Talk:Thomas Henry Huxley

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August 7, 2007 WikiProject A-class review Not approved

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[edit] Add external link

Please add a link to <http://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/>, which is editing and publishing all of the correspondence of Charles Darwin. Thomas Huxley was a significant correspondent of Darwin. Eadp 15:31, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rt Hon

OK if TH was not a Privy Counciller he is not entitled to a Rt Hon, unless he is the son of a Duke, which he wasn't. I have no idea, and don't have a biography handy. Anyone who can clarify please do.--Michael Johnson 00:55, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Title of Right Honourable is only used for those MPs who are PCs. This is because all forms of address in the House of Commons are prescribed: members are Honourable Members; if they are also PCs they are Rt Hon; and if they are also QCs then they are Rt Hon and Learned (!!) It is an historical practice to control abuse and conflict in the House. In modern times at least the title Rt Hon is not used in general life in Britain, but it is proper to place the initials PC after your name. Macdonald-Ross, 31st March 2007.

[edit] External links display

There seems to be a display issue with the first two lines of External links, but I don't know enough about templates to fix it.--Hatch68 18:31, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cleaned up Racial Listing

The breakdown of Huxley's races was jumbled and difficult. I cleaned it up, no content changed. Now it reads from the largest groups first, not putting it in the middle. Saint yondo 12:36, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

I see much work has gone into this, but it has thrown the balance of the Huxley entry somewhat out of kilter by its length and detail. The topic is not one of the most important in Huxley's life, and none of his biographers has ever suggested it was. Also, the source was not a book, but a journal paper. One of the things we should aim for is to achieve a balance, which is hard to do! However, I think this section is rather overcooked. Macdonald-ross 20:27, 31 March 2007 (UTC)


Several links in the racial listing section are hyperlinked back to this page. This should be corrected by anyone that could write articles with sufficient information. Absolute Zerr 23:38, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

I intend to do some study on the racial listing sometime soon. Saint yondo 12:52, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

This section really cannot stay as is, just a list of names and no account of H's ideas. Nor is it worth a separate section in any case, for reasons given above. It's out of keeping with the biography as a whole. I propose to write a simple para and put in it place within an existing section. Macdonald-ross 14:57, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I removed some race pov and a template a little while ago. The term macrorace was not mentioned in the reference given, it is by less reputable 'researchers' who wanted a Huxley citation. I think the proposed simple paragraph is enough to put this 'topic' in perspective. ☻ Fred|☝ discussion|✍ contributions 17:13, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Setting quotes & verse: some thoughts

Experiments with layout have revealed that the software available for layout in Wiki is rather limited, especially for quotes and verse. Anyone who has used PageMaker will know what we are missing! Therefore I've used the simplest facilities which produce a good result; but it would also help if everyone else would stop trying to be brilliant...

The second point is to remember that a pattern of spelling/ refs/ layout (&c) once stable in an article should be adhered to; never mind what choices are made elsewhere, the choices here are reasonable, within Wiki guidelines &c &c.

The third point is that unless you spot a clear mistake (give refs!) or a clear omission (give refs!) then please don't tinker! There are so many stubs that need work that anyone who has time to spare can find something useful to do. That's where help is really needed. Macdonald-ross 14:20, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] sub-page on Hux-Wilber debate

I've avoided expanding the account of the famous debate in the main page whilst being aware that for some hist/sci buffs it's the bees knees! On the main page is what seems objectively true, namely, that the Hux-Owen controversies were more important and in the long run more decisive in turning minds in the Darwinian direction. The problem with the H/W debate is not just the conflicting accounts but also a general lack of appreciation of what the BA meetings were at the time.

Hux already has a reasonable sub-page on THH and agnosticism (not by me) and the bot keeps telling me the page is too long, so I'm going to write an account of the debate offline and get an editor to read it before springing it on the system as a sub-page. Macdonald-ross 14:49, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

See Reaction to Darwin's theory#The British Association debate – you might find it useful to expand that as needed, and link to it from this page. .. dave souza, talk 10:23, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
My recent rediscovery of Alfred Newton's first-hand evidence (not noticed by most commentators) has caused me to fluff up this section, and to counter the revisionist tendency on the several articles linked to this topic. Newton was a meticulous and painstaking worker. His evidence supports the traditional account so clearly (though not the exact words) that I feel the revisionist pro-Wilberforce version (authored mostly by modern Anglicans) is scarcely viable. It is interesting, too, that so many have written on this topic without reading all the evidence that has survived. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:02, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Citation layout and formatting

