Life and matter : a criticism of Professor Haeckel's "Riddle of the universe" / by Sir Oliver Lodge.

Date:
1905
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Life and matter : a criticism of Professor Haeckel's "Riddle of the universe" / by Sir Oliver Lodge. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    Darwin's theory of the natural origin of species at once gave us the solution of the mystic ' problem of creation,' the great ' question of all questions'—the problem of the true character and origin of man himself (p, 28) \cf. p. 19 above]. It is a great deal more than that patient observer and deep thinker Charles Darwin ever claimed, nor have his wiser disciples claimed it for him. It is familiar that he explained how variations once arisen would be clinched, if favourable in the struggle, by the action of heredity and survival ; but the source or origin of the variations themselves he did not explain. Do they arise by guidance or by chance .? Is natural selection akin to the verified and practical processes of artificial selection ? or is it wholly alien to them and influenced by chance alone ? The latter view can hardly be considered a complete explanation, though it is verbally the one adopted by Professor Haeckel, and it is of interest to see what he means by chance :— Since impartial study of the evolution of the world teaches us that there is no definite aim and