In "Global Spencerism" the authors analyse the communication and appropriation of Herbert Spencer s ideas around the globe. In the last quarter of the nineteenth century Spencer s distinctive theory of evolution, based on Lamarckianism, was almost as influential as Darwin s.".

The Metaphysical Society was founded in 1869 at the instigation of James Knowles (editor of the Contemporary Review and then of the Nineteenth Century) with a view to 'collect, arrange, and diffuse Knowledge (whether objective or subjective) of mental and moral phenomena' (first resolution of the society in April 1869). The Society was a private dining and debate club that gathered together a latter-day clerisy. Building on the tradition of the Cambridge Apostles, they elected talented members from across the Victorian (...) intellectual spectrum: Bishops, one Cardinal, philosophers, men of science, literary figures, and politicians. The Society included in its 62 members prominent figures such as T. H. Huxley, William Gladstone, Walter Bagehot, Henry Edward Manning, John Ruskin, and Alfred Lord Tennyson. (shrink)

In 1854 the biologist Thomas Henry Huxley pointed to a significant change in the way that reviewers were treating books that endorsed deeply flawed scientific theories. In the past, “when a book had been shown to be a mass of pretentious nonsense,” it “quietly sunk into its proper limbo. But these days appear, unhappily, to have gone by.” Due to the “utter ignorance of the public mind as to the methods of science and the criterion of truth,” scientists were now (...) forced to review such books in order to expose their deficiencies (Huxley 1903, 1). Huxley’s observation indicates how the development of a mass reading audience in mid-nineteenth century Britain transformed the very nature of scientific controversy. Scientists were compelled to debate the validity of theories in new public sites, not just in exclusive scientific societies or in specialized scientific journals with limited circulation. It was during the nineteenth century that public controversy—not limited to science alone—became possible for the first time. In this short piece I will discuss how the “communications revolution” produced a public space for the debate over evolutionary theory in mid-nineteenth century Britain. I will focus on periodicals as one of those public spaces in which the debate took place.1 As Huxley found, attempting to resolve a scientific controversy in the general periodical press could be a risky venture. Although a non-specialized journal could provide the public space necessary for reaching the reading audience, maintaining scientific authority in such a site was somewhat problematic. (shrink)

For nineteenth century British scientific naturalists like Charles Darwin, Thomas Henry Huxley, and John Tyndall, translation, and the issues of language that it raised, were crucial. Dealing with these issues became a major part of their strategy to reform British science, and it involved opening up the scientific community to French and German research. Early in their careers, both Huxley and Tyndall invested time translating science books from the continent into English. Later, as they themselves wrote books that were in (...) demand across the channel, they, and Darwin, put a great deal of time and energy into locating the best possible translators for their writings. Translation was not only a key to reforming British science; it was also essential as a means of circulating the evolutionary worldview of scientific naturalism globally. But Darwin, Huxley, and Tyndall were not fully prepared for the challenges they would encounter in authorizing translations of their own works. (shrink)