Some more POD ideas I've had concerning Darwin:
- he sticks to geology for most of his life, and he aids some early paleonthologists in their work, but doesn't branch out into biological research on his own. Wallace might or might not overtake him in this particular field of research. Given that in OTL, Wallace's evolutionary research was several years behind Darwin's research, we could see a somewhat delayed and more poorly understood Or one that is backed up by less practical evidence, given how Wallace started experimenting later.
- he remains more hesitant about publishing his over 20 years of accumulated research during the late 1850s. Two possible reasons could be that he doesn't learn about Wallace coming to the same conclusions in parallel soon enough, or that he learns about Wallace's conclusions as in OTL, but still proves more hesitant to publish his findings in time (thus possibly butterflying away the timely OTL publishing of
On the Origin of Species).
- he settles down with Emma somewhere else than Kent (or the southeast in general). The absence of the local geology influences his ideas on deep geological time (and its effects on evolution) in different ways. For instance, maybe he settles down in an area with geology of Paleozoic origins, instead of the Mesozoic chalk bedrocks of southeastern England that he researched in OTL (and that provoked him to start thinking about the erosion of the bedrock and how long it must have eroded by natural processes since the times of its height).
- there's a fire at his house (someone accidentally lights the furniture, the house is struck by lightning, etc.), and some or all of his notes are destroyed, with him having no backup. Even if he reconstructs some of the notes from memory, he will have lost a lot of data and years of research, and some of the excellent practical evidence backing up his theories on natural selection and evolutionary pressures gets irretrievably lost. This could make him even more hesitant to publish his theories, given how obsessive he always was about testing them first.
- a scenario similar to the above-mentioned one happens, but in this case, someone accidentally throws out his package with the notes into the garbage while cleaning up the cupboard below the staircase where he used to keep the package.
- he publishes an ATL equivalent of
On the Origin... several years earlier, even if it's at the expense of citing less empirical evidence than in the OTL version of the work. Ergo, he's less obsessive about conducting decades worth of practical research in the garden, greenhouse and countryside than in OTL.
- he publishes his findings later, because Wallace's ATL research is slowed down compared to the OTL one. Thus, Darwin isn't pressured to basically compile his notes and write his first great work in just under sixteen months, at breakneck speed, just to trump Wallace.
What happens if there's no theory and nobody to take up the torch until decades later? If the theory of evolution is introduced decades later the body of evidence for it is going to be that much stronger at it's initial presentation.
Also a possible variant. Especially if we butterfly away both Darwin and Wallace and potential ATL researchers in other countries that might turn out like them, and if we also butterfly away some of the geologists and botanists that layed the groundwork for Darwin's and Wallace's curiosity to research the various topics in greater detail.
No Alfred Russel Wallace. Evolutionary thought is set back decades, and Darwin is forced to work from a blank slate. It's going to be an uphill struggle getting the theory widely-recognized.
Yeah, even moreso than in OTL. And if Darwin never went down this route of scientific interest, having Wallace missing to fill in the gap would be a real setback. Of course, as I've noted, some ATL researcher that could replace them might pop up in some other country (France, Germany, Poland, Russia, who knows...), though that's more of a "worse-outcome-with-a-silver-lining" variation on this ATL scenario.
Well without Darwin Natural selection would probably have a more diffuse authorship. The idea was out there and would only be delayed a few years. However having a slower rise to prominence would not affect the final shape of the consensus.
So probably less difference than you might think after a hundred years. Of course with multiple parents the philosophical implications would have a wider range and variations (cooperative selection, sexual selection, cultural selection) would be more popular.
Yeah, that's a cool implication !
In the 20thC I suggest the wider base of natural selection based ideas would make it less likely to be picked on by the new American religious movements.
This could prove rather favourable to the better defense of the ideas, yes. Though I'm sure that your typical run-of-the-mill fundamentalists/literalists would still find excuses for "debunking" any theories on evolutionary processes.
Of course since they have to pick on something to attack and the other possibilities are very unpleasant, we may live in a world modified by a time travelling Darwin