@Chlidonias Read David Quammen's "Reluctant Mr Darwin" and "Song of the Dodo" and Robert Wright's "The Moral Animal" and then the writings of the great man himself and then tell me that I am "making things up".
In spite of Darwin's undeniable scientific genius he was very much a man of his time and deeply socially conservative / prudish to the point of being excessively and some might say pathologically so.
Hence why I saw an obvious irony in the statue in the picture.
That doesn't diminish him in my opinion and as a conservation biologist I am a great admirer of Darwin but it is just historic fact that these were aspects of his character traits.
Yes, I have read those, probably all a long time before you did. Of course Darwin was "socially conservative" - he was an upper class Victorian - but that does not actually equate to "prude", and certainly not "pathologically so". I'm kind of curious how you think someone who was "pathologically prudish" - whatever that means - could openly write about matters of sex and about sexual organs.
@Chlidonias Have you ? I am inclined to think you haven't because if you had you would understand why I am saying Darwin (like many Victorian men) was prudish and had some quite deep seated psychological issues too surrounding these and other issues that could be classed as pathological (again another common issue in Victorian society).
It wasn't just a psycho-social issue limited to the upper classes as you can see the same in the writings of Robert Spruce, Henry Walter Bates and to a lesser extent with Alfred Russell Wallace who were lower middle class / working class.
If you had read in particular the "Moral Animal" by Robert Wright who did an extensive combing over of all of Darwin's personal letters / correspondences and archives at Downe House where the great man lived then you wouldn't even be questioning this.
That is the irony / paradox of the Victorians / the late 19th century Natural Historians, they could write and contemplate somewhat openly the sexual organs and habits of orchids, earthworms, molluscs and even mammals but could not and would not recognize their own animality.
They were trapped by the religiously inspired social conventions, norms and prejudices of their day yet were reluctantly also "killing god" and illuminating the true human condition by scientific enquiry.
@Chlidonias Well I might ask you the same, are you suggesting that I am lying or "making things up" about what is historical fact about Darwin and that I have read in reading those well known books ?
