Editing Franz Boas (section)

===Orthogenetic versus Darwinian evolution===
[[File:Huxley - Mans Place in Nature.png|thumb|right|An illustration from ''[[Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature]]'' (1863) by [[Thomas Henry Huxley]], which became emblematic of the now-discredited idea of [[orthogenesis|evolution as linear progress]]]]
One of the greatest accomplishments of Boas and his students was their critique of theories of physical, social, and cultural evolution current at that time. This critique is central to Boas's work in museums, as well as his work in all four fields of anthropology. As historian [[George W. Stocking Jr.|George Stocking]] noted, however, Boas's main project was to distinguish between biological and cultural heredity, and to focus on the cultural processes that he believed had the greatest influence over social life.<ref>Stocking, George W. Jr. 1968. Race, culture, and evolution: Essays in the history of anthropology. New York: Free Press. 264</ref> In fact, Boas supported Darwinian theory, although he did not assume that it automatically applied to cultural and historical phenomena (and indeed was a lifelong opponent of 19th-century theories of [[cultural evolution]], such as those of [[Lewis H. Morgan]] and [[Edward Burnett Tylor]]).<ref>Alexander Lesser, 1981 "Franz Boas" p. 25 in Sydel Silverman, ed. ''From Totems to Teachers'' New York: Columbia University Press</ref> The notion of evolution that the Boasians ridiculed and rejected was the then dominant belief in [[orthogenesis]]—a determinate or [[teleology|teleological]] process of evolution in which change occurs progressively regardless of [[natural selection]]. Boas rejected the prevalent theories of [[Sociocultural evolution|social evolution]] developed by Edward Burnett Tylor, Lewis Henry Morgan, and [[Herbert Spencer]] not because he rejected the notion of "evolution" per se, but because he rejected orthogenetic notions of evolution in favor of Darwinian evolution.

The difference between these prevailing theories of cultural evolution and Darwinian theory cannot be overstated: the orthogeneticists argued that all societies progress through the same stages in the same sequence. Thus, although the [[Inuit]] with whom Boas worked at [[Baffin Island]], and the [[German people|Germans]] with whom he studied as a graduate student, were contemporaries of one another, evolutionists argued that the Inuit were at an earlier stage in their evolution, and Germans at a later stage.

Boasians argued that virtually every claim made by cultural evolutionists was contradicted by the data, or reflected a profound misinterpretation of the data. As Boas's student [[Robert Lowie]] remarked, "Contrary to some misleading statements on the subject, there have been no responsible opponents of evolution as 'scientifically proved', though there has been determined hostility to an evolutionary metaphysics that falsifies the established facts". In an unpublished lecture, Boas characterized his debt to Darwin thus:

<blockquote>Although the idea does not appear quite definitely expressed in Darwin's discussion of the development of mental powers, it seems quite clear that his main object has been to express his conviction that the mental faculties developed essentially without a purposive end, but they originated as variations, and were continued by natural selection. This idea was also brought out very clearly by Wallace, who emphasized that apparently reasonable activities of man might very well have developed without an actual application of reasoning.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Lewis |first=Herbert S. |date=2018-05-03 |title="The Relation of Darwin to Anthropology": A Previously Unpublished Lecture by Franz Boas (1909) |url=https://histanthro.org/clio/the-relation-of-darwin-to-anthropology/ |access-date=2022-07-04 |website=History of Anthropology Review |language=English}}</ref></blockquote>

Thus, Boas suggested that what appear to be patterns or structures in a culture were not a product of conscious design, but rather the outcome of diverse mechanisms that produce cultural variation (such as diffusion and independent invention), shaped by the social environment in which people live and act. Boas concluded his lecture by acknowledging the importance of Darwin's work: "I hope I may have succeeded in presenting to you, however imperfectly, the currents of thought due to the work of the immortal Darwin which have helped to make anthropology what it is at the present time."<ref>Boas, 1909 lecture; see Lewis 2001b.</ref>