[Taxacom] Darwin and species

[John Grehan]

As the species question is of endless interest to some on this list I offer
a couple of excerpts on the subject from 'Biogeography of Australasia':

"Darwin (1859) accepted that species were natural groups but also argued
that there is 'no fundamental difference between varieties and species' (p.
278), or between species and genera (p. 485). The evolutionary explanation
freed one 'from the vain search for the undiscovered and undiscoverable
essence of the term species' (p. 485). In particular, Darwin analysed the
idea, supported in Buffon's creationist work, that reproductive isolation
is the essence of the species (Mallet, 2010b). Darwin devoted a whole
chapter ('Hybridism') to dissecting this definition, later termed the
'biological species concept', and he concluded by rejecting it."



"In contrast with the Modern Synthesis approach, Mallet (2010a) suggested
that Darwin did know what he was talking about, and Mallet questioned why
Dobzhansky and Mayr 'felt impelled to develop a new, anti-Darwinian
definition' of species...Mayr 'paradoxically' seems to have promoted a
reproductive isolation essence similar to the one Darwin had tried to
banish...".



"Mayr often emphasized that his oown ideas on the origin of biodiversity
(including founder ffect speciation; Mayr, 1954) were based on Wagner's
Migrationstheorie (e.g. Wagner, 1873)...In contrast with Mayr, Darwin
regarded Wagner's work as 'increasingly fanatical and scientifically
na?ve', and described it in his notes as 'most wretched rubbish (Sulloway,
1979).