By SEAN B. CARROLL - NEW YORK TIMES
Added: Tue, 24 Nov 2009 00:00:00 UTC

Thanks to Mordacious1 for the link.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/24/science/24creature.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Charles Darwin seems to have had a boundless interest in the many forms life takes on earth. He could find something about any animal or plant that piqued his insatiable curiosity, and masses of such observations fueled his prodigious output of books and scientific papers.

Darwin was particularly intrigued by what he referred to as “contrivances,” the various biological devices through which creatures make their livings or disperse their young.

Even the most pedestrian species seized his imagination. Take the Roman land snail Helix pomatia, for instance. If one is not a lover of escargot, this common European snail would inspire little attention. But not so for Darwin. He was gripped, and troubled, by the mere existence of land snails.

In 1857, he wrote his first letter to the naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace, who was then making his way across the Malay Archipelago. Wallace’s own voyages and observations would independently lead him to the concept of natural selection.

Darwin explained his obsession: “One of the subjects on which I have been experimentising & which cost me much trouble is the means of distribution of all organic beings found on oceanic islands; & any facts on this subject would be most gratefully received: Land-Molluscs are a great perplexity to me.”
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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/24/science/24creature.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

TAGGED: BIOLOGY, EVOLUTION