William Henry Dallinger FRS (5 July 1839 – 7 November 1909) was a British minister in the Wesleyan Methodist Church. He was also an accomplished

scientist A scientist is a person who Scientific method, researches to advance knowledge in an Branches of science, area of the natural sciences. In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engag ...

, being the first to study the complete lifecycle of

unicellular organism A unicellular organism, also known as a single-celled organism, is an organism that consists of a single cell, unlike a multicellular organism that consists of multiple cells. Organisms fall into two general categories: prokaryotic organisms and ...

s under the

microscope A microscope () is a laboratory equipment, laboratory instrument used to examine objects that are too small to be seen by the naked eye. Microscopy is the science of investigating small objects and structures using a microscope. Microscopic ...

and studying the adaptation of such organisms to temperature. He made numerous contributions to microscopy, and was president of the

Quekett Microscopical Club The Quekett Microscopical Club is a learned society for the promotion of microscopy. Its members come from all over the world, and include both amateur and professional microscopists. It is a registered charity and not-for-profit publisher, with t ...

from 1889 to 1892. Dallinger was awarded three honorary doctorates, the Ll.D. from

Victoria College, Toronto Victoria University is a federated college of the University of Toronto located at the St. George campus in Downtown Toronto. The school was founded in 1836 by the Wesleyan Methodist Church of Canada as a nonsectarian literary institution. From ...

in 1884, the D.Sc. from Dublin in 1892, and the D.L.C. from Durham in 1896. Dallinger was married to Emma Ion Goldsmith (1842-1910). They had one child, son Percy Gough (1867-1930).

Research into Darwin's theories

Dallinger was one of the first to carry out a controlled evolution experiment. In the late 19th century, he cultivated small unicellular organisms in a custom-built incubator over a time period of seven years (1880–1886). Dallinger slowly increased the temperature of the incubator from an initial 60 °F up to 158 °F. The early cultures had shown clear signs of distress at a temperature of 73 °F, and were certainly not capable of surviving at 158 °F. The organisms Dallinger had in his incubator at the end of the experiment, on the other hand, were perfectly fine at 158 °F. However, these organisms would no longer grow at the initial 60 °F. Dallinger concluded that he had found evidence for Darwinian adaptation in his incubator, and that the organisms had adapted to live in a high-temperature environment. Unfortunately, Dallinger's incubator was accidentally destroyed in 1886, and Dallinger could not continue this line of research. Dallinger was an early supporter of

Darwinism ''Darwinism'' is a term used to describe a theory of biological evolution developed by the English naturalist Charles Darwin (1809–1882) and others. The theory states that all species of organisms arise and develop through the natural sel ...

. He accepted

natural selection Natural selection is the differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. It is a key mechanism of evolution, the change in the Heredity, heritable traits characteristic of a population over generation ...

and considered

creationism Creationism is the faith, religious belief that nature, and aspects such as the universe, Earth, life, and humans, originated with supernatural acts of Creation myth, divine creation, and is often Pseudoscience, pseudoscientific.#Gunn 2004, Gun ...

to be "absolutely untenable". He believed there was no conflict between religion and science and there was no reason to try and reconcile the

Book of Genesis The Book of Genesis (from Greek language, Greek ; ; ) is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its incipit, first word, (In the beginning (phrase), 'In the beginning'). Genesis purpor ...

with geology.Michael R. Watts. (2015). ''The Dissenters: The Crisis and Conscience of Nonconformity''. Oxford University Press. p. 18.

Selected scientific publications by Dallinger

* * * * * ''The Creator, and what we may know of the method of creation'' (1887)

References

External links

Article on Dallinger in ''Science in Christian Perspective''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dallinger, William 1839 births 1909 deaths British microbiologists 19th-century British biologists Critics of creationism English Methodist ministers Fellows of the Royal Society Parson-naturalists 19th-century English Methodist ministers