The Pioneers and Vestiges of Evolution

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0:32Data brokers are making billions, pulling details about you from public records and the internet, and then packaging and selling it, usually without your consent. That's how your information lands in the hands of scammers, spammers, even stalkers. It's why you get endless robocalls, and why ads seem to follow you everywhere. That's where Aura comes in. Aura actively removes your data from broker sites and keeps it off. They also instantly alert you if your information shows up in a breach or on the dark web. But Aura goes beyond data protection. With one app, you get a VPN, antivirus, password manager, spam call protection, dark web monitoring, and even up to $5 million in identity theft insurance.

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Vestiges Book

1:28The book was not anything special to look at. Small, with a red cover. 390 pages. A gold stamp announced the title, Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation. But inside, it was packed with dynamite. Vestiges was published in 1844, an ambitious blend of every ology imaginable. Biology, anthropology, geology, even theology. It covered everything from the origin of the solar system to the future of humankind.

2:01Most dangerously of all, it proposed that human beings evolved from apes, long before Charles Darwin ever did. And we know that Darwin read it, along with Queen Victoria, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Florence Nightingale, George Eliot, and more. It was the most controversial book of its day, and probably the most influential book you've never heard of. So who wrote it? That was the best part. The author was anonymous. This led to countless hours of gossip in salons and parlors over who could have put together such a dangerous and bizarre book.

2:38And moreover, who would have dared?

Robert Chambers

2:47This is The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Keen, a topsy-turvy, sciency history podcast where footnotes become the real story.

2:59One Sunday around 1832, a preacher in Edinburgh, Scotland, ascended the pulpit and began waving a magazine around. Its title was Chambers Edinburgh Journal. The preacher denounced it as atheistic and evil and told his followers never to read it. Everyone applauded, except for a bearded, red-faced man in the front pew. That was Robert Chambers himself.

3:29He grabbed his wife, stomped out, and never returned. The 30-year-old Chambers ran the journal with his brother William, although the two did not like each other. William was cold and calculated, Robert more hot-headed. But Chambers' journal was quite popular, with a circulation of 90,000. It mixed essays, short stories, and poems, though no politics or religion, nothing controversial. Robert was the driving force behind that success, since he wrote much of each issue.

4:01As a spinoff project, the journal published books, most of which Robert also wrote. In fact, by the early 1840s, he had written 30 books, a furious pace. To add to his stress, disease claimed two of his daughters within half a year. One was less than three months old. One was three weeks old. Not surprisingly, Chambers had a nervous breakdown afterward. To clear his mind, he began golfing, taking long walks, thinking about his future.

4:33Chambers was actually born with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot. As a result, he always thought of himself as different, marked for something special. So after his breakdown, he rented a country villa and began composing the ambitious books that he had long been contemplating, Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation. Before this point, no one had ever studied creation scientifically. How did Earth appear? How did the continents form? How did species arise? These topics were considered the province of religion, not science.

5:07But Vestiges argued that natural laws underlay creation, not miracles and gods. Chambers proposed that stars and planets coalesced long ago from a so-called fire mist of small particles. Meanwhile, new species evolved from existing ones, and humankind from apes. Daring stuff. Chambers also labored to polish the book's probes. For literary inspiration, he looked to Sir Walter Scott. In his books, Scott built lavish medieval worlds, lush with detail.

5:39Chambers expended the same care in evoking the lost world of trilobites and pterodactyls. Chambers also employed vivid analogies. To describe the vast orbit of Uranus, he noted, If the swiftest racehorse ever known had begun to traverse this path at full speed at the time of the birth of Moses, he would only as yet have accomplished half his journey. That really drives the point home. Vestiges did have its odd moments. In different passages, Chambers muses about dogs playing dominoes and how to hatch mammals from bird eggs.

6:14Strangest of all to modern ears, Chambers believed in the old idea of a great chain of being among animals. According to the great chain of being, insects were the lowest animals. But over time, insects had evolved into fish. Fish had given rise to amphibians, who in turn generated reptiles and then birds. Birds finally produced mammals and then humankind. And Chambers insisted that humankind would evolve someday as well, into angels. Chambers decided early on to keep his authorship anonymous.

