How did Buffons theory influence Darwins thinking about evolution?
I’m not sure if Buffon’s ‘Histoire Naturelle’ influenced Darwin so much as it must have angered him enough to want to disprove many of Buffon’s outlandish and unfounded claims. An example of the naive claims made by Buffon: “In the Americas, therefore, animated Nature is weaker, less active, and more circumscribed in the variety of her productions; for we perceive, from the enumeration of the American animals, that the numbers of species is not only fewer, but that, in general, all the animals are much smaller than those of the Old World (Europe).” Darwin surely must have known just how much of a Quack Buffon really was. How about this observation by Buffon?: “Hence in the New Continent, there are more running waters, in proportion to the extent of territory, than in the Old; and this quantity of water is greatly increased for want of proper drains or outlets. … Besides, as the earth is every where there covered with trees, shrubs, and gross herbage, it never dries. The transpiration
