Items related to The Inheritance of Acquired Characteristics
Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1914 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER XLVIII ENVIRONMENT AND DEVELOPMENT The biologists and physicians of today are inclined to underestimate the influence of the environment upon living beings and, on the other hand, to overestimate the effects of procreation. Only internal conditions are considered responsible for the development of the embryo, while the effectiveness of external conditions is almost denied, with the physical and mental characteristics of an individual irrevocably decided from the very start. Whatever future is held in store for the embryo and child remains supposedly unessential in comparison with the potentialities already contained in the generative cells of the parents and forebears. The main cause for the rejection of environment as a factor in development is the doubt with which the theory of the heredity of acquired characteristics is confronted. The question whether the effects of environment are hereditary is, to be sure, connected with, but essentially different from, the question whether the influences of environment affect the individual or its embryonic history at all. That this last question must be answered unconditionally in the affirmative cannot be contended by anybody now. The amount of proofs is so large that it seems superfluous to quote them (Chapter XXXVIII). Indubitably the quantity and quality of food, of light and air (oxygen, carbon-dioxide, humidity of the air, poisonous pollutions, such as dust, smoke, and illuminating gas), the extent and nature of exercise and daily labor, spiritual and mental impressions, make themselves powerfully felt in the life and the characteristics of the developed individual as well as in the one in the process of development. It is platitudinous to remark that the early childhood is more...
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About the Author
Dr. Paul Kammerer was born in Vienna in 1880. While on a lecture circuit in the United States and England, he became a sensation among the science community for his research on Lamarckian inheritance, being hailed by the New York Times as the next Darwin. He committed suicide in 1926 after fellow researchers accused him of forging his results.
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- PublisherTheclassics.Us
- Publication date2013
- ISBN 10 1230326863
- ISBN 13 9781230326863
- BindingPaperback
- LanguageEnglish
- Number of pages102
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