Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- MEMOIR
- Hybridisation and Cross-breeding as a Method of Scientific Investigation
- Problems of Heredity as a subject for Horticultural Investigation
- An Address on Mendelian Heredity and its application to Man. Delivered before the Neurological Society, London, I. ii. 1906
- Gamete and Zygote. A Lay Discourse. The Henry Sidgwick Memorial Lecture, 1917
- Heredity and Variation in Modern Lights
- Presidential Address to the Zoological Section, British Association: Cambridge Meeting, 1904
- Presidential Address to the Agricultural Subsection, British Association: Portsmouth Meeting, 1911
- Presidential Address to the British Association, Australia: (a) Melbourne Meeting, 1914. (b) Sydney Meeting, 1914
- The Methods and Scope of Genetics. Inaugural Lecture delivered 23 October 1908. Cambridge
- Biological Fact and the Structure of Society. The Herbert Spencer Lecture, 28 February 1912. Oxford
- Science and Nationality. Presidential Address delivered at the Inaugural Meeting of the Yorkshire Science Association
- Common-sense in Racial Problems. The Galton Lecture
- Evolutionary Faith and Modern Doubts. Address to American Association for the Advancement of Science. Toronto, 1922
- Progress in Biology. An Address delivered March 12, 1924, on the occasion of the Centenary of Birkbeck College, London
- EDUCATIONAL ESSAYS
- REVIEWS
- Evolution for Amateurs. A review of The Evolution Theory
- Heredity in the Physiology of Nations. A review of The Principles of Heredity
- Huxley and Evolution
- APPENDIX
- INDEX OF PERSONS
- INDEX OF SUBJECTS
- PLATES I-III (Figs. 1-6) to Mendelian Heredity and its application to Man
Evolution for Amateurs. A review of The Evolution Theory
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 September 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- MEMOIR
- Hybridisation and Cross-breeding as a Method of Scientific Investigation
- Problems of Heredity as a subject for Horticultural Investigation
- An Address on Mendelian Heredity and its application to Man. Delivered before the Neurological Society, London, I. ii. 1906
- Gamete and Zygote. A Lay Discourse. The Henry Sidgwick Memorial Lecture, 1917
- Heredity and Variation in Modern Lights
- Presidential Address to the Zoological Section, British Association: Cambridge Meeting, 1904
- Presidential Address to the Agricultural Subsection, British Association: Portsmouth Meeting, 1911
- Presidential Address to the British Association, Australia: (a) Melbourne Meeting, 1914. (b) Sydney Meeting, 1914
- The Methods and Scope of Genetics. Inaugural Lecture delivered 23 October 1908. Cambridge
- Biological Fact and the Structure of Society. The Herbert Spencer Lecture, 28 February 1912. Oxford
- Science and Nationality. Presidential Address delivered at the Inaugural Meeting of the Yorkshire Science Association
- Common-sense in Racial Problems. The Galton Lecture
- Evolutionary Faith and Modern Doubts. Address to American Association for the Advancement of Science. Toronto, 1922
- Progress in Biology. An Address delivered March 12, 1924, on the occasion of the Centenary of Birkbeck College, London
- EDUCATIONAL ESSAYS
- REVIEWS
- Evolution for Amateurs. A review of The Evolution Theory
- Heredity in the Physiology of Nations. A review of The Principles of Heredity
- Huxley and Evolution
- APPENDIX
- INDEX OF PERSONS
- INDEX OF SUBJECTS
- PLATES I-III (Figs. 1-6) to Mendelian Heredity and its application to Man
Summary
To Professor Weismann the gratitude of naturalists is ever due for two excellent services. He it was who first taught us to distinguish the “soma”, or body, from the germ, thus ridding evolutionary science of the distracting belief that the experience of the organism is transmitted to its offspring. Formerly “use and disuse” were good enough answers to any troublesome conundrum of adaptation. Weismann's demand for evidence that in a single case such effects were transmitted brought this vague reasoning to an end. The inheritance of acquired characters was then seen to be an assumption needing independent proof, and, when proof was called for, there was no reply that a critical mind could accept as valid. How much laborious argumentation collapsed when this keystone was withdrawn we need not now recall; but those who are now constructing a sound science of heredity on the basis of physiological fact know that it was by Weismann's thorough demolition that their ground was cleared.
It was, moreover, through his ingenious speculations as to the mechanism of heredity that efforts were concentrated on a determination of the exact processes by which germ cells are formed. Whatever be the interpretation, the visible facts are now known, a direct consequence of Weismann's stimulus and initiative, which will bear fruit hereafter.
But even with this record well in mind, it is impossible to pass a lenient judgment on The Evolution Theory. It should have appeared thirty years ago. Then Natural Selection was a new idea.
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- Information
- William Bateson, NaturalistHis Essays and Addresses Together with a Short Account of His Life, pp. 449 - 455Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009