Evolution's Captain: The Dark Fate of the Man Who Sailed Charles Darwin Around the World by Peter Nichols

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


An innovative approach to a controversial issue through examining the life of the captain of the HMS Beagle.  Part one covers the career of Captain FitzRoy and provides a detailed understanding of his character and personality.  Also included is the early life of Charles Darwin.  It helps the reader view the humanity of one who has become larger than life.

The second half is weaker.  The content shifts to Darwin and his change from devout Christian to founder of atheistic evolution.  This could have been portrayed more thoroughly considering that this is the major focus of the rest of the book.  I saw Captain FitzRoy becoming a figure representing those who will become extinct because they hold onto a supposedly inadequate and inconsistent belief system.  While his kind die out, the more fit (atheistic evolutionists?) survive.

The author describes the seas of the southern latitudes in a way that I could feel the spray and the gales, but his attempt to address the evolution-creation controversy left me in the doldrums.





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