Evolution in Modern Thought

Evolution in Modern Thought,
by

Ernst Haeckel and J. Arthur Thomson and August Weismann This
eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no
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Title: Evolution in Modern Thought
Author: Ernst Haeckel J. Arthur Thomson August Weismann
Release Date: August 29, 2007 [EBook #22430]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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EVOLUTION IN MODERN
THOUGHT

BY HAECKEL, THOMSON, WEISMANN
AND OTHERS

THE MODERN LIBRARY
PUBLISHERS :: :: NEW YORK
* * * * *

CONTENTS
I DARWIN'S PREDECESSORS
J. Arthur Thomson, Professor of Natural History in the University of
Aberdeen
II The Selection Theory
August Weismann, Professor of Zoology in the University of Freiburg
(Baden)
III HEREDITY AND VARIATION IN MODERN LIGHTS
W. Bateson, Professor of Biology in the University of Cambridge
IV "THE DESCENT OF MAN"
G. Schwalbe, Professor of Anatomy in the University of Strassburg
V CHARLES DARWIN AS AN ANTHROPOLOGIST
Ernst Haeckel, Professor of Zoology in the University of Jena
VI MENTAL FACTORS IN EVOLUTION

C. Lloyd Morgan, Professor of Psychology at University College,
Bristol
VII THE INFLUENCE OF THE CONCEPTION OF EVOLUTION
ON MODERN PHILOSOPHY
H. Höffding, Professor of Philosophy in the University of Copenhagen
VIII THE INFLUENCE OF DARWIN UPON RELIGIOUS
THOUGHT
Rev. P. H. Waggett
IX DARWINISM AND HISTORY
J. B. Bury, Regious Professor of Modern History in the University of
Cambridge
X DARWINISM AND SOCIOLOGY
C. Bouglé, Professor of Social Philosophy in the University of
Toulouse, and Deputy-Professor at the Sorbonne, Paris
* * * * *

EVOLUTION IN MODERN THOUGHT
I
DARWIN'S PREDECESSORS
BY J. ARTHUR THOMSON
Professor of Natural History in the University of Aberdeen
In seeking to discover Darwin's relation to his predecessors it is useful
to distinguish the various services which he rendered to the theory of
organic evolution.

(I) As everyone knows, the general idea of the Doctrine of Descent is
that the plants and animals of the present day are the lineal descendants
of ancestors on the whole somewhat simpler, that these again are
descended from yet simpler forms, and so on backwards towards the
literal "Protozoa" and "Protophyta" about which we unfortunately know
nothing. Now no one supposes that Darwin originated this idea, which
in rudiment at least is as old as Aristotle. What Darwin did was to make
it current intellectual coin. He gave it a form that commended itself to
the scientific and public intelligence of the day, and he won widespread
conviction by showing with consummate skill that it was an effective
formula to work with, a key which no lock refused. In a scholarly,
critical, and pre-eminently fair-minded way, admitting difficulties and
removing them, foreseeing objections and forestalling them, he showed
that the doctrine of descent supplied a modal interpretation of how our
present-day fauna and flora have come to be.
(II) In the second place, Darwin applied the evolution-idea to particular
problems, such as the descent of man, and showed what a powerful
organon it is, introducing order into masses of uncorrelated facts,
interpreting enigmas both of structure and function, both bodily and
mental, and, best of all, stimulating and guiding further investigation.
But here again it cannot be claimed that Darwin was original. The
problem of the descent or ascent of man, and other particular cases of
evolution, had attracted not a few naturalists before Darwin's day,
though no one [except Herbert Spencer in the psychological domain
(1855)] had come near him in precision and thoroughness of inquiry.
(III) In the third place, Darwin contributed largely to a knowledge of
the factors in the evolution-process, especially by his analysis of what
occurs in the case of domestic animals and cultivated plants, and by his
elaboration of the theory of Natural Selection which Alfred Russel
Wallace independently stated at the same time, and of which there had
been a few previous suggestions of a more or less vague description. It
was here that Darwin's originality was greatest, for he revealed to
naturalists the many different forms--often very subtle--which natural
selection takes, and with the insight of a disciplined scientific
imagination he realised what a mighty engine of progress it has been

and is.
(IV) As an epoch-marking contribution, not only to Ætiology but to
Natural History in the widest sense, we rank the picture which Darwin
gave to the world of the web of life, that is to say, of the inter-relations
and linkages in Nature. For the Biology of the individual--if that be not
a contradiction in terms--no idea