereas weak or bad traits will eventually be weeded out. This progression eventually changes the composition of the population, causing the development of new, and more efficient species. Using the fossil record as evidence, Darwin proposed that all modern-day species descended from one original species at the beginning of time. This theory is widely accepted by scientists, even in the modern daytwenty-first century.

Before the publication of Origin of the Species, the most widely accepted scientific theory besides Creationism was Transmutation, which suggested that an individual’s traits became more pronounced the more they were used, and less-used traits became less pronounced. However, there was little evidence to back up how and why these supposed mutations occurred. Nevertheless, many scientists and clergy members still refused to accept Darwin’s more developed theories until Gregor Mendel’s research on the existence of genes came to light in the 20^th centurywith the publication of his paper, “Experiments in Plant Hybridization” in 1865, which called the study a “solution of a question the importance of which cannot be overestimated in connection with the history of the evolution of organic forms.”[11]. According to Mendel, certain traits in plants and animals are inherited, and thus are passed on from one generation to the next by way of genes. Mendel’s work was based on the theory of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, who claimed that the amount an organism used a certain structure or organ caused it to grow or shrink. Although this proved to be false, Mendel showed that indeed some traits are heritable, just as Lamarck theorized. Mendel proved this theory by cross-breeding pea plants, and observing which traits were passed on to offspring in what combinations. Based on this research, Mendel proposed several laws of heredity. First, genes do not combine, but pass to the offspring intact from the parents. Second, each parent passes half of its genes to its offspring, with certain traits dominant over others. Third, different offspring from the same parents can receive different genes. Imagine that this basis for modern genetics came from experiments with peas by an Augustinian monk! This proof of genetics cleared up the mystery of how individuals were able to pass traits on to their offspring, and lent credibility to Darwin’s claims. Unfortunately, Darwin was unable to attend the meeting at Oxford with his friends and supporters due to severe illness, so he relied on Huxley and Hooker to defend him in absentia.

Darwin’s theories were controversial for several reasons that remain hotly debated in the modern day. First of all, the theory of evolution challenged the Creationism theory of the origin of life on earth, and therefore directly challenged the authority of the church. According to the book of Genesis in the Old Testament of the Bible, God created the earth in six days and rested on the seventh. Darwin’s claim that the existence of man is a product of millions of years of evolution from one original creature or species is difficult for believers of Christianity to accept for believers of Christianity. If they accept that the Bible is wrong in its account of creation, what else might the good book be wrong about? Also, Darwin’s work implies that man is not the pinnacle of creation or some sort of super-being as was popularly believed, but instead was simply another species of animal, just like the beasts. Plus, humans and apes once had a common ancestor from which both lines descended. In fact, we now know that humans and chimpanzees share 98% of their DNA in common. Many Victorian thinkers did not want to admit that they were related to a creature in the zoo, and therefore fought Darwin’s findings tooth and nail, if you will excuse the expression.

*Bishop Samuel Wilberforce* [12]

Samuel Wilberforce[13] was born in 1805 in London. During his years at Oriel College, Oxford, he and his friends were known for their exemplary conduct. He graduated in 1826 with a degree in mathematics and secondarily classics. He was made Bishop of Oxford in 1845.[14] Although his High Church Party became unpopular after the papal bull of 1850 established a Roman hierarchy in England, his reputation as a gentleman, his charisma, and his skills at oratory kept him in the limelight, and earned him the nickname “Soapy Sam” for his ability to slide out of tight arguments.

Wilberforce supported the construction of the Oxford Museum of Natural History as a center for the study of the wonders of God’s creation.[15] This gained him the reputation as a supporter of scientific research, although his actual knowledge of the subject, as a math major, was extremely limited. Any His limited scientific preparation he had at all for the meeting at Oxford was thankstaught to him to by Richard Owen, a naturalist and Superintendent of the natural history collection at the British Museum, who rejected Darwin’s ideas. Like many Victorian thinkers, Owen felt that humans were superior to all other animal species, and in fact argued that a separate subclass of mammals should exist for homo sapiens, meaning that humans are no more related to apes than any other mammal. Owen at one point had acted as mentor to a younger Darwin, and Darwin’s fame and recognition for the publication of “Origin of the Species” did not sit well with him. Friends said that Wilberforce came to Oxford ready to “smash Darwin.” Unfortunately for Owen and Wilberforce, Huxley and his followers were able to prove that the three parts of the brain which Owen claimed were unique to humans actually also appear in slightly revised forms in apes. Shortly after the debate with Thomas Huxley at Oxford, Wilberforce published an article in the Quarterly making most of the same points against Darwinism that he had made in the debate. To many, this was proof of his limited scope of knowledge on the subject of biological science.

