Acknowledgements Introduction: Darwin in the Large Intellectual Context Recalibrating Darwin's imageSketch of an intellectual frameworkThe multiple faces of Darwin: John C. Greene, Michael Ruse, and Robert J. Richards A static worldview: The main theses of this book Part I: Historical Shallowness Chapter 1: Evolution in a Fully Constituted Word The completeness of the worldNeontology versus paleontology: the double epistemological standard Recycling today's variations A closed, permanent and segmented tree of life Archetypes, ancestors, or shadows?Conclusion of part IPart II: To Travel in Geographical Space is to Travel in Geological Time Chapter 2: Imposing Order Upon Complexity: Divergence Forward in Time (Origin, chap. 1-5, 8) The Origin of Species: The argumentative structure of a book The tradition of natural theology From the economy of nature (Linnaeus) to the principle of divergence (Darwin) Divergence forward in timeHow to segregrate entities bound in reproductive networks? Natural selection: a force blurring affiliative signs? Graduated lower entities or intertwined strains?The exhaustion of the evolutionary dynamics over time Conclusion Chapter 3: The Wild Power of Natural Selection: Vertical Evolution, Analogies, and Imaginary Scenarios (Origin, chap. 6-7) pLooking for transitions: Darwin's explicit method Case studies: Squirrels, ants, and flying creatures Case study: The rise of complex eyes The homology-analogy spectrum The unity of type (descent) versus the conditions of existence (natural selection) Conclusion Chapter 4: An Attempt at Taming Natural Selection With Convergence Backward in Time, Part I (Origin, chap. 11-12) The structure of Darwin's theory: Levels of explanation A research program on biogeography Case study: Alpine plants in the Northern Hemisphere Case study: The Galapagos Islands Case study: A worldwide dispersal from around the North Pole The weak contingency thesis versus the strong contingency thesis ConclusionChapter 5: An Attempt at Taming Natural Selection With Convergence Backward in Time, Part II (Origin, chap. 13) Blurred phylogenetic connections: Facing analogies and deleted affiliation The limitations of systematics The limitations of morphology, embryology, and comparative anatomy Conclusion of part II Part III: Evolutionary DynamicsChapter 6: Cyclicity, Evolutionary Equilibrium, and Biological Progress Darwin and biological progressThwarting biological progressMotion in a closed system: Recycling mechanical devices Rotating shafts: Fixed taxonomic categories and cycling taxonomic categories Opening and closing devices
Increasing population versus decreasing population
A world fully stocked versus a world not fully stocked
Atomism versus connectedness Conclusion of part IIIPart IV: A Question of Methods Chapter 7: Methodologies for a World Already Revealed Behind a science of real cause (vera causa) From ontology to methodology and back The touchstone of Darwin's methodology: uniformitarianism Conclusion of part IVConclusion: A restored unity in the Origin of Species? References.