- Nov 2023
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zoonomiaproject.org zoonomiaproject.orgZoonomia1
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danallosso.substack.com danallosso.substack.com
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Chapter 39 of Zoonomia, “On Generation,” presents Erasmus’ ideas on competition, extinction, and how “different fibrils or molecules are detached from…the parent…to form” the child. The Temple of Nature goes even farther, declaring “all vegetables and animals now existing were originally derived from the smallest microscopic ones, formed by spontaneous vitality” in ancient oceans.
Interesting to contemplate the evolution of the idea of evolution through the Darwin family.
Charles would obviously have read his grandfather's book, but it also bears noting that he also had access to his grandfather's commonplace book (and likely his other papers).
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Darwin's Grandfather<br /> by [[Dan Allosso]]
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Erasmus Darwin’s popularity in America was so great that over a hundred children in Massachusetts between 1800 and 1850 were apparently named after him. I was so surprised to discover a half dozen of them in the remote hill-town of Ashfield where I had gone to find Dr. Charles Knowlton that I did a whole project trying to track them down.
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- Jun 2022
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www.revolutionaryplayers.org.uk www.revolutionaryplayers.org.uk
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https://www.revolutionaryplayers.org.uk/the-scope-and-nature-of-darwins-commonplace-book/
Erasmus Darwin's commonplace book
It is one of the version(s?) published by John Bell based on John Locke's method and is a quarto volume bound in vellum with about 300 sheets of fine paper.
Blank pages 1 to 160 were numbered and filled by Darwin in his own hand with 136 entries. The book was started in 1776 and continued until 1787. Presumably Darwin had a previous commonplace book, but it has not been found and this version doesn't have any experiments prior to 1776, though there are indications that some material has been transferred from another source.
The book contains material on medical records, scientific matters, mechanical and industrial improvements, and inventions.
The provenance of Erasmus Darwin's seems to have it pass through is widow Elizabeth who added some family history to it. It passed through to her son and other descendants who added entries primarily of family related topics. Leonard Darwin (1850-1943), the last surviving son of Charles Darwin gave it to Down House, Kent from whence it was loaned to Erasmus Darwin House in 1999.
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- May 2022
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www.historyofinformation.com www.historyofinformation.com
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Toward the end of the 18th century English publisher John Bell published notebooks entitled Bell’s Common-Place Book, Formed generally upon the Principles Recommended and Practised by Mr Locke.” These included eight pages of instructions on Locke’s indexing method, a system which not only made it easier to find passages, but also served the higher purpose of “facilitat[ing] reflexive thought.”
At the end of the 18th century, John Bell (1745–1831), an English publisher published notebooks with the title Bell’s Common-Place Book, Formed generally upon the Principles Recommended and Practised by Mr Locke. The notebooks commonly included 550 pages, of which eight pages included instructions on John Locke's indexing method.
Link to: - Didn't Erasmus Darwin use one of these?!
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- Aug 2021
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www.erasmusdarwin.org www.erasmusdarwin.org
- Dec 2019
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frankensteinvariorum.github.io frankensteinvariorum.github.io
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I had heard of some discoveries having been made by an English philosopher
It is unclear who this English philosopher might have been, though it might be a reference to Erasmus Darwin, who Percy Shelley cites in the novel's introduction.
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Dr. Darwin
Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802), the evolutionist and poet who lived in Birmingham, England, is clearly on Percy Shelley's mind when he introduces Mary's text in the 1818 edition. Critics of the novel have not often followed this lead in thinking about it as an early work in the British evolutionary imagination. Erasmus Darwin had made "not of impossible occurrence" that one presently visible species could mutate into another. Victor contemplates this possibility—as an alarming one—when he speculates in Volume 3, Chapter 3, that the Creature's demand that he create a "mate" could result in a new evolutionary development, "a race of devils."
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