Happy birthday Charles Darwin

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On this day 215 years ago the father of the development of the theory of evolution by natural selection, Charles Darwin, was born in England. He is one of history's most famous scientists--specifically for evolutionary biology. He initially enrolled in medical school as his father wanted him to become a physician but he was more interested in natural history, biology, and geology. The fact that he couldn't handle the sight of blood also helped to push him away from medicine and into those other fields. In 1831 he embarked on a 5 year scientific expedition around the world on a ship called the HMS Beagle. He was employed as a naturalist and collected/drew many specimens of what he saw as he traveled around the world. The place that had the biggest influence on his thinking about the variety in the world was the Galapagos Islands in the Pacific Ocean. Upon returning to England he spent like 25 years considering what he had seen and how life could change over time. He was in correspondence with another scientist who was also considering evolution. Darwin was not in a hurry to publish his theory because he knew it would make him a pariah with the church and community in a time where the church had a huge influence on all aspects of daily life. It wasn't until the other scientist, Alfred Wallace, wrote him with basically the same ideas that Darwin had worked out that he finally published. He wanted credit for his work. He published his book, On The Origin of Species, and it was a best-seller. I always tell my students that it was like the Fifty Shades of Grey series of novels. Everyone read them because they wanted to know what everyone else was talking about but no one wanted to actually admit that they read them. To this day biology has not found an alternative to Darwin's mechanism of evolution by natural selection. FUNFACT #1: Detractors love to say "oh evolution is just a theory--it isn't proven." Wrong. In science when something is termed a theory it means that it is a hypothesis with A LOT of evidence to back it up and that it hasn't been disproven. FUNFACT #2: During his 5 year tour Darwin contracted a tropical parasite, T. cruzi, which caused him to be a very ill man for the rest of his life.