Darwin's Descent & Bronowski's Ascent

After Charles Darwin completed his "Origin of Species", voted the most influential science book of all time, he extended his logic to explain the evolution of Man, called "The Descent of Man", implying that he thought that Man evolved or descended from the lower form of species.

Here it is relevant to note that Darwin wrote "Ignorance begets confidence more than knowledge does. It is the ignorant who are more assertive of their views than they who know."

(It is well known that he was anticipated by Hindu cosmology in its ten avatars, starting from fish, tortoise, boar, man-lion, dwarf & various divine human forms.)

Darwin, noting the anatomical similarities between man & animals, went on to describe the differences in mind as also one of degree & not of kind.

The noted mathematician trained in physics, J. Bronowski, prepared a TV serial & a book called "The Ascent of Man" primarily on the advances in the Life Sciences.

He takes up the story from Darwin & continued from the African man, evolution of the brain, hunting, agriculture, wheel, use of horse, hierarchy, architecture, art, metallurgy, & the beginnings of modern science.

He has an interesting take on Islam. "The spread of ideas demands a new pulse. The coming of Islam, six hundred years after Christ, was the new powerful impulse. In a hundred years, Islam established a fabulous city of learning in Baghdad. The knowledge of Greece & of the East was treasured, absorbed & diversified."

Paying due respect to Pythagoras, Copernicus, Galileo & Newton, he traces the Industrial revolution, life sciences under Pasteur & Mendel & subsequent DNA, & ends with the catchword "Knowledge is our Destiny" echoing Darwin's opening statement.