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Sandra Herbert's "Charles Darwin, Geologist"

“It is good to have Darwin’s achievements as a geologist accorded their proper place in his history, and Sandra Herbert has been almost geological in her cracking of the strata of his early years. I doubt whether this exhumation of Darwin’s formative years will ever be bettered.”—Times Literary Supplement

“In this illuminating portrait, Herbert outlines Darwin’s contributions to the field of geology, from his collection and documentation of various geological specimens to his participation in the Geological Society of London. She examines Darwin’s written observations about land features around the world and explores how geology influenced his ideas on species and evolution. Herbert, a professor of history, provides an unusual perspective on the intellectual development of this great thinker.”—Science News

“Herbert rightly emphasizes that the geology to which the young Darwin contributed was already a well-established science. . . . Interspersed with Herbert’s valuable analyses of Darwin’s geological fieldwork and theorizing are chapters on other topics. . . . Herbert describes in fascinating detail the practical aspects of Darwin’s geology: his hammer and other instruments, his methods for collecting specimens and making notes, and so on. . . . Perhaps of greatest interest to other Darwin scholars and to biologists, she analyzes with care the ways in which his geology generated the problems to which his eventual theory of the origin of new species was designed to be the solution. . . . This is a highly important contribution, not just to Darwin studies but also to the sadly neglected field of the history of geology itself.”—Nature

“Herbert makes a strong case for reading deeper into the ways Darwin understood changes in time and changes in space. Rocks rise and sink; species appear and go extinct. What happens on one part of the globe is connected to another. Gradually, over long periods, small changes can accumulate into great effects. Continents will emerge, as do new animals and plants. For Herbert, what geology gave to Darwin was a gradualist’s sense of time and a global perspective. For historians, what Herbert has presented is a broader view of the science of Charles Darwin.”—American Scientist

The main conclusion of the book is that geology, through Darwin, contributed an immense amount to the establishment of evolutionary theory, but that geology was itself profoundly affected by it from then on.  Nowadays most geologists study evolutionary theory as part of palaeontology and palaeobiology, and they will be proud to learn that Darwin was really one of them.  I regard Herbert's book as a fitting tribute to a great human being and creator of a brave new world, who was himself a triumphant product of at least 3 billion years of the majestic and unpredictable process of evolution."— Times Higher Education Supplement