Darwin's sketch appears on page 36 of his "Notebook B" - the first 35 pages are taken up by considerations on the "evolutionary thoughts" of his famous grandfather Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802).
By the second revolution in evolutionary thought — the so-called Modern Synthesis of the nineteen-thirties and forties, when Darwin's theory of evolution was fused with Mendel's theory of genetics — development was left out in the cold.
Instead he sketches out a way of seeing humankind and its planet, signposted by figures from the history of evolutionary thought.
The in-text quotes span over 150 years and lend a historical perspective to the development of evolutionary thought and the iterative, unending process of science itself.
However, the guides are proud of the islands' association with the history of evolutionary thought, and enjoy talking about evolution while giving tours.
Evolution is everywhere in Galápagos, especially regarding the role the islands have played in the history of evolutionary thought.
Witnessing debates among scientists at the frontiers of evolutionary thought may leave the impression that evolution is a theory in crisis, yet that is not the case.
The synthesis also resulted in a considerable narrowing of the range of mainstream evolutionary thought (what Stephen Jay Gould called the "hardening of the synthesis"): by the 1950s, natural selection acting on genetic variation was virtually the only acceptable mechanism of evolutionary change (panselectionism), and macroevolution was simply considered the result of extensive microevolution.
The timing of the dispersal of humans in the world is derived from the application of evolutionary thought at several levels.
Like the salt doll, who in a proverbial Indian tale, dives into an ocean to determine its depth, only to dissolve away quickly, genetics was effectively absorbed into mainstream evolutionary thought by the 1930s via the modern synthesis.
