Show Me The Evidence!

In a "Dog" we should trust: all others must bring data: https://t.co/Ts5EQd4J1m pic.twitter.com/hR05OYmNeI

— Supermythbuster (@supermyths) April 6, 2016

Joseph Hooker and Charles Lyell Lied to the Linnean Society: Jim Dempster's Private Correspondence with Ian Hardie

Jim Dempster

The letter below is from Jim Dempster. He writes to Ian Hardie in December 1994. Ian was, at the time, this letter was typed, the solicitor of the Patrick Matthew Trust. The "Trust" was set up by the descendants of Matthew.

In this letter, Dempster writes to inform Hardie of the difficulties of conducting sound research outside of a university environment, and of his discovery that Hooker and Lyell lied to the Linnean Society that Wallace had given his consent to have his paper read alongside Darwin's.

Dempster and Matthew scholars (perhaps even curious Darwinists) will be interested that one of the illustrious John Hunter's descendants was, apparently, interested in Dempster's work on the topic of that great original thinker. Curiouser and curiouser!

Note, in 2005, Dempster was compelled to vanity published his third important book on the history of the discovery of natural selection "The Illustrious Hunter and the Darwins".

Over a decade before this letter was written, in 1983, Dempster published Patrick Matthew and Natural Selection. But soon after the publisher went bankrupt. The Patrick Matthew Trust helped the widely published scientist Dempster to promote and fund in part his second hugely important book on the history of discovery of natural selection (compelled to be vanity published with the Pentland Press): Dempster, W.J. (1996) Natural Selection and Patrick Matthew. Edinburgh. The Pentland Press. (for more details and full references see my blog article on Dempster: here). See also a November 1993 press article on the topic here and another here.

This letter is the first evidence that I can recall seeing where Dempster writes about that  sly lie, which Hooker and Lyell used to deceive the Linnean Society. I nail it myself in Nullius  (Sutton 2014) - but I thought I arrived at it independently of Dempster. Perhaps not - perhaps my brain was "knowledge contaminated" from one of Dempster's three books on the topic of Matthew and discovery of natural selection? I am most interested to find out. Indeed the evidence for subconscious/forgotten  'Dempsterian knowledge contamination' of my brain - one way or the other - will be fascinating in light of my most recent peer reviewed article on the very topic of the phenomenon of the notion of 'knowledge contamination' (Sutton 2016).  Now I must go back with great curiosity and read all three of Dempster's superb books on Matthew with a fine toothcomb for the fourth time! When I find my answer I shall write about it.

Most importantly, in this letter, Dempster informs Hardie that his research reveals that both Darwin and Wallace lifted much from the articles on organic evolution that were written by Edward Blyth. Had only Dempster - and other Darwin and Matthew scholars before him done what all good scientists should do and - "followed the data" from the botanist and polymath John Loudon's 1832 review of Matthew's (1831) book, where he wrote that Matthew apparently had something original to say on "the origin of species", my science hero, Dempster, would have discovered what I was first to discover in 2014 (Sutton 2014).  Namely, that Loudon went on to be Editor of the journal that published two of those important and influential Blyth articles! Potential Matthewian 'knowledge contamination' via Loudon -> Byth -> Darwin & Wallace is thus uniquely now proven!

I see that, as Dempster informed Hardie, Longman and Co of London, and Black of Edinburgh - the original publishing houses of Matthew's (1831) On Naval Timber - were not interested in publishing a book about Matthew, written by a scientist of Dempster's calibre and proven abilities. I wonder why not? Had either "House" published Dempster's work they would have added to their catalogue the brilliantly objective scalpel-like scholarship of one who removed the cognitive cataracts from his own "eyes" to see the facts beyond the Victorian smog of Darwin's deceptions. Consider, for example, what he shows us here in his private red-inked assessment of the lies about Matthew's book that Darwin slyly wove into the Origin of Species from 1861 (3rd edition) onwards. The context and precise significance of the red-ink notes Dempster wrote on his copy of Darwin's "Historical Sketch" is examined, in-depth, here   ):

His textbook on surgery that Dempster mentions to Ian Hardie

Mike Sutton at the James Hutton Institute March 2016

Read the paper presented: Here

Treasure Your Exceptions: So Let's Face the Facts: Charles Darwin was an Exceptional Liar and a Hypocrite of the Highest Order

In their excellent book: 'Treasure Your Exceptions':  Professor Donald Forsdyke and Professor Alan Cock (Cock and Forsdyke 2008, p. 644) note that in 1874 Darwin wrote in The Descent of Man:

' "False facts are highly injurious to the progress of science, for they often endure long: but false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, for everyone takes salutary pleasure in proving their falseness." This view may itself be false. While false facts may not always be "rapidly corrected" as Keilin supposed, it is false views that show the great propensity to "endure long." Everyone may not take pleasure in proving false a view that has abstract elements and/or is politically correct (e.g. the doctrine of natural slection). Often it is the scientist, not the historian, who is best placed to remedy this. '

