Jeffries Wyman - Views On Evolution and Correspondence With Darwin

Views On Evolution and Correspondence With Darwin

Wyman was a theist who attended the Unitarian Church at Harvard and as such leaned toward a belief in a "theistic, morphological form of evolution rather than natural selection." Two historians of science who chronicles Wyman's career, A. Hunter Dupree and Toby Appel, disagreed as to Wyman's reception of Darwin's theories of evolution and natural selection. Dupree believed that Wyman's religious beliefs caused him to struggle with Darwin's theories, accepting them "only by intense effort both as a scientist and a person." Appel disagreed with Dupree, believing that Wyman had no difficulty accepting Darwin's theory of evolution but that his work in philosophical anatomy made it "doubtful that he ever accepted natural selection." In her article, Appel makes a case for Wyman as a proponent of philosophical anatomy at Harvard, along with Louis Agassiz and Asa Gray. Philosophical anatomy, also known as transcendental anatomy, was the "search for ideal patterns of structure in nature." This search did not prevent Wyman and Gray in accepting evolution, although Agassiz never did. However, unlike Gray, Wyman could not accept natural selection as the method of evolution, believing instead in evolution as "directed by the Creator."

When On the Origin of Species was published in 1859, Wyman's one-time mentor, Richard Owen came out against the book, while his colleague Asa Gray supported it. In 1860, Darwin went to Gray to enlist Wyman's support due to Wyman's work on higher apes and anatomy. Wyman wrote to Darwin agreeing that "progressive development is a far more probable theory than progressive creations", and the two men corresponded between 1860 and 1866, with Darwin writing at one point "I know hardly anyone whose opinions I should be more inclined to defer to."