PART IV 



HYPER-DARWINISM WEISMANN, KIDD 



CHAPTER XVIII 



A "FAIRY TALE OF SCIENCE"? 



An intenser assertion of struggle Not on ground of experiment ; evidence is 

 ambiguous On ground of a theory of heredity Darwin's theory (Pan- 

 genesis) assumed derivation of embryonic qualities from qualities and 

 tissues of parental organisms Use-inheritance possible or probable on this 

 view But "Atavism" forced the concession, some "gemmules" had 

 passed on undeveloped from earlier generations till they found their chance 

 Galton's figures for resemblance to ancestors Hence theories asserting 

 "continuity of the germ plasm" Parable of the Hierarchy Galton 

 ("Stirp") does not absolutely deny the possibility of use-inheritance 

 But in Weismann's earlier and more consistent views, founded on by Mr. 

 Kidd, amphimixis is the only cause of variation Extrusion of one of the 

 "polar bodies" securing (?) non-identity of all offspring of same pair 

 Permutations and combinations of qualities of unicellular organisms 

 Nature selecting fittest adults, and in them best germ plasm Parable of 

 the suckers Of the Nile No new quality arises, but amount of each 

 telling quality increases Qualities arose originally, Lamarck fashion, from 

 environment, when unicellular life lay open to its pressure Unicellular 

 organisms (propagating by fission) and germ plasm are potentially immortal 

 Correlation alleged between sex and (natural) death ; now sex is absent 

 from the unicellular world Natural selection might account for the 

 predominance (if not origin) of sex if Weismann would assume the necessary 

 competition Romanes alleges that natural selection might account for pre- 

 dominance of habit of dying natural death ; but would not death by violence 

 sufficiently prevent any race (immersed in the struggle) from falling into 

 wholesale decrepitude ? Origin of sex and death a mystery ; or " chance " 

 variation ! or effect of molecular constitution of germ plasm ! Weismann's 

 appeal to "natural selection," while he denies " struggle," is metaphysical 

 in the worst sense Recapitulation, and note of some of Weismann's 

 changes of opinion before 1893 Especially this change : ENVIRONMENT 

 MAY DO SOMETHING TO MODIFY GERM PLASM ! Making true use-inheritance 

 conceivable, though not inevitable Mr. Kidd is anachronous Panmixia, 

 the absence of natural selection, is held to involve indefinite retrogression ; 

 important ; questionable.; 



