TIME OF POWER

His theory of human beings evolving from apes In his second-most famous book, The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex, Darwin proposed that human beings evolved from some type of ape closely related to a chimpanzee. But when you look closely, you see an enormous amount of difference between chimpanzees and man. The idea, so commonly thought, that we share 99 percent of our DNA with chimps has been refuted with the deciphering of the chimpanzee genome….

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His theory of homology In his studies, Darwin noticed that different types of creatures shared some common features, such as the five fingers of a human hand and the five digits of a bat’s wing or of a dolphin’s fin. He postulated that this similarity in different species, which he called "homology," was evidence for a common ancestry. Yet this argument is based on an analogy that’s quite weak since the fossil record shows no gradual evolution of these limbs…

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His discounting of the Cambrian explosion Darwin was aware of what is called the "Cambrian explosion"—fossils of a bewildering variety of complex life-forms appearing suddenly, without predecessors, in the same low level of the fossil record. This obviously did not fit his evolutionary model of simple-to-complex life. Instead of a few related organisms appearing early in the fossil record as he hoped, there was an explosion of life—where the various main body types (called phyla) of living creatures seem to…

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His failure to see the limits of variation of species Darwin got the idea about natural selection in part from observing artificial selection. For instance, he noted the way pigeon breeders came up with a great variety of pigeons. Yet we should remember, they are still all classified as pigeons! He thought that from this variety, given enough time, pigeons could eventually evolve into some other type of birds, such as eagles or vultures, and gradually, even to other creatures…

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His expectation of intermediate fossils During his life, Charles Darwin was puzzled over the fossil record. For it to back his theory, the evidence should show a fine gradation between the different animal species and have millions of intermediate links. He stated it this way: "The number of intermediate and transitional links, between all living and extinct species, must have been inconceivably great. But assuredly, if this theory [of evolution] be true, such have lived upon the earth" (The Origin…

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His ideas about the information inside the cell Back in Darwin’s day, scientists didn’t know what type or quantity of information was embedded within the cell. Darwin assumed it would be very elementary—only a few instructions to tell the cell how to function. Because he believed in the simplicity of the information of the cell, he came up with a theory called "pangenesis," where huge variations simply popped out of cells at random—something that was later proven to be entirely…

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The supposed simplicity of the cell Consider for a moment the simple, humble bacteria. What Charles Darwin saw under a crude microscope looked quite primitive—a rounded glob of matter called "protoplasm"—and he thought it consisted of a few elementary components that could be easily assembled. Yet today we know bacteria contain complex molecular machines, each bacterium being more like a sophisticated automobile factory with multiple robotic devices and a complex control center. As molecular biologist Jonathan Wells and mathematician William…

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The "warm little pond" theory Charles Darwin once wrote to his good friend Joseph Hooker about the possibility of life arising spontaneously from "some warm little pond." During his day, some scientists still believed in "spontaneous generation," the idea that life can arise from nonlife—which was Darwin’s hope. Later, the famous French scientist Louis Pasteur decisively refuted the idea, and 150 years of observation and experimentation have confirmed these results. It turns out life is supremely more complex than Darwin…

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