Ruse Michael
Department of Philosophy, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306, USA.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2009 Jun 16;106 Suppl 1(Suppl 1):10040-7. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0901011106. Epub 2009 Jun 15.
The Darwinian revolution is generally taken to be one of the key events in the history of Western science. In recent years, however, the very notion of a scientific revolution has come under attack, and in the specific case of Charles Darwin and his Origin of Species there are serious questions about the nature of the change (if there was such) and the specifically Darwinian input. This article considers these issues by addressing these questions: Was there a Darwinian revolution? That is, was there a revolution at all? Was there a Darwinian revolution? That is, what was the specific contribution of Charles Darwin? Was there a Darwinian revolution? That is, what was the conceptual nature of what occurred on and around the publication of the Origin? I argue that there was a major change, both scientifically and in a broader metaphysical sense; that Charles Darwin was the major player in the change, although one must qualify the nature and the extent of the change, looking particularly at things in a broader historical context than just as an immediate event; and that the revolution was complex and we need the insights of rather different philosophies of scientific change to capture the whole phenomenon. In some respects, indeed, the process of analysis is still ongoing and unresolved.
达尔文革命通常被视为西方科学史上的关键事件之一。然而，近年来，科学革命这一概念本身受到了攻击，就查尔斯·达尔文及其《物种起源》的具体情况而言，关于变化的本质（如果存在变化的话）以及达尔文的具体贡献存在严重问题。本文通过回答以下问题来探讨这些问题：存在一场达尔文革命吗？也就是说，到底存在一场革命吗？存在一场达尔文革命吗？也就是说，查尔斯·达尔文的具体贡献是什么？存在一场达尔文革命吗？也就是说，在《物种起源》出版前后所发生之事的概念本质是什么？我认为，在科学以及更广泛的形而上学意义上都发生了重大变化；查尔斯·达尔文是这场变化的主要推动者，不过必须对变化的本质和程度加以限定，尤其要从比仅仅将其视为一个直接事件更广阔的历史背景来审视；这场革命是复杂的，我们需要不同的科学变革哲学的见解来把握整个现象。的确，在某些方面，分析过程仍在进行且尚无定论。
