Further information
Darwin 200
As part of celebrations of Darwin’s bicentenary, Imperial College London and Penguin books are co-hosting the book launch of Darwin’s Sacred Cause: race, emancipation and the quest for human origins.
Join evolutionary biologist and journalist Olivia Judson in conversation with Adrian Desmond and James Moore, co-authors of a groundbreaking re-evaluation of Darwin’s science and ideas, for an evening of lively debate, discussion and discovery, as part of Imperial College London’s Darwin200 celebrations.
The event is co-hosted by Imperial College London and Penguin books. Signed copies of the book will be available for purchase.
Entry is by ticket only. Email your name and full contact address details to events@imperial.ac.uk.
Darwin authors Adrian Desmond (left) and James Moore
New insights from fresh and untapped sources have driven Darwin scholars Desmond and Moore to re-think the basis of Darwin’s theories. Their new book, Darwin’s Sacred Cause, gives a new explanation of how Darwin reached his views on human origins. Published for the worldwide Darwin celebrations of 2009 – the bicentenary of his birth and the 150th anniversary of the Origin of Species – this book restores the moral core of Darwin’s work by recovering its lost historical context.
Through massive detective work among unpublished Darwin letters, unplumbed family correspondence and newly discovered Darwin reading lists, as well as diaries, ships’ logs, and dozens of official documents and rare contemporary works on race relations and humans origins, the authors back up their compelling claim: Darwin began his career committed to the unity of the human family; his science flowed from the greatest moral movement of his age.
Adrian Desmond, co-author with James Moore of the seminal Darwin, has published seven other books on evolution, including Huxley, a life of Darwin’s ‘bulldog’. He studied at Harvard and University College London, and has higher degrees in vertebrate palaeontology and history of science, with a PhD for his work on Victorian evolution. He is an Honorary Research Fellow in the Biology Department at University College London.
James Moore has many publications on Darwin and his age, including The Post-Darwinian Controversies and The Darwin Legend . He holds degrees in science, divinity and history, and a PhD from Manchester University for his work on Victorian evolution and religion. Having taught at Cambridge, Harvard, Notre Dame and McMaster Universities, he is now Professor of the History of Science in the Open University.
