Ronald Fisher Quotes
We may consequently state the fundamental theorem of Natural Selection in the form: The rate of increase in fitness of any organism at any time is equal to its genetic variance in fitness at that time.
Fisher, Ronald A. The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection. Clarendon Press, 1930, p. 37.
Actually, The Theory of Evolution shows no such thing. Diversity is critical for Natural Selection to function. It is the inbred Royalty of Europe that showed a propensity to various defects and abnormalities. There are millions of examples where the offspring of a couple are superior to both parents with respect to a characteristic. Some also who are inferior to both parents. Then there are some “in-between”. Traits in evolution and generics are not subject to a simple averaging.
This quotation from this letter was one of the key items of evidence showing that Wallace had independently developed the concept of Evolution before Darwin published his famous treatise. Darwin began formulating his theory of natural selection in the late 1830s but he went on working quietly on it for twenty years. He wanted to amass a wealth of evidence before publicly presenting his idea. During those years he corresponded briefly with Wallace (right), who was exploring the wildlife of South America and Asia. Wallace supplied Darwin with birds for his studies and decided to seek Darwin's help in publishing his own ideas on evolution. He sent Darwin his theory in 1858, which, to Darwin's shock, nearly replicated Darwin's own…. Joseph Dalton Hooker arranged for both Darwin's and Wallace's theories to be presented to a meeting of the Linnaean Society in 1858. However, Wallace seems to have been onto the idea of evolution over a decade before as this quotation shows.
Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher FRS was a British statistician, geneticist, and academic. For his work in statistics, he has been described as "a genius who almost single-handedly created the foundations for modern statistical science" and "the single most important figure in 20th century statistics". In genetics, his work used mathematics to combine Mendelian genetics and natural selection; this contributed to the revival of Darwinism in the early 20th-century revision of the theory of evolution known as the modern synthesis. For his contributions to biology, Fisher has been called "the greatest of Darwin’s successors".
