Quote
I don't quite comprehend the connection you are trying to make to the Royal Navy. It was simply the thing to do for lots of people, go to school at the Royal Navy. Feather in the cap sort of thing like going to to West Point or something... gives people officer status. Being subjects of the crown it also showed their loyalty and desire to serve.

The thing that strikes me as unusual is that these people weren't joining the Royal Navy in the way other monied persons did. They didn't sign on as regular officers. They we more loosely committed, as surgeons and naturalists. Other traditional paths were available. Darwin was barely able to obtain his father's permission because of the unconventional nature of his venture to join the Beagle.

Yet we find this same (at least somewhat unconventional) path followed by Huxley & I forget which other ones.

Dark Matter + Dark Energy = Dark Truth

"We find that such evidence demonstrates that the ID argument is dependent upon setting a scientifically unreasonable burden of proof for the theory of evolution." - Judge Jones Kitzmiller case
http://www.talkreason.org/articles/Falsify.cfm

"To Compel A Man To Furnish Funds For The Propagation Of Ideas He Disbelieves And Abhors Is Sinful And Tyrannical." - Thomas Jefferson

"And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath?" - Thomas Jefferson