David Schwinghammer's Blog - Posts Tagged "evolution"
Clarence Darrow
Without a doubt the greatest influence on Clarence Darrow's career as "Attorney for the Damned" was his father, Amiris, a furniture store owner in Kinsman, Illinois. He was the town radical who had a hard time making ends meet, but somehow always found money for books, which he passed on to his precocious son.
Darrow began his career in Chicago working for the city and spent six years dispensing legal advice for the railroads, as Abraham Lincoln had done before him. He quit when his mentor, William C. Gowdy died, but said he had felt guilty working for a giant corporation long before that.
Darrow's career as a radical lawyer began when he represented coal miners who were bargaining for an eight hour day. Author Farrell gives us a gruesome picture of children under ten years old working sorting coal. The coal owners purposefully paid their men and boys less than a living wage and the garment industry took full advantage of it in that families needed to send the mother and daughters out to work also. Textile mills popped up around the coal mines. Eventually Darrow would move up the ladder of radical causes, representing Wild Bill Haywood who was charged in the murder of Governor Steunenberg, who had been a union foil, and he would later represent the McNamara brothers charged with bombing the LOS ANGELES TIMES.
John A. Farrell reveals Darrow's warts as well as his talents. He divorced his first wife and was a lifelong advocate of free love, although he married a second time. He carried on a long affair with reporter Mary Field Parton, even after she was married, and he tried to seduce her sister every time he saw her. The famous poet, Edgar Lee Masters, who was Darrow's law partner, viewed Darrow as somewhat of a phony, claiming Darrow chiseled him out of some fees.
Darrow was also tried twice for trying to bribe the McNamara jury. Farrell shows how Pinkertons were hired to infiltrate Darrow's defense team, so Darrow may have felt he was justified in using extra legal tactics, that is if he was guilty. Some of his friends thought he was.
Darrow also represented some questionable clients, namely Chicago gangsters and the rich such as the Leopolds and the Loebs, which astonished his fellow radicals. Darrow's excuse was always that he was a lawyer and that's what lawyers did.
Sometimes Darrow couldn't get his clients off so he tried to get the sentence reduced. This happened with Leopold and Loeb; Darrow argued that the state of Illinois had never put to death a murderer under the age of 18. He also defended Patrick Prendergast, the murderer of Chicago mayor Carter Harrison, employing an insanity plea.
Farrell doesn't do justice to Darrow's most famous case, The Scopes Monkey Trial held in Dayton, Tennessee. We do learn that the case was a show trial conceived by drugstore lawyers in Dayton, as a sort of booster ploy for the town. Darrow and William Jennings Bryan brushed the other lawyers aside. When the noted agnostic and the evangelical politician became the focus of the trial, matters got serious. Unfortunately the judge disallowed expert witnesses and the case for evolution never got a fair hearing.
Darrow often spent days making a closing statement. He must've been really good because it seems he usually did it to a packed house. He may be the greatest lawyer in American history.
Darrow began his career in Chicago working for the city and spent six years dispensing legal advice for the railroads, as Abraham Lincoln had done before him. He quit when his mentor, William C. Gowdy died, but said he had felt guilty working for a giant corporation long before that.
Darrow's career as a radical lawyer began when he represented coal miners who were bargaining for an eight hour day. Author Farrell gives us a gruesome picture of children under ten years old working sorting coal. The coal owners purposefully paid their men and boys less than a living wage and the garment industry took full advantage of it in that families needed to send the mother and daughters out to work also. Textile mills popped up around the coal mines. Eventually Darrow would move up the ladder of radical causes, representing Wild Bill Haywood who was charged in the murder of Governor Steunenberg, who had been a union foil, and he would later represent the McNamara brothers charged with bombing the LOS ANGELES TIMES.
John A. Farrell reveals Darrow's warts as well as his talents. He divorced his first wife and was a lifelong advocate of free love, although he married a second time. He carried on a long affair with reporter Mary Field Parton, even after she was married, and he tried to seduce her sister every time he saw her. The famous poet, Edgar Lee Masters, who was Darrow's law partner, viewed Darrow as somewhat of a phony, claiming Darrow chiseled him out of some fees.
Darrow was also tried twice for trying to bribe the McNamara jury. Farrell shows how Pinkertons were hired to infiltrate Darrow's defense team, so Darrow may have felt he was justified in using extra legal tactics, that is if he was guilty. Some of his friends thought he was.
Darrow also represented some questionable clients, namely Chicago gangsters and the rich such as the Leopolds and the Loebs, which astonished his fellow radicals. Darrow's excuse was always that he was a lawyer and that's what lawyers did.
Sometimes Darrow couldn't get his clients off so he tried to get the sentence reduced. This happened with Leopold and Loeb; Darrow argued that the state of Illinois had never put to death a murderer under the age of 18. He also defended Patrick Prendergast, the murderer of Chicago mayor Carter Harrison, employing an insanity plea.
Farrell doesn't do justice to Darrow's most famous case, The Scopes Monkey Trial held in Dayton, Tennessee. We do learn that the case was a show trial conceived by drugstore lawyers in Dayton, as a sort of booster ploy for the town. Darrow and William Jennings Bryan brushed the other lawyers aside. When the noted agnostic and the evangelical politician became the focus of the trial, matters got serious. Unfortunately the judge disallowed expert witnesses and the case for evolution never got a fair hearing.
Darrow often spent days making a closing statement. He must've been really good because it seems he usually did it to a packed house. He may be the greatest lawyer in American history.
