ne Ohio I\^a/w7'afc/, 



PUBLISHED BY 



The Biological Club of the Ohio Slate University. 

 Volume IV. DECEMBER, 1903. No. 2. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



Morse — The Transmission of Ac(inircil ('liariioter- 25 



SCHAFFNER — Notes Oil ttie Nutation of Plants 30 



ScHAFFNER-Poisonons and Other Injnrions Plants of Ohio (continiK'd) :!2 



OsBoKN - Aradidae of Ohio oi! 



OsiiORN— A Subterranean Koot— Infesting Fulgorid -ll 



OsBOKN— New Species of Ohi;> Fnl.^oridae -14 



News and Notes 17 



CoBERLY— MeetiuL's of the Biologieal (;inb -17 



THE TRANSMISSION OF ACQUIRED CHARAC- 

 TERS.- 



Max Morse. 



I shall invite your attention this evening to a theme which like 

 the poor, "Ye have ahvaj-s with you." It is the old question 

 whether the changes in the growing organism, or the adult, pro- 

 duced by the direct action of the environment about it, are carried, 

 through heredity, to the offspring. Jean Lamark first used the 

 term " acquired character" to designate characters such as these 

 and to him are we to look for the first clear statement of the case. 

 By this it is not to be understood that the idea of the transmis- 

 sion of acquired characters arose with Lamark. No great gener- 

 alization ever arose or ever can arise with one man alone. The 

 attribution of the idea of the transmission of acquired characters 

 to Lamark falls in the same category as attributing evolution to 

 Darwin. And as Darwin first attempted to ansivcr the question 

 how organisms change, Lamark first raised the question how the}' 

 change at all. The Greeks in the dawn of history accounted for 

 diversity in living forms by the direct effect of environment. 

 Indeed, not until the time of Darwin was there a rival theory 

 advanced. And we can easily see the reason for this when we 

 consider the directness and naivete of the transmission theory as 

 against the negative action of selection. The histor}- of science 

 shows that hypotheses created as explanations of natural phe- 

 nomena are at iirst simple and that it is only when the phenomena 

 nre better understood that the h}'potlieses become more complex. 

 The Corpuscular Theory of light in Newton's sense sufficed for a 



=■'■ Presidential Address, Biological Club, Nov. 2, 1903. 



