Darwin's Proposed Bear-to-Whale Transition Set Off Bull Detectors in 1859

In the first edition of the Origin of Species, Darwin speculated that something like a whale might have evolved from a bear, whose mouth expanded in order to catch insects, followed presumably by other adaptations to render a fully aquatic mammal. This bear-to-whale transition set off bull detectors among Darwin's readers, who roundly mocked for it, leading the author to delete the speculation from future editions.

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