Things seem a bit disorganised at present: to illustrate an approach which I've found useful, I've added a "Sources" subsection to the "Notes and references", with Darwin's life and letters formatted using Template:Citation so that if you click on the citation "Darwin (1887)" it acts as a link taking you to that source. This trick doesn't work with the "Cite book" etc. templates which have been used elsewhere. The alternatives are described at Wikipedia:Citation templates. The Wikipedia:Guide to layout recommends using the "Notes" section for Harvard citations and other notes, with a separate "References" section rather than the "Sources" subsection I've added – as you'll see from Wikipedia talk:Guide to layout#Separate Notes and Citation sections, there are a number of options and various opinions about what to use: the important thing is to find consensus on this talk page then try to stick to a uniform format on the page. .. dave souza, talk 10:23, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I had a look at Charles Darwin, the method used there looks good, though it's a little annoying that you can't hop from the harvard cite to the expanded reference. MR mentioned that he thought this article should be upgraded from mid to high importance, and I agree with him, though I don't know what the procedure for that is. ornis (t) 11:34, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Good stuff. I'm a bit overloaded just now, but will try to assist as much as poss. The inline links at Charles Darwin should take you to a short Harvard reference in its "Citations" section, which in turn links down to the relevant detailed reference in the "References" section. We can get the same effect here by using the Template:Citation in the "References" section. Here's info from Wikipedia:Guide to layout#Standard appendices and descriptions with my comments added. It says that "Certain optional standard sections should be added at the bottom of an article." and shows "Common appendix sections":

  1. Quotations (deprecated) – dunno who's doing the deprecating.
  2. See also – this is for related internal links, which are best kept in the body of the article as at present.
  3. Notes – this would be the present "Notes and References" section
  4. References – this would take over from the "Sources" section, and should include all the sources that have been used in writing the article, in alphabetical order by author, then in date order for each author. I'd expect it to include most of the current "Further Reading" and "Biographies of Huxley" sections, preferably put into Template:Citation templates – many of the present inline templates such as "cite book" could simply be moved here, being replaced by "harvnb" (Template:Harvard citation no brackets) templates showing only the author name, year and page number. It's a matter of preference whether you want web page citations etc in here: it would be easier at first to leave them inline as at present so that they provide information in the "Notes" section.
  5. Further reading (or Bibliography) – lists any of the current "Further Reading" and "Biographies of Huxley" that weren't used as references.
  6. External links – for external links that weren't used as web page citations, or are so important that you want the link in twice.
  • It is okay to change the sequence of these appendices, but the Notes and References sections should be next to each other. For example, you may put "Further reading" above "Notes and references" or vice versa.
  • "Notes" is only for footnotes (explanations or comments on any part of the main text). "References" is only for referenced materials (books, websites etc. cited in the main text). Otherwise "Notes and references" should be combined. – what they forget to tell you is that Harvard citations appear here, and if you want a separate "Notes" section it's possible but a bit fiddly.
  • All succession boxes and navigational footers should go at the very end of the article, following the last appendix section, but preceding the "categories and interwiki links". – anything appropriate?

Hope this gives a basis for progress. Several of the references at Charles Darwin can be used here, ask me first as they're using a slightly outdated template and I've already updated a couple but have left them uniform at Cs. See DarwinOnline as a source for some of the references mentioned here. Will keep in tough, don't hesitate to ask me any questions that come up – can't guarantee being able to answer! .. dave souza, talk 16:32, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Alright, I've done the first dozen. Is there anything to choose between "citation" and "Harvard reference" templates in the reference section? ornis (t) 01:06, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
Thanks, looks good. It's a bit of a nuisance, but Template:Harvard reference which we used on Darwin is now "DEPRECATED. USE Template:Citation INSTEAD" (their capitals) – not sure why. I've tried to keep to one or the other in articles, as some people get very annoyed about inconsistency. The sequence is a bit different, so when possible I'll try to help out with converting from one to the other. ... dave souza, talk 09:05, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
Alright, I've been using them for the most part anyway, mostly because I'm lazy and it's easier by far to convert cite book, refs to citation. As far as converting the harvard references, that's ok I'll get on to those. Though there is one ref I'm not sure how to deal with: Ruse, Michael (1997), Thomas Henry Huxley and the status of evolution as science. In Barr, Alan P. I'll leave it for the moment, but I was wondering, should it get it's own line in references ( since it's an essay in a collection already cited ) or should it be made to refer to the collection in some way? ornis (t) 22:43, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
There's an example at Template:Citation for part[s] of edited books, so I've tried that out. Out of tidiness, have deleted unused bits sections from the template. Hope that's suitable, ... dave souza, talk 13:06, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Looks ok, I've copied the format for a couple that were similar. I've also finished converting the Harvard refs to citation, and rolling further reading into references. There's still quite a few references in the text that need to be inlined. ornis (t) 07:36, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Location

