Saturday 21 December 2013

Alfred Russel Wallace unveiled

I’m still not sure why Alfred Russel Wallace always has his middle name used, like the assassin of a an American president, but his statue has just been unveiled at the Natural History Museum. Wallace was not forgotten and Darwin did not cheat him out of due credit for Natural Selection. Nevertheless, his contributions to biology were numerous and important and his independent realisation of the mechanism Natural Selection should be no less applauded just because he was second. It is therefore great that he now has a statue at the Natural History museum.

You can watch a video of the unveiling below (unless it gets pulled - the source is unclear). It is great (and somewhat refreshing) to hear David Attenborough emphasise the comradery and friendship of Darwin and Wallace, rather than (as others are prone to do) spouting conspiracy theories that diminish both men.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Thanks for leaving a comment! (Unless you're a spammer, in which case please stop - I am only going to delete it. You are just wasting your time and mine.)