6:47If the book flopped, that could harm his literary reputation. More importantly, he knew the book would anger religious folks. Although Chambers praised God repeatedly in its pages, careful readers would see that God played little role in Chambers' vision. This was creation without a deity. Science was the true creator for Chambers. And it wasn't just preachers that Chambers feared. People in this era sometimes went to prison for blasphemy. Chambers had 11 children, and writing the book could destroy his family.

7:19Only a handful of people knew Chambers was the author. One was his wife, Anne, who rewrote the original manuscript to prevent anyone from recognizing Chambers' handwriting. Another confidant was Alexander Ireland, a trusted friend who approached a publisher in London and handled negotiations. In their correspondence, Chambers and Ireland used code words. Through Ireland, Chambers delivered the book to his publisher in August 1844.

7:54Back then, publishers handled printing, sales, and promotion, but authors assumed the financial risk. Chambers ordered a printing of 1,000 copies, then got scared and backed off to 750. That still cost him £137, around $18,000 today. The book hit stores in October. Chambers should have ordered more copies. The first print run sold out in a month. He rushed 1,000 more copies into print in December. That run sold out in two weeks.

8:25The 1,500 printed in February sold out in a day. 2,000 more finally arrived in April. The book was even more popular in the United States, where it went through 20 editions. One of its biggest fans was a young lawyer in Illinois who read it straight through in one city, something that he rarely did with books. But Abe Lincoln loved vestiges that much. As one historian noted, the book was just dangerous enough to be attractive. It described a familiar clockwork universe, but with literary flair,

8:57and had just enough sex to titillate folks, and just enough atheism to seem naughty. There are stories of people sneaking copies to bed at night, so not even family members would observe them reading it. Alfred Russell Wallace, who later co-discovered the theory of natural selection, credited the book with inspiring him to pursue a career in biology. Meanwhile, the other discoverer of natural selection, Charles Darwin, had another reaction to vestiges. Panic. Had he been scooped about evolution?

9:28In 1844, only a handful of colleagues knew that Darwin believed in evolution. In fact, that very summer, he had sketched a summary of his theory, around 230 pages. Now, here was another book on evolution, and a more ambitious book, since it covered the evolution of solar systems, planets, and humans, too. Darwin read the book a month after publication, plopping down in the infamously dirty and flea-infested British Museum Library. His reaction was mixed. On the one hand, Darwin walked away reassured.

10:00Vestiges covered biological evolution, yes, but only in general terms. Chambers had not proposed a mechanism or driver for evolution, like natural selection. So Darwin had not been scooped on his primary idea. At the same time, Darwin was horrified. He wanted to discuss evolution scientifically, without religious or moral overtones. But vestiges had plunged right into the fray, with maximum controversy. Would that ruin the reception for his own work? He feared so.

10:31There was rampant speculation about who the anonymous author was. People suggested prime ministers, dukes, earls. One person suggested Prince Albert himself, who often sponsored scientific projects, and who read the whole book aloud to Queen Victoria. Suspicion also fell on computer pioneer Charles Babbage, programming pioneer Ada Lovelace, geologist Charles Lyle, and, of course, Charles Darwin. At least 60 suspects were bandied about in private letters.

11:02Robert Chambers was one of them. People detected Scottish phrasing in certain passages. Scientists also noticed a few mistakes in vestiges. Mistakes that Chambers had also made in magazine pieces. Among others, Darwin pegged Chambers right away. Most of Chambers' friends had no clue. Amusingly, one even recommended that he read the book. It seemed like just his thing. But a few friends were suspicious, and asked him directly if he was the author. Chambers never lied on such occasions, but he was cagey.

11:33He would say something like, come on, you know how busy I am? How could I find time to write such a book? Then he would steer the conversation elsewhere. His wife Anne once overheard someone in a bookshop declare that a hack like Chambers could never have written something as sublime as vestiges. Robert and Anne shared a good laugh over that. Still, enough people suspected Chambers that it affected his personal life. In November 1848, Chambers decided to run for Lord Provost of Edinburgh, a post similar to mayor. But suspicions over vestiges dogged his candidacy, and he withdrew in embarrassment.

