of the origin of the legend of wicked capitalism. Caton argues that Smith's conception of economics was pre-industrial (it failed to recognise that industrial technology had become a commodity) and states that the wicked capitalism legend was created in the 1820–1840 period by a clique of factory owners. In the book, Caton rejects the belief that the human species is evolving to a higher type. In The Origin of Subjectivity: An Essay on Descartes, Caton argues that Descartes based his epistemology on optics ('optical epistemology'); and that he used his metaphysics 'as a flag to cover the goods'-- a rationalist philosophy dedicated to 'the mastery and possession of nature'. Caton's publications on Margaret Mead, Derek Freeman, and the Samoa controversy are part of the standard literature. His edited volume, The Samoa Reader: Anthropologists Take Stock, remains the one comprehensive reader on the subject. Among his contributions to the volume are two studies on Freeman's psychology. They were featured in 2005 in a lead article in the Chronicle of Higher Education. Also in 2005, Caton was a consultant to the BBC for its documentary on the Freeman-Mead controversy, Tales from the Jungle. His last work focused on Charles Darwin. As a former officer of the International Society of Human Ethology, he worked to integrate the Society into the web of activities celebrating the bicentenary of Darwin's birth (2009). Caton also published a reinterpretation of Darwin's contribution to the establishment of evolution. He has also devised a new interpretation of Darwin's famous illness, which he presented at the ISHE conference in Detroit, August 2006. This research was to be included in The Darwin Legend. Caton was an evolutionist skeptical of Darwinian mechanisms, and was also a catastrophist. Caton contributed a paper to a young earth creationist journal on the evolutionary basis for eugenics, The Holocaust, and euthanasia. There is no indication that Caton was a creationist. Publications etext available here External links Biography Official website of Hiram Caton's work References Reviews of The Politics of Progress HIV/AIDS denialists Australian non-fiction writers 1936 births 2010 deaths University of Chicago alumni Yale University alumni Griffith University faculty