David Syme

David Syme (2 October 1827 – 14 February 1908) was a Scottish-Australian newspaper proprietor of The Age and regarded as "the father of protection in Australia" who had immense influence in the Government of Victoria. His first biographer, Ambrose Pratt, declared Syme "could hate as few men can [and] loved power as few men ever loved it".

Early life and family Syme was born at North Berwick in Scotland, the youngest of seven children and fourth son of Jean (née Mitchell) and George Alexander Syme (18??–1845), a parish schoolmaster. George Syme was a radical in church and state. His income was comfortable yet moderate, and it was stretched providing for his large family and sending his three eldest sons to universities (which he successfully did). He provided David with a relentlessly demanding education himself. Syme was not a creationist, he accepted the fact of evolution, but rejected Darwinism. Syme was an advocate of what he termed "cellular intelligence". He believed that the cell is a biological unit and a "vital entity" which could drive organic modifications.

In 1891, Alfred Russel Wallace negatively reviewed Syme's book in the Nature journal, stating that Syme had misrepresented Darwin's theory. Wallace concluded that "Mr. Syme has a considerable reputation in other departments of literature as a powerful writer and acute critic; but he has entirely mistaken his vocation in this feeble and almost puerile attempt to overthrow the vast edifice of fact and theory raised by the genius and the life-long labours of Darwin."

The Dictionary of National Biography noted that Syme's book The Soul: A Study and an Argument (1903) "attacked both materialism and the current argument for design and described Syme's own belief as a kind of pantheistic teleology."

Legacy Syme was hailed on his death as "one of the greatest men in colonial history" by his friend, then Prime Minister Alfred Deakin.

The Age remained in family hands after Syme's death. It was headed by Sir Geoffrey Syme from 1908 to 1942 and Oswald Syme from 1942 to 1964 before eventually being passed to Ranald McDonald, David Syme's great-grandson, (Oswald Syme's grandson) who sold the Age to Fairfax in 1983. The Syme family controlled the newspaper outright for 127 years, from 1856 to 1983.

David Syme received no honours, having declined a knighthood in 1900. A knighthood for services to journalism and the Commonwealth was later presented to David Syme's son, Geoffrey in 1941.

Selected publications Outlines of an Industrial Science (1876) On the Modification of Organisms (1890) The Soul: A Study and an Argument (1903)