12:07Discover the ultimate escape at Center Med Spa, Chattanooga's exclusive day spa retreat. At Center Med Spa, our focus is to enhance your self-care journey. Indulge in our array of services, from pedicures and manicures, to relaxing massages, facials, injectables, and cutting-edge skin rejuvenation treatments. Visit our website or call us today to book your personalized experience. Center Med Spa, where beauty and wellness begins with you. Most people don't realize how much their personal information is being bought and sold every day.

12:41Data brokers are making billions, pulling details about you from public records and the internet, and then packaging and selling it, usually without your consent. That's how your information lands in the hands of scammers, spammers, even stalkers. It's why you get endless robocalls, and why ads seem to follow you everywhere. That's where Aura comes in. Aura actively removes your data from broker sites and keeps it off. They also instantly alert you if your information shows up in a breach or on the dark web. But Aura goes beyond data protection. With one app, you get a VPN, antivirus, password manager, spam call protection, dark web monitoring,

13:15and even up to $5 million in identity theft insurance, all backed by 24-7 U.S.-based fraud support. Other companies might sell just credit monitoring or just a VPN. Aura gives you all of it, together, at the same price competitors charge for just one service. Start your free trial today at Aura.com slash remove. Protect yourself now at Aura.com slash remove.

Book Reception

13:38However fun it was to speculate in private about the author of an anonymous book, British High Society considered it rude and invasive to do so in public. But many people broke that rule for vestiges. Why? Because vestiges seemed to promote atheism. For the sake of public morals, people wanted to expose the author and shame him. Before vestiges appeared, atheism was waning in England, with few adherents. The book revitalized it as an intellectual movement. Vestiges offered an appealing, even entertaining view of materialism.

14:11It presented a grand view of life while sidelining God. So preachers trained their guns on the book. They attacked it for denying miracles and the existence of a soul, for reducing the Bible to mere folk tales. The newly founded YMCA also sponsored lectures railing against vestiges. At least one person interpreted its popularity as a sign from the book of Revelation that the world was coming to an end. Reviews of vestiges were generally harsh. One complained that it reduced life to wriggling impurities and the putrefactive mucus.

14:46Another blasted the ingenious sophistry of this anonymous pseudo-philosopher. And the book got called every name under the sun. Odious, disgusting, revolting, irrational, poisonous, even a filthy abortion. All this criticism proved that Chambers had been wise to remain anonymous. But inadvertently, it also gave the book tons of free advertising. People love a scandal. Chambers' publisher even agreed to print 5,000 cheap, mass-market paperbacks for middle-class and working-class people.

15:18These paperbacks cost just one-third the regular price. Such books were booming in popularity due to the rise of railroad travel when people wanted something lightweight to pass the time on journeys. Vestiges was perfect for this. It was one of the first science books aimed at a broad audience, and it introduced the masses to scientific thinking. Still, despite the good it did for science education, Vestiges ultimately failed in its most ambitious aim, convincing actual scientists of its truth, partly because Chambers made some mistakes.

15:49Sometimes these were mere boo-boos. For instance, because of our planet's rotation, the Earth actually has a belly bulge. It's wider at the equator than it is at the poles. Isaac Newton, in the 1600s, had calculated the ratio of the poles to the equator as 229 to 230. Chambers had used those figures in vestiges. But more careful work in the 1800s had proved that the true ratio was not 229 to 230, but 299 to 300.

16:20Not a fatal flaw, but it showed that Chambers was using outdated sources. There were several such mistakes in vestiges, and the accumulation of them made Chambers look amateurish and undermined his credibility. Other mistakes were more lethal, since they undermined key arguments. Recall that Chambers advocated for a hierarchy among animals, a great chain of being. Insects had first evolved and given rise to fish. Fish, in turn, gave rise to amphibians, then reptiles, birds, and mammals. A similar hierarchy existed for plants.