BEFORE THE DAWN
Using DNA markers, scientists have traced our origin to a hundred and fifty hunter gatherers.
Is Evolution a theory or a fact? After reading Nicholas Wade’s BEFORE THE DAWN, there seems to be little doubt that it is a fact.
Scientists can now trace, using the DNA of a louse, when people first began wearing clothes. They can trace our ancestors to 5,000 people who lived in Northern Africa 45,000 years ago. Using mitochondrial DNA, scientists have identified three main branches of humankind bearing the mutation markers L1, L2, and L3. L3's progeny, bearing the markers M or N, crossed the Red Sea, probably at the south end, followed the coastline and eventually settled in India. From there they spread out, some venturing toward the west, others east, usually in bands of 150 or so hunters and gatherers.
Scientists can also trace back remnants of the original language men spoke to two African tribes, Hadza and !Kung speakers, two of the most ancient populations in the world. Nicholas Wade argues that the development of language was an impetus to the ancestral population’s leaving Africa.
If they were to survive, these wanderers needed to treat strangers as kin. Religion was a helpful institution in that respect. They also retained certain traits from their primate past; protecting their territory and war. Then they learned to cultivate wheat, probably accidentally. This led to storage and to settlement and domestication of animals. With settlement our ancestors gave up their egalitarian lifestyles. Headmen and kings, priests, administrators were needed for ceremonies and to manage affairs. Specialization of roles followed.
Probably the most interesting aspect of BEFORE THE DAWN is the solid evidence Wade offers that evolution is a fact. Ironically blood diseases, such as sickle cell anemia, protect against diseases like malaria. Another recent mutation, as recent as 1300 years ago, protects against smallpox. Then there’s the ability to drink cow’s milk. We only became lactose tolerant 6,000 years ago. More solid evidence arises when we consider the Ashkenazi Jews, who have an I.Q. averaging at least a standard deviation higher than the rest of us. Some scientists argue that this resulted from the Ashkenazi being barred from all trades except monetary ones, which required complex thinking processes. Others maintain that because they were constantly being persecuted they had to be smarter to survive; natural selection took care of the rest.
Wade argues that evolution is an ongoing process. He predicts that in the future people will look different than they do today. They may be stockier and more compact due to the next ice ago. We may establish colonies on Mars and Europia and because of genetic drift these people would look different, much as the Chinese developed different skin color and eye folds due to isolation. Wade also foresees genetic engineering which may add another chromosome which would prevent old age and known diseases.
Wade also provides evidence that evolution can result from not only a physical environment but also a cultural environment. In that way, man is, to some degree, responsible for his own evolution. Charles Darwin said in THE DESCENT OF MAN, "Man may be excused for feeling some pride at having risen, though not through his own exertions, to the very summit of the organic scale; and the fact of his having thus risen, instead of having been aboriginally placed there, may give him hope for a still higher destiny in the distant future."
Is Evolution a theory or a fact? After reading Nicholas Wade’s BEFORE THE DAWN, there seems to be little doubt that it is a fact.
Scientists can now trace, using the DNA of a louse, when people first began wearing clothes. They can trace our ancestors to 5,000 people who lived in Northern Africa 45,000 years ago. Using mitochondrial DNA, scientists have identified three main branches of humankind bearing the mutation markers L1, L2, and L3. L3's progeny, bearing the markers M or N, crossed the Red Sea, probably at the south end, followed the coastline and eventually settled in India. From there they spread out, some venturing toward the west, others east, usually in bands of 150 or so hunters and gatherers.
Scientists can also trace back remnants of the original language men spoke to two African tribes, Hadza and !Kung speakers, two of the most ancient populations in the world. Nicholas Wade argues that the development of language was an impetus to the ancestral population’s leaving Africa.
If they were to survive, these wanderers needed to treat strangers as kin. Religion was a helpful institution in that respect. They also retained certain traits from their primate past; protecting their territory and war. Then they learned to cultivate wheat, probably accidentally. This led to storage and to settlement and domestication of animals. With settlement our ancestors gave up their egalitarian lifestyles. Headmen and kings, priests, administrators were needed for ceremonies and to manage affairs. Specialization of roles followed.
Probably the most interesting aspect of BEFORE THE DAWN is the solid evidence Wade offers that evolution is a fact. Ironically blood diseases, such as sickle cell anemia, protect against diseases like malaria. Another recent mutation, as recent as 1300 years ago, protects against smallpox. Then there’s the ability to drink cow’s milk. We only became lactose tolerant 6,000 years ago. More solid evidence arises when we consider the Ashkenazi Jews, who have an I.Q. averaging at least a standard deviation higher than the rest of us. Some scientists argue that this resulted from the Ashkenazi being barred from all trades except monetary ones, which required complex thinking processes. Others maintain that because they were constantly being persecuted they had to be smarter to survive; natural selection took care of the rest.
Wade argues that evolution is an ongoing process. He predicts that in the future people will look different than they do today. They may be stockier and more compact due to the next ice ago. We may establish colonies on Mars and Europia and because of genetic drift these people would look different, much as the Chinese developed different skin color and eye folds due to isolation. Wade also foresees genetic engineering which may add another chromosome which would prevent old age and known diseases.
Wade also provides evidence that evolution can result from not only a physical environment but also a cultural environment. In that way, man is, to some degree, responsible for his own evolution. Charles Darwin said in THE DESCENT OF MAN, "Man may be excused for feeling some pride at having risen, though not through his own exertions, to the very summit of the organic scale; and the fact of his having thus risen, instead of having been aboriginally placed there, may give him hope for a still higher destiny in the distant future."