In attacking Darwinism, the Bishop’s main claim was, of course, that evolutionism contradicted the dogma of the church:

“Man's derived supremacy over the earth; man's power of absolute speech; man's gift of reason; man's free will and responsibility; man's fall and man's redemption; the incarnation of the Eternal Son; the indwelling of the Eternal Spirit, - all are equally and utterly irreconcilable with the degrading notion of the brute origin of him who was created in the image of God, and redeemed by the Eternal Son.”[16]

*The British Association for the Advancement of Science*

The British Association for the Advancement of Science was founded in 1831 and modeled after a similar group that existed in[SAM2] Germany. In the 1830s, scientific discoveries remained hidden in the private sector, with no governmental funding or educational process. Thus, the BAAS became well known as the main public forum for discussion of new developments. The association met yearly at a different major city each time, and eventually the meetings were divided between subjects such as physics, geology, natural science, etc. However, the meetings increasingly became venues for an elite society of scientists in London to advertise the safety, respectability, and orthodoxy of science as a whole to doubting religious and political leaders. The BAAS still exists in 2005 as the BA,[17], and is a nationwide, open membership organization, “dedicated to connecting science with people, so that science and its applications become accessible to all. The BA aims to promote openness about science in society and to engage and inspire people directly with science and technology and their implications.”[18] Instead of yearly meetings, the association holds annual Festivals of Science.

And now, let’s go back to June 30, 1860, and I will describe the debate as I witnessed it. The event began originally as an ordinary meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. However, the meeting had to be moved to a bigger Lecture Room[19] to accommodate the seven hundred700 people who showed up to hear Bishop Wilberforce speak. First, a New Yorker named Dr. Draper read a paper called Intellectual Development of Europe considered with reference to the views of Mr. Darwin. The paper lasted for over an hour. I got bored after ten10 minutes, so I spent the time looking around at my fellow audience members from my vantage point in the ceiling rafters, where my time machine, by the way, is still stuck. I recognized Huxley and Wilberforce sitting on the platform with several other men unfamiliar to me, although one appeared to be Huxley’s colleague Sir J. Hooker. Judging by which groups cheered for which speakers, I can make some educated guesses as to the composition of the audience. The women by the windows stood out immediately as they waved their white handkerchiefs in support of the Bishop. There was a mass of clergymen in the middle of the room who also shouted for the Bishop, and behind them a smaller cluster of undergraduates who supported the Darwinians, despite their small number.

When the paper was finally over, the President of the Association called for responses, but cautioned people to only give valid arguments instead of vague appeals. Several men stood up to give theological arguments, but were booed back to their seats. The President then clarified that the discussion should rest only on scientific evidence. Finally, the crowd grew excited as Bishop Wilberforce rose to speak. For half an hour I hung from my time machine and listened to this man who was lauded for his skill at public oratory. Truly, he spoke lightly and fluently, and his smiles to the audience persuaded them to take his side. Yet once I got used to his smooth speech, I realized that his argument seemed to rely very little on scientific fact. As one of his opponents phrased it, “He ridiculed Darwin badly and Huxley savagely; but all in such dulcet tones, so persuasive a manner, and in such well turned periods, that I who had been inclined to blame the President for allowing a discussion that could serve no scientific purpose now forgave him from the bottom of my heart.”[20] I have since discovered that Wilberforce was a spokesperson for the scientists who opposed Darwin, but was not in fact a scientist himself. His main inspiration was probably Sir Richard Owen, a biologist with whom Huxley had an ongoing evolutionary debate. In keeping with this competitive spirit, Wilberforce turned to Huxley at the end of his speech and asked, “Is it through your grandfather or your grandmother that you claim your descent from a monkey[21]?”[22] [23]

At this point, Huxley, until now thoughtful and taciturn, animatedly whispered something under his breath to the man seated next to him. I was too far away to hear, but the phrase passed back through the crowd was “The Lord hath delivered him into my hands.”[24] Then he stood and spoke. Where Wilberforce had been genial and winning to the audience, Huxley was stern and grave. He received a cheer from a few of his close friends, but the audience clearly favored Wilberforce. Then Huxley spoke:

“I asserted--and I repeat--that a man has no reason to be ashamed of having an ape for his grandfather. If there were an ancestor whom I should feel shame in recalling it would rather be a man--a man of restless and versatile intellect--who, not content with an equivocal success in his own sphere of activity, plunges into scientific questions with which he has no real acquaintance, only to obscure them by an aimless rhetoric, and distract the attention of his hearers from the real point at issue by eloquent digressions and skilled appeals to religious prejudice.”[25]
 