Of course, false views are often built on a premise comprising false facts. And when that happens an entire paradigm can be constructed. For example, Darwin (1861), in the Origin, wrote false facts (indeed proven deliberate lies, because he had been prior-informed - with hard evidence - that the opposite was true) regarding the prior-readership of the original ideas on natural selection in Matthew's (1831) book On Naval Timber and Arboriculture. From the subsequent mindless Darwinist parroting of Darwin's lies by many - including  the world's leading Royal Society Darwin Medal winning Darwinists Sir Gavin de Beer (FRS) and Ernst Mayr (FRS) (see Sutton 2016) - Darwin scholars constructed a tri-independent discovery paradigm of dual immaculate conception, by Darwin and Wallace (1858) of the prior-published original ideas of Matthew (1831).

The original discovery of disconfirming facts for this paradigm (Sutton 2014) - that as opposed to none at all - seven naturalists actually cited Matthew's (1831) book and the ideas in it pre-1858, that four of those seven were well known to Darwin, and three played major roles influencing and facilitating the pre-1858 work of Darwin and Wallace on organic evolution, punctures the myth-based old paradigm and replaces it with a new one of highly probable "Matthewian knowledge contamination" of the pre-1858 brains of Darwin and Wallace, of the brains of their influencers and of the brains of their influencer's influencers.

In 2016 - after over 155 years of credulous parroting of Darwin's lies, as though they are truths, of failing to follow the data, and of obvious and of significant fact denial in the field of the history of discovery of natural selection and its influence, it is time for Darwin scholars to face the independently verifiable facts.

The Scotsman Cover's Sutton's Hutton Institute Lecture

Darwin may have stolen evolution theory from Perthshire farmer

Reference Stenson, J. (2016) March 17. Darwin may have stolen evolution theory from Perthshire farmer. The Scotsman http://www.scotsman.com/heritage/people-places/darwin-may-have-stolen-evolution-theory-from-perthshire-farmer-1-4074755

Read The Story Here

Please refer to the comments section in The Scotsman where I fill  in the crucial knowledge gaps in the coverage of this story by The Scotsman. 

 I wrote in the comments section on 2 April 2016:

I was only today made aware of the coverage of this story by the Scotsman.

My presentation at the Hutton Institute was followed by a most stimulating debate. Essentially, what has been newly discovered is that - as opposed to the old Darwin-myth story that none read it - the new technology of the internet has worked rather in the same way a metal detector can find things like the Staffordshire Hoard - that could never have been found with a toothbrush - seven naturalists actually cited Matthew's book and the ideas in it before Darwin replicated those ideas and then excused that poor scholarship conduct by claiming none had read them before he did so. Moreover, four of those naturalists were very well known to Darwin, and three played major roles influencing the work of Darwin and Wallace before they replicated those same ideas.

In fact, Darwin is newly proven to have lied about the readership of Matthew's book because he wrote that no naturalists had read it after Matthew informed him in writing that the opposite was true.

Matthew complained bitterly (in his letters to the press) to his dying day about the treatment he received by Darwin's Darwinists in denying him full credit over Darwin.

Matthew to Darwin and Wallace probable "knowledge contamination" is what is newly proven by the New Data. As yet, there is no hard evidence that Darwin or Wallace actually read Matthew's book before 1860. But lies both told in this story mean it would be irrational to continue to assume good faith regarding anything they wrote about Matthew. 

Rationally, the newly discovered facts disconfirm the old Darwinist paradigm of Darwin's and Wallace's supposed miraculous immaculate conceptions of Matthew's prior-published hypothesis.

My book 'Nullius in Verba: Darwin's greatest secret' contains fully referenced evidence to all of the above facts and a great deal more besides.

Edinburgh Evening News 1993

Reference: Thorpe, N. (1993) Back to Basics: New evidence reveals Scot's part in evolution theory: Origin of the thesis. The Edinburgh Evening News. November 6th. 1993.

The East Lothian Courier 1993

Alastair Robertson on Patrick Matthew in the Daily Mail in 1996

Reference: Robertson, A. (1996) Obscure farmer is missing link in Darwin's theory of evolution. Daily Mail. April 15th p.25.

Ivor Smullen on Patrick Matthew, Jim Dempster and Ian Hardie

The Image Below is from the Dempster Private Family Archive

Reference:  Smullen, I. (1994). The First Evolutionist. Country Life. October 6. p. 68.

Why do Darwinists Despise Patrick Matthew? Part 1: the Case of W. T. Calman

Among a host of biologists, and other scientists, William Thomas Calman agreed that Matthew was the first into print with the hypothesis of natural selection  see:

• Calman, W. T. (1912) Patrick Matthew (1790-1874) The Journal of Botany. British and Foreign. pp. 193-194.
• Calman, W. T. (1912a) Patrick Matthew of Gourdiehill, Naturalist. British Association, Dundee Meeting, 1912. Handbook. David Winter and Son. Dundee. P.451-457. CLICK HERE TO READ.

