摘要 : Among the legendary episodes in the history of science is the long period of time that elapsed between the dawning in Darwin抯 mind of the idea of evolution by natural selection and the publication of that idea in On the Origin of... 展开 Among the legendary episodes in the history of science is the long period of time that elapsed between the dawning in Darwin抯 mind of the idea of evolution by natural selection and the publication of that idea in On the Origin of Species. The point of the story, in most accounts, is the somewhat hasty composition of his book in the effort to establish priority over Alfred Russel Wallace. The often overlooked corollary, however, is the benefit Darwin derived from the delay. Although he had to commit words to paper in a hurry, by the time he did so his ideas had fully matured, and they were presented with an accumulation of evidence, a force of logic and an elegance of style that were by-products of the leisurely period of incubation. 收起