Darwin's way with a notebook

 Charles Darwin wrote a description of his method of working.

It’s a short passage in his autobiography. I wish every young person with a sense of curiosity got a chance to read it. It’s a good account of the kind of method that independent thinkers could use to study any problem that interests them.

Here’s the basic method:

1. In July 1837, when he was 28, Darwin was working on a problem about how animals change. His thinking was not clear, so he “opened a notebook” on the problem. I like that phrase.

2. The notebook was a place where he collected facts. He tried not to have a theory in mind that would influence his thinking about what was relevant. He just collected facts — all of them.

3. Collecting facts is similar to reporting. It includes observation, conversations with experts, interviews and reading. He filled his notebook with abstracts of books and articles.

4. A book he was reading outside his own disciplines of geology and biology— Malthus’s An Essay on the Principle of Population — was the catalyst for Darwin’s own thinking about his own problem. 

5. You could describe what occurred as a moment of enlightenment. Darwin said he could point to the spot in the road that his carriage was passing when the idea of natural selection occurred to him. But that account overlooks 15 months of working through material in his notebooks and his fortunate decision to cross the lines of academic disciplines in search of insights from another field. There was a flash of insight, yes, but only after months of plodding.

I have a good friend who has two precocious granddaughters. The next time he mentions their interests and inquiries, I’m going to ask Grandpa if he’s showed them how to keep a notebook.

I have many bad habits, but keeping notebooks a good one. It’s been fun. There’s nothing quite like thinking about a problem for a while and deciding it’s time to open a notebook on it.