As Darwin so famously said...

I just sent the following email to a journalist at the Observer:

Simon,

In your piece Darwin's theory turned bosses into dinosaurs in today's Observer, you re-quote the oft-quoted Darwin quote: "It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change."

I wonder if you have an original source for this quote. I have never been able to track one down. A search for the phrase 'responsive to change' yields zero hits on both the Complete Works of Darwin and Darwin Correspondence Project websites.

I suspect Darwin never said any such thing.

Regards,

Richard Carter, FCD
The Friends of Charles Darwin
http://friendsofdarwin.com

In fact, I'm pretty damn sure Darwin never said any such thing—even though the quote appears all over the internet (in particular, in stories about economics). If anyone out there knows the original source for the quote, please cite it in the comments.

Postscripts:

Richard Carter, FCD

Writer and photographer Richard Carter, FCD is the founder of the Friends of Charles Darwin. He lives in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire.WebsiteNewsletterMastodonetc…

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