Running head: CHARLES DARWIN, AN HONEST

MAN 1

Charles Darwin, an Honest Man

Diego Santos

Brigham Young University - Idaho

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Charles Darwin, an Honest Man

I read an article entitled, Charles Darwin: A Gentle Revolutionary. This article shows off

the path Charles Darwin took in order to publish his famous theory in the book On the Origin of

Species.

It is interesting how long it took to Charles to publish his ideas because he took a long

journey to assure he had completely behaved scientifically. Of course, it the way I put things. In

fact, Charles took a long observation journey while traveling through the South America coast,

taking all sort of evidence, and then spend the next twenty years analyzing those evidence,

testing his ideas about what could explain the variety of species he had saw and collected.

One interesting fact about Charles’s attitude towards his work is that he was always

relying on testing his ideas through all the evidence he had. It means that he had to patiently

adapt the conclusions he was drawing as the fact, through the evidence, showed him another

thing. This attitude shows how committed to behaving scientifically he was. He did not part from

a closed idea and put all the effort to find evidence that could corroborate with that idea.

After his theory was mature enough to be published, he found out that the process of

validation of his theory would take a long path. Even longer than the twenty years, he took to

formulate it. The scientific community was in somewhat appalled by his discovery, and they

were not intended to buy it easily. Although the work as a whole had a positive impact, the

fundamental principle of Natural Selection took longer to be accepted by the scientific

community. It proves that his work was under scrutiny for long. Actually, it was not until the

twentieth century under geneticists’ work in using Natural Selection in the heredity’s theory that

Natural Selection became a true landmark of science.

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All these aspects show me that Charles Darwin behaved scientifically. Although, I am

not aware of what his findings mean in light of the knowledge that I have of the Plan of

Salvation. I prefer to quote a letter issued by the First Presidency in 1931,

“Upon the fundamental doctrines of the Church, we are all agreed. Our mission is to bear

the message of the restored gospel to the people of the world. Leave Geology, Biology,

Archaeology and Anthropology, no one of which has to do with the salvation of the souls of

mankind, to scientific research, while we magnify our calling in the realm of the Church.”

I truly believe that one day Heavenly Father will reveal to us the means by which the

Earth and men were created. For now, we know why Earth and men were created, not how.
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References

Willians, B., Clough, M. P., Stanley, M., Colbert, J. T. (n.d). Charles Darwin: A Gentle

Revolutionary, pp 1-6. The Story Behind the Science. Retrieved 8 August 2018 from

www.storybehindthescience.org