Charles Darwin’s work remains the foundation of biology, providing a unifying, logical explanation of the diversity of life, writes Andy Richardson.

Shrewsbury’s most famous son, Charles Darwin, changed the world. His impact reverberated across the globe when, during the 19th century, he devised a theory of evolution. The English naturalist Charles Robert Darwin, who was born on February 12, 1809, realised and demonstrated that all species of life had evolved over time from common ancestors.

In his book, On The Origin Of Species, he proved that evolution occurs. His ground-breaking theory became accepted by the scientific community and the general public in his lifetime, while his theory of natural selection came to be widely seen as the primary explanation of evolution in the 1930s. Darwin’s work remains the foundation of biology, as it provides a unifying logical explanation for the diversity of life.

The impact of his work, however, does not stop there. Oxford academic Lord May believes Darwin’s theories can be applied to climate change. He believes the work of Darwin can help us to understand, and therefore reduce, its impact.

On February 22, Lord May will deliver the Charles Darwin Memorial Lecture at Theatre Severn in Shrewsbury. The event, which has been organised by the Friends of Shrewsbury’s Museums, will provide an opportunity for him to explain his ideas.

He says: “I read somewhere the other day, and I’ve heard it said before, that the three most important figures of the 19th century were Darwin, Marx and Freud. I don’t think there’s much doubt that Marx’s ideas affected us, not necessarily for the better. His view of historical processes haven’t stood up to the test of time particularly well.

“Freud had an impact on how we think about ourselves. But the intellectual underpinnings of his ideas haven’t stood up well to the test of time either.”

Lord May says only Darwin’s ideas have endured. He says the Shropshire academic’s work is all the more incredible because he was seriously undermined by a lack of knowledge in matters relating to physics, chemistry and other elements of science. Nuclear chemistry, for instance, did not exist.

Lord May is one of the leading thinkers of the 20th and 21st century, in his field. The Australian has been Chief Scientific Adviser to HM Government, President of the Royal Society, and a Professor at Sydney, Princeton, Oxford, and Imperial College London. He is a Fellow of Merton College, Oxford and crossbencher in the House of Lords and President Elect of the British Association for the Advancement of Science.

He has studied animal population dynamics and the relationship between complexity and stability in natural communities. He made major advances in the field of population biology, through the application of mathematical techniques, and his work played a key role in the development of theoretical ecology through the 1970s and 1980s. All of which makes him ideally placed to talk about Darwin.

On February 22, Lord May will discuss a topic that Darwin saw as one of his greatest problems. The topic remains as unsolved today as it was then. It is this: How do we maintain co-operative behaviour when there are those who take the benefits without paying the costs? Aspects of that question lie at the heart of the world’s difficulty in tackling climate change.

Lord May says: “You may say it’s obvious why we want to co-operate, you pay a small cost and receive benefits in return. Prairie dogs, for instance, take it in turn to be on watch and issue squeaky calls. That entails a real risk to the animal giving the alarm call but it is of benefit to the community as a whole. So, the benefit of being in the colony far exceeds the risk in taking your turn. The problem arises if there are prairie dogs that do not take their turn. They receive the benefits but they do not pay the costs.”

Lord May says that behaviour lies at the heart of the problems of tackling climate change. Many nations want others to cut carbon emissions so the rapidity of climate change is reduced. However, like the prairie dog who won’t go on watch, that means others have to do more work while receiving less reward.

Lord May adds: “This is one of the major unsolved problems of our time. Once you get larger societies and larger aggregates it’s hard to see how you create stable associations where people pay their dues. That brings us to climate change.

“There is no longer any doubt about the reality of the problem. It requires global co-operation. Action needs to be in equitable proportions. Eighty per cent of the stuff up there (in the atmosphere) was put there by developing countries. So it’s unreasonable for developing countries to stop developed to help solve a problem that they didn’t create.”

Lord May accepts he does not have the answer of how we solve climate change. Nor, he suspects, would Darwin. There seems to be no fair and proper solution to the problem. However, identifying that a thorny issue exists – of who should do what – could set us on the path to real change.

Such intellectual issues bring great pleasure to the Oxford professor and he is looking forward to his Shrewsbury talk. He adds: “My approach is just to note there is a problem. As I’m fond of saying, ‘I will, if you will’ far too easily turns into ‘I won’t, if you won’t’. In so far as I have any thoughts about it, they are much more speculative and suitable to cocktail parties.

“These talks, however, do bring a great deal of pleasure to me. I enjoy doing these sort of things. I don’t these days give under graduate lectures, but I have just always enjoyed that kind of interaction with individuals and audiences. And besides, Shropshire is a nice part of the world. I normally pass through it on the way to go walking somewhere.”

• Tickets for Lord May’s lecture are available from www.theatresevern.co.uk or by telephoning 01743 281281