A Brief History of Creation
Page 36
and geology, 94
and Paley, 105
Vestiges reviewed by, 89–90, 107
self-replication, 166, 245, 248–49, 250
Seneca the Younger, 31
Shakespeare, William, 13–14, 30, 119
Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, 76–77, 78–79
Frankenstein, xi, 76n, 77, 79
Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 29, 76–77, 78
silkworms, disease of, 137
Simplicius, 8
Singer, George, 86
single-celled organisms, xvii, 38, 40, 42, 229
16S RNA genes, 230
Smith, Adam, 67
Smithsonian National Museum, 211–12
solar system:
exploration of, 183–84, 254
formation of, 147, 220
life elsewhere in, 221
Sorbonne, scientific soirées at, 117–19, 126, 128, 253, 254
soul, 82, 104
Soviet Union:
and Cold War, 180–82, 181, 271n
genetics in, 166–70, 269n
Moscow conference, 180–82
October Revolution, 156–57, 183
Sputnik launched by, 181, 183
space:
concept of, 220
origin of life in, 184–85, 187, 193, 219–21
space exploration, 183–84, 254; see also NASA
Spallanzani, Lazzaro, 69–70, 71, 258
Spanish Civil War, 152–53
species, gradations within, 60
Spiegelman, Sol, 230, 247–48
“Spiegelman’s monsters,” 248, 250
Spinoza, Baruch, 28, 29, 31
spiritualism, 115
spirituality, 28
spontaneous generation, xvii
Aristotle on, 10–11, 13, 18, 20, 133, 134, 141, 144
assumptions disproved, 164, 257
Bastian on, 133–35, 137, 138, 139, 141, 143–44, 148
Buffon and Needham’s studies of, 56–60, 57, 71–72
and Cohn’s spores, 144
of “eels,” 50–51, 56, 69
and élan vital, 81, 82
and electricity, 75, 76, 79
experimentation to disprove theory of, 22–23, 22, 44, 143–44, 148, 153, 175, 217, 273n
experimentation to prove theory of, 75, 134–35, 137
first creatures emerging via, 115–16, 119, 123, 141
Lamarck on, 104, 120
life created in laboratory, 76
of microbes, 40, 112
Pasteur on, 118–19, 120, 126, 128–29, 129, 134, 148, 217, 253, 257, 268n
Priestly on, 102–3
recipes based on, 21
transmutation, 77–78, 88, 113, 114
Stalin, Joseph, 167–68
Stokes, Pringle, 93, 100
Strick, James, Sparks of Life, 268n
stromatolites, 224, 225
sun:
age of, 158
ultraviolet radiation from, 165, 175, 223
sundial, invention of, 6
superbugs, 236
superstition, 67, 255
and Voltaire, 49, 61, 65, 66, 71
Swammerdam, Jan, 23
Swift, Jonathan, 38, 61
synthetic life-forms, 246–50
Synthia (first artificial organism), 247
Szostak, Jack, 244–50
telescope, 31
Teller, Edward, 173–74, 271n
Tertullian, 12
Tetrahymena thermophila, 243–45, 243
Thales (philosopher), 5, 12, 81, 82
cosmology of, 6–7
Theophrastus (Tyrtamus), 8, 9
thermodynamics, laws of, 158
Thirty Years’ War, 27
Thomas, Lewis, The Medusa and the Snail, 186
Thomas, Shirley, 270n
Timiryazev, Kliment, 155–56
transformationism, 103
transmutation:
and C. Darwin, 97, 102, 103, 106, 110
and E. Darwin, 77–78, 102, 103
and evolution theory, 78, 88, 97, 102–3, 106, 110, 113
Lamarckian, 88, 97, 110, 116, 134, 168
and spontaneous generation, 77–78, 86, 113, 114
tree, records of growth, 20
tree of life:
Aristotle, 10
Chambers, 233
Darwin, 228–29, 233
phylogenetic, 228, 233
Woese, 227, 229, 231–33, 233, 236–38
Trembley, Abraham:
Memoires pour servir à l’histoire d’un genre de polypes d’eau douce, 55
polyps (hydras), 54–56, 55, 60
trigonometry, discovery of, 5
Truman, Harry S., 271n
Turing, Alan, 206
Tyndall, John, 138–39, 142–44
tyndallization, 144
ultraviolet radiation, 165, 175, 223
University of Chicago, 172, 173–74, 178, 184, 195
University of Queensland, 221–22
Urey, Harold, 173, 251
Miller-Urey experiment, 175–80, 182, 184, 185, 194, 195, 197, 198, 199, 245
and NASA exobiology program, 191, 218
and Orgueil meteorite, 218
US Geological Survey (USGS), 162–63
Ussher, James, Annals of the Old Testament, 146, 147, 158
Uwins, Philippa, 222
Vavilov, Nikolai, 152, 168
Venter, Craig, 246–47, 253
recipe for a cell, 260
Vermeer, Jan, 29
The Girl with the Pearl Earring, 28
Victoria, queen of England, 88
Viking missions, 185, 213, 220
Virgil, 19
viruses, 166, 202, 218–19, 226, 274n
Vishniac, Wolf, 184–85
vitalism, 81–83, 84, 124, 128–29, 253, 254
vitamin A, 197
Volta, Alessandro, 81
Voltaire, 28, 60–66, 82, 146
and Buffon, 60–61, 66
death of, 71
Dialogues d’Évhémère, 70–71
Dictionnaire philosophique, 45–48, 65
and du Châtelet, 61–63, 71
Elements of Newton’s Philosophy, 63
essay on miracles, 48–49
and Maupertuis, 63–65, 66
and Needham, 48–49, 60, 64, 65, 66, 69–71, 263n
and religion, 65–66, 67, 105
Wächtershäuser, Günter, 237–38
Walcott, Charles Doolittle, 161–63, 162, 213
Wald, George, 257
Wallace, Alfred Russel, 108–9, 114, 115, 132, 135, 161
Warren, Earl, 173
water:
as essence of all matter, 6–7
essential for life, 213
Watson, James:
and DNA structure, 200–204, 205, 226
and genetics, 241
sexism of, 203–4n
The Double Helix, 200, 203
Wedgwood, Josiah, 93, 101
Weeks, William, 88
wheat, Needham’s experiments on, 50–51, 58
Wickramasinghe, Chandra, 218, 219, 220
wife beating, as crime, 29
Wilberforce, Bishop Samuel, 131
Wilkins, Maurice, 203, 204
William of Orange, 50
William the Silent, 50
Wimmer, Eckard, 246, 247
witchcraft, 28
Woese, Carl, 225–27, 229–38, 247
and archaea, 231–32
and genetic code, 226–27, 239, 241
and LUCA, 225
and RNA, 232
tree of life, 227, 229, 231–33, 233, 236–38
Woesian revolution, 231–33
Wöhler, Friedrich, 82–83n
Wollstonecraft, Mary [Shelley], 76–77, 78–79
World War I, 141–42
Wren, Christopher, 35, 36
X Club, 129–30, 132, 138, 139
X-rays, discovery of, 201
yeast cells, 125–26
Yellowstone National Park, 237
&n
bsp; Zare, Richard, 214
Zoological Society of London, 100
Zuckerkandl, Emile, 229
zymotic theory, 137, 138
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