Yet we see that in the same year that he gave Matthew some of his due credit in published print, in a private letter dated 1908, the zoologist W. T.  Calman provides ample evidence that he appeared to despise Matthew. Why?

The image of the letter below was kindly supplied by the Dempster Family Private Archive.

The letter was written by Calman.

Jim Dempster (1996) has written that it was addressed to Professor D'Arcy Thompson: 

As you can see Calman - a Scot from Dundee - refers to Matthew as a bore in his letter to his mentor Professor D'arcy. But why would he do so?

For one thing, Calman was working at the heart of the English scientific establishment at the time - in the Natural History Museum, London, where he worked as Assistant Curator of Crustacea and Pycnogonida and Keeper of Zoology.  To be elected to the Royal Society, which he was nine years later, in 1921, Calman had to fit in with the prejudices of the so-called scientific establishment. Consequently, no matter what the facts, Calman would in no small part have felt obliged to be seen to conform to the Darwin (FRS) bias-against Matthew.

 I discuss the context of Calman's words - and how they reflect the rules of the so-called "establishment" in my book Nullius in Verba (Sutton 2014) :

Specifically writing about the treatment of Chambers’ Vestiges, Secord so superbly explains why heresy was given the silent treatment in the first half of the nineteenth century that I am obliged to quote some of his excellent scholarship at length:

‘Science in these circles was embedded in codes of gentility, which meant that claims to legislate over nature were unlikely to succeed. As long as the gentlemen of science expressed their views in the appropriate manner, which often meant sticking to their experience except when speaking in confidence, they could believe what they wished on religious and political issues. By regulating their talk and expressing certainty only for specific “facts” in their specific “departments,” men of science could be both polite and authoritative at the same time – something that was not always easy to do. Beyond that, they were no more than ordinary participants in the conversation that defined polite society. The modest social origins of many men of science meant that silence was the most effective way of exercising authority. They spoke to larger issues where consensus already existed. …Neutrality was necessary if science’s claims to absolute truth were not to conflict with the demands of civility. To say more would have been inappropriate and boring.’

For his massive breach of etiquette, those same gentlemen of science saw Matthew as just such a bore; a fact revealed in Dempster’s indispensable book on Matthew (Dempster 1996. p.5):

‘For the British Association[1] meeting at Dundee in 1912 Calman, a deputy director of the Natural History Museum, was given the duty of presenting some facts about Patrick Matthew. Calman’s contribution is largely a translation from the German essay by May (1911). It is clear from a letter sent, prior to the meeting, to D’Arcy Thompson that Calman had little regard for Matthew who is referred to as ‘an old bore’.

In the first half of the 19^th century especially, men of science were looking to become respected and professionalised, looking to carve out a niche in society for their discipline. As Yeo (1984, p.9) explains:

‘…close relationship between science and general cultural debate, together with the insecure status of the scientific community, made the authority of science a significant issue. Scientists had to establish the domain of natural knowledge as their own, and monitor the boundaries between science and religion.’

For that same reason, the rules of the Royal Society stated that its members should discuss nothing about God or politics. And news that was unconnected to the business of philosophy should be avoided at all costs (Gleick 2010).

Calman - like others in the story of Matthew and Darwin - simply never "followed the data" as a good scientist should!

Clearly, Matthew’s book broke every rule in the Royal Society’s unwritten one! Those 19th century rules would most surely have clung on to men such as Calman in the first two decades of the 20th century. That context provides one  possible explanation for why Matthew was treated the way he was. It explains why no one stood up and pointed out Darwin's obvious lies about the proven pre-Origin readership of Matthew's original ideas. And it explains why no one - not Calman, nor any other before I -  did as all scientists should do, which is to follow the data. 

My original findings (see Sutton 2016) proved that seven naturalists - as opposed to none, as the world's leading Darwinists, Darwin himself, Sir Gavin de Beer ad Ernst Mayr claimed - read and cited Matthews ideas - including the (in actual fact) naturalist polymath John Loudon (who Darwin learned in published print at least by 1860 had reviewed Matthew's book in 1832 - noting its originality on the topic of what he actually referred to then as "the origin of species") to Edward Blyth - whose two highly influential papers on organic evolution were published in a journal of which Loudon was the Editor (see my latest peer reviewed paper: 'On Knowledge Contamination: New Data Challenges Claims of Darwin’s and Wallace’s Independent Conceptions of Matthew’s Prior-Published Hypothesis' for all the hard "New Evidence", on this topic. My paper provides further hard evidence, which was arrived at by simply "following the data": Sutton 2016).  

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[1] The British Association for the Advancement of Science.

Notably 

• D'arcy Wentworth Thompson (FRS) received the Gold Medal of the the Linnean Society in 1938 and was awarded the Royal Society's  Darwin Medal in 1946.
• William Thomas Calman (FRS) was President of the Linnean Society from 1934 to 1937. He was awarded the Linnean Medal in 1946