More than a year ago, this article was moved from Thomas Henry Huxley to Thomas Huxley on the rather dubious premise that the latter is the "mre coommon name" [sic]. In fact, I've almost never seen him called "Thomas Huxley." I've almost always seen either T.H. Huxley or the full name. I have no preference between T.H. Huxley and Thomas Henry Huxley, but the article certainly shouldn't be here. Any other opinions on this? john k 05:31, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree, and prefer Thomas Henry Huxley. This is one case among many where a correct (in sense of most common) three-name head has been replaced by a two-name head. Will someone please do it? Macdonald-ross 16:43, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
It's not hard, you just click the move button at the top, give a reason, in this case moving to most commonly recognised name or something like that, then create a new page at the old name and make it a redirect... I'll do, but in general if there's common agreement to a move, anyone can move any article. ornis (t) 01:16, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Ok strike that last bit, it creates the redirect for you. Anyway, instructions are here: WP:MOVE. ornis (t) 01:21, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A minor change

I just now rearranged the name of Linda Holland and added a somewhat more-complete reference. The paper's description and citation are here. Somewhat may want to clean up the format I used. - Nice article! - Astrochemist 20:34, 4 August 2007 (UTC)


[edit] "Kowalesky" per letter of Thomas Huxley

Can anybody track down / make any necessary redirects / start article if necessary for "Kowalesky" per letter of Thomas Huxley [1] - "Kowalesky could never have announced his great discovery of the affinity of the Ascidians and Vertebrates, by which zoologists had been startled." -- May be AKA "Kowalski", but I can't find a likely reference. -- (Hmm, Kazimierz Kowalski? - in which case we need an article.) -- Writtenonsand 14:08, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Flag on T.H. Huxley

Not that it's a vital point, but what do others think about the UK flag on this article, which Rangek has deleted twice, and clearly believes is wrongly used? It doesn't seem to violate anything in Wikipedia:FLAGS#Biographical_use section. Are we to remove them from all biographies? Is there a clear-cut ruling on this issue, which somehow I've missed? Macdonald-ross (talk) 11:43, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reasons for reverts

1. Rt. Hon. as a prefix is not used in British life except for Members of Parliament, even though they may be Privy Counsellors. So it comes off the box. This is the second time I've explained this.

2. Debate with Wilberforce: "However, historical research has severely called into question the authenticity of this supposed exchange." is a gross over-statement, and the reference given is quite one-sided. The para should stand as originally written, with the issue left balanced between the two views. Macdonald-ross (talk) 13:16, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Info Box / Doctoral student nonsense

This is not the first time: Huxley did not take his 2nd MB; he was no-one's doctoral student and none of his students were doctoral candidates. It is ridiculous to use modern terminology for 19thC figures whose whole life and career was so different from those of today. I had vainly hoped this was clear from the content of the article! There is no objection to giving credit to such as Thomas Wharton Jones providing a way can be found to avoid nonsense terms in the box. Macdonald-ross (talk) 14:09, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Advocacy of evolution rather than natural selection

The comment to this edit correctly says that "evolution per se was not darwin's original theory. rather, it was the natural selection which produces that evolution", but the edit misses the point that Huxley became known for advocacy of evolution rather than natural selection, so I've undone it. The cited source carefully states that "Huxley's vigorous public support of Charles Darwin's evolutionary naturalism earned him the nickname 'Darwin's bulldog'," avoiding any mention of natural selection. Browne makes interesting points about Huxley's article in the Westminster Review expressing his doubts about natural selection which could ideally be added to the relevant section, which already mekes it clear that Huxley never lost those doubts. ... dave souza, talk 14:46, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "Influences" in infobox should include Charles Darwin, IMHO

Sometimes the excess of research causes the more obvious links to be lost to sight, but WP has many eyes. --Wloveral (talk) 23:44, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that's a point, and one I've been thinking about recently. Influences are generally from one's youth, but there's no doubt the crafty fellow massaged Hal into shape! I've also been thinking of Edward Forbes. Anyway, thanks for the prod. Macdonald-ross (talk) 05:54, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] H's view on race and North v South

The American Civil War, the situation of slaves and everything connected, was not really central to H's life, but for those interested an account is in Desmond vol 2, 325 et seq. He was in favour of the North, and thought it absurd to think that negros were a different species. But his opposition to slavery was not of the Darwin/Wilberforce kind. Those two families were against slavery root and branch for moral reasons; Huxley seemed to think it was bad economics, and inconsistent with the political freedom Americans aspired to.

I've kept out short quotations on this topic out of the article because they need so much context to be interpreted. And as side issues to the biography, the topic would take up space in an article which is quite long enough. Macdonald-ross (talk) 13:29, 29 May 2008 (UTC)