16:52According to this theory, so-called simpler animals like insects should appear first in the fossil record. Supposedly more complex animals should appear later. And the available evidence in the early 1800s supported that idea. Unfortunately, by the 1840s, more digging had unearthed contrary evidence. Fish and complex plants were appearing down where only insects and simple foliage should have been. Whoops. Birds also appeared far earlier than they supposedly should have in the fossil record. Discoveries in astronomy proved equally bad for Chambers.

17:25In discussing the Milky Way, Vestiges had said those smears of white were remnants of the so-called fire mist from which stars and planets were born. In reality, better telescopes resolved that supposed mist into pinpoints of distinct stars. Chambers' hypothetical fire mist did not exist. For his part, Charles Darwin was not impressed with Vestiges. In a letter to a friend, Darwin admitted that it was lively and well-written. But he grumbled that its geology strikes me as bad, and its zoology far worse.

17:59The book reinforced Darwin's belief that he would need to nail down every last fact before publishing his book on evolution. But he refrained from saying anything in public until his own book on evolution appeared in 1859, On the Origin of Species. And Darwin was not kind. He mentioned Vestiges by name, then immediately undercut it, all but declaring that the text was useless as science. By implication, he was saying that it did not influence his own thinking at all. Darwin knew that people would compare Vestiges and Origin, and he wanted to choke off such criticism.

18:33But in claiming the book did not influence him, Darwin showed a surprising lack of insight. As historians have noted, Vestiges paved the way for Origin. It got people talking about evolution, even made the idea seem commonplace. Darwin took plenty of heat for his book, but he would have taken a lot more if Vestiges had not already been scorched. When Robert Chambers died in 1871, Vestiges was still anonymous. But again, Darwin had already guessed the author.

19:04And in writing a condolence letter to Chambers' family, Darwin admitted feeling guilty for dismissing Vestiges out of hand, even if he thought Chambers' science was wrong. Darwin felt especially guilty because he had actually met Chambers after Origin came out, and Chambers had seen what he'd written. And despite Darwin's criticism, Chambers was a perfect gentleman that day. In 1884, two years after Darwin died, a quarter century after Origin, and 40 years after the first edition of Vestiges, the 12th edition of Vestiges appeared.

19:36This one was special. Three words had been added to the cover. It now read, Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation, by Robert Chambers. His family had decided to let the world know. This must have been an agonizing decision. But over the previous two decades, Darwin had become the target for most anti-evolution vitriol, so there was less risk. Indeed, the bigger risk was that Chambers would be forgotten, despite his pioneering role in promoting evolution. But let's not allow that to happen.

20:08Vestiges was a big deal, one of the most important science texts ever written. In the words of one of the book's rare positive reviews, the author of the Vestiges may be wrong in his conjectures and facts, but that does not disentitle him to the thanks of those who think that to stimulate inquiry is to ensure progress. And that he has done more than any other writer of our day. This is the Disappearing Spoon Podcast.

20:40If you like the show, please subscribe, leave a five-star review, or tell friends and family. Reviews, subscriptions, and word of mouth really do help. Also, please support the show at patreon.com slash disappearing spoon. It costs as little as seven cents per day for ad-free shows. You can also get bonus episodes and signed books. You can find more incredible stories in my books. Check out samkeen.com. You can also inquire about booking me as a speaker at your school or event.

21:11This episode was written, edited, and produced by me, Sam Keen. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time.

21:47See the transformation for yourself. Visit us now at centermedspa.com. Most people don't realize how much their personal information is being bought and sold every day. Data brokers are making billions, pulling details about you from public records and the internet, and then packaging and selling it, usually without your consent. That's how your information lands in the hands of scammers, spammers, even stalkers. It's why you get endless robocalls, and why ads seem to follow you everywhere. That's where Aura comes in. Aura actively removes your data from broker sites and keeps it off.

22:19They also instantly alert you if your information shows up in a breach or on the dark web. But Aura goes beyond data protection. With one app, you get a VPN, antivirus, password manager, spam call protection, dark web monitoring, and even up to $5 million in identity theft insurance, all backed by 24-7 U.S.-based fraud support. Other companies might sell just credit monitoring or just a VPN. Aura gives you all of it, together, at the same price competitors charge for just one service. Start your free trial today at aura.com slash remove.

22:50Protect yourself now at aura.com slash remove.