 This retort by Huxley[26] created quite a stir. The audience jumped from their seats and cheered as much as they had for the Bishop before. I heard a scream as one of the women fainted, apparently from the shock of the implied insult, and had to be carried from the room. I have to admit, I found the whole thing rather tame, and was hoping for some low-blow insults and maybe a slapping fight. I was unfortunately disappointed in this wish. Nevertheless, Huxley was able to point out, without directly saying it, the bad taste and manners of the Bishop’s remark. At this point, Huxley’s friend Sir Hooker stood up and further denounced the Bishop’s speech in terms of its lack of scientific knowledge and lack of grasp on the principles of Darwin’s Origin. The Bishop offered no reply, and the meeting dispersed, with the Bishop’s supporters looking chastened. I waited in my vehicle until the room emptied.
 This debate was historically important, not because it turned the tide in favor of Darwinism, but because it put the theory on the map of academia. Huxley was able to carry an unfavorable audience based solely on the force of his arguments. Debates over the question of evolution continued for the next two years after the Oxford meeting, culminating in the Cambridge meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1862.
 Well, Professor Bump, I hope you’re happy. You wanted me to learn something about the Victorian era firsthand, and it looks like I did. Unfortunately, I may still fail your class; unless I can get myself untangled from these rafters, you will never be able to read this journal entry and know what adventures have befallen me. If I ever do get down from here, maybe I will write a book about my experiences. I could call it The Descent of…Woman. (Insert rim shot here.) Then again, I do have 150 years to find my way home before you even miss me. If I look a little bit older and more careworn when you see me in class next Thursday, I hope you will understand the reason.

Word Count: 2878

With Quotes: 3282

Website: https://webspace.utexas.edu/sja03/Lit%20Project/p1b.htm

Word Count: 2523

With Quotes: 2901

Website: https://webspace.utexas.edu/sja03/Lit%20Project/p1a%20final.htm

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[1] Time machine photo courtesy of Terry Allison.

[2] Caricature of Darwin as an ape, in Hornet magazine. Wikipedia Online. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Darwin#The_Origin_of_Species

[3] Plaque outside the Lecture Room where the debate took place. http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/oxford/UnivMuseum/debate2.jpg

[4] Oxford University Natural History Museum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_University_Museum_of_Natural_History

[5] Picture of Thomas Henry Huxley. http://www.ingenious.org.uk/See/?s=S2&target=ctx&DCID=10299457

[6] "Huxley, Thomas Henry," Microsoft® Encarta® Online Encyclopedia 2005 http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761553436/Thomas_Huxley.html.

[7]Letter from Huxley to Darwin reproduced in The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley V.1 by Leonard Huxley. http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext04/llth110.txt 

[8] Picture of Charles Darwin, 1854. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Darwin

[9] Statue of Charles Darwin found in the Oxford University Natural History Museum. http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/oxford/UnivMuseum/Darwin3.JPG

[10] “The Origin of Species” Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Species

[11] Mendel, Gregor. Experiments in Plant Hybridisation. Cambridge, Harvard University Press: 1950.

[12] Painting of Bishop Samuel Wilberforce. http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/oxford/UnivMuseum/Wilberforce.jpg

[13] Photo of Samuel Wilberforce by Lewis Carroll. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Wilberforce

[14] “Samuel Wilberforce” Wikipedia Online. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Wilberforce

[15] “Oxford University Museum of Natural History” Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_University_Museum_of_Natural_History#The_1860_evolution_debate

[16] Quote by Wilberforce, according to John Hedley Brooke in Science & Christian Belief. http://www.cis.org.uk/scb/articles/hedley_brooke.htm

[17] Richard Owen: Dinosaur Man picture from BA website http://www.the-ba.net/the-ba. Owen coined the term dinosaur in 1841 to mean “fearfully great lizard”

[18] From the BA website. http://www.the-ba.net/the-ba

[19] Doors of Lecture Room in Oxford Natural History Museum. http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/oxford/UnivMuseum/debate1.jpg

[20]Huxley, Leonard. The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley, by his son Leonard Huxley. Norton Anthology of English Literature, 3^rd ed., 1962. Reprinted in Bump’s Victorian Literature Course Packet Vol II p. 420E.. London: Macmillan, 1903.

[21] Cartoon published in Punch, May 1861. http://aleph0.clarku.edu/huxley/comm/Punch/Monkey.html

[22]“Oxford University Museum of Natural History.” Wikipedia Online. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_University_Museum_of_Natural_History#The_1860_evolution_debate

[23] Cartoon published in Punch, May 1861. http://aleph0.clarku.edu/huxley/comm/Punch/Monkey.html

22“Oxford University Museum of Natural History.” Wikipedia Online. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_University_Museum_of_Natural_History#The_1860_evolution_debate

[25] Wording as recorded in a letter from undergraduate John Richard Green to his friend Boyd Dawkins. Reprinted in Leonard Huxley’s Life and Letters.

[26] Caricature of Thomas Huxley from Vanity Fair magazine. Wikipedia Online. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_University_Museum_of_Natural_History#The_1860_evolution_debate

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