• journal_title：Geology
• Contributor：Kenneth J. Hsü
• Publisher：Geological Society of America
• Date：1986-
• Format：text/html
• Language：en
• Identifier：10.1130/0091-7613(1986)14<532:CDTM>2.0.CO;2
• journal_abbrev：Geology
• issn：0091-7613
• volume：14
• issue：6
• firstpage：532

Darwin's three mistakes were that (1) he dismissed mass extinctions as artifacts; of an imperfect geologic record; (2) he assumed that species diversity, like individuals of a given species, tends to increase exponentially with time; and (3) he considered biotic interactions the major cause of species extinction. Those mistakes led to the theory propounded in his book On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (Darwin, 1859), which has been adopted by many as the scientific basis of their social philosophies.