Llosa says it’s because Darwin liked spontaneous order.  Fine, yes: this might convince the 17 conservatives who don’t like Darwin primarily because they still associate him with collectivism or eugenics.  But most conservatives, I think, are smart enough to know that’s not the case, or, if they don’t like Darwin for these reasons, they are secondary.  The main reason is because he contradicts the Bible in a much more substantial way that either Aristotle (at least, the Aristotle we learn about) or Copernicus did.  That’s a big deal, particularly in light of modern readings of history as literally accurate, a trend that has then been retro-actively applied to the Bible.  Whether or not the writers or original audiences took Genesis and Revelation literally (or stories about wars, or stories in general), a whole bunch of people, now, do.  And that makes Darwin’s theories unpleasant.  So while I like the following idea, I’m not sure it really works:

It is fascinating that conservatives who advocate for a spontaneous order–the free market–in political economy and decry social engineering as a threat to progress and civilization should resent Darwin’s overwhelming case for the idea that order can design itself. In an essay in the British publication The Spectator, the conservative science writer Matt Ridley reflects on the paradox that the left has claimed Darwin even though leftist political ideas contradict his basic teaching: “In the average European biology laboratory you will find fervent believers in the individualist, emergent, decentralized properties of genomes who prefer dirigiste determinism to bring order to the economy.”