Essays in scientific synthesis / by Eugenio Rignano.

  • Eugenio Rignano
Date:
[1918]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Essays in scientific synthesis / by Eugenio Rignano. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    was welcomed at once by the majority of his scientific contemporaries, and in a short time absorbed the attention of the scientific world. It was certainly an advantage for Darwin to have at his disposal in support of his theory the whole body of English experiments in artificial selection in the plant and animal worlds, and in the uninterrupted creation of new varieties from a few initial domestic races. Further, as we know, Darwin was directly inspired by the volume which the economist Malthus had written on population. Now, this book had given rise to the bitterest polemics, and one result had been that the British public had been made already familiar with the ideas of the struggle for existence and natural selection. This naturally was of the utmost value in the diffusion of Darwin’s teaching. This is not the place to write a history of the doctrine of the evolution of species. It is sufficient to remember that Darwin did not deny the effects of use and disuse, but as factors in transformation he considered them of secondary importance, and laid stress on the selective factor alone. And thus it came about that although Darwin never mentioned the name of Lamarck, the French zoologist was drawn from his temporary oblivion and compared to, or rather contrasted with, the English naturalist, because he had, on the contrary, neglected the selective factor, and had pronounced the one only important factor to be the transmissibility of acquired modifications. Through this antagonism Lamarck reaped no small advantage from the notoriety his rival had obtained. Hence arose the two schools, the Neo-Lamarckians and
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