Reactions to On the Origin of Species pro-evolution scientists and Unitarians with liberal churchmen, two of the authors were indicted for heresy and lost their jobs by 1862. In October 1860, John Phillips published "Life on the Earth, its origin and succession", reiterating points from his Rede Lecture and disputing Darwin's arguments. He sent a copy to Darwin, who thanked him, though "sorry, but not surprised, to see that you are dead against me". On 20 November, Darwin told Lyell of his revisions for a third edition of the "Origin", including removing his estimate of the time it took for the Weald to erode: "The confounded Wealden
Genetics and the Origin of Species whiz by." The book began as a series of lectures at Columbia University in October and November 1936. Dobzhansky decided to attend the summer 1936 meeting of the Genetics Society of America in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. When the geneticist Leslie Dunn learned of this, he invited Dobzhansky to give a series of lectures at Columbia. He sent the invitation in April, and within a month he had suggested that the lectures be a springboard for writing a general treatise on evolutionary genetics. Dobzhansky was enthusiastic, and in May he wrote back, proposing the title "Genetics and the Origin of Species".