38 DARWINISM TO-DAY. 



Spencer, is evidently the atrophied rudiment of a bone once 



much larger. It weighs now about one ounce, less than a 



millionth of the weight of the whole body. 



Spencer's ex- 

 ample of the Let us suppose that when it weighed two 



^Jak ft e ounces an individual had a femur which by 

 variational chance weighed but one ounce. 

 What advantage over other whales would the difference give 

 it? What fraction of the daily nourishment would this ad- 

 vantageous variation permit the fortunate whale to add to its 

 stored fat instead of spending it on an extra ounce of useless 

 femur? Who would dare claim that this variation would 

 aid in success in the struggle for existence ? And yet this is 

 the argument for the reduction of useless organs through 

 the influence of natural selection. Roux and Weismann, 

 realising the absurdity of the argument, have put forward 

 two theories, one called the "battle of the parts" and the 

 other the "theory of germinal selection" to aid the selection 

 theory to explain the degeneration and reduction of organs. 

 The reader will find these theories explained in chapter viii. 

 Every student of systematic zoology or botany has a keen 

 realisation, too, of the fact that a majority of the distinguish- 

 ing characters which he recognises in the vari- 

 Many species ous species and genera that come under his 



characters of no . 



-utility, eye are of a sort that reveal to him no trace of 



particular utility or advantage. Indeed he can 

 go farther and express, to himself at least, his conviction 

 that many of these slight but constant specific differences 10 

 can actually have no special advantageousness about them. 

 One's experience as an observer of nature and one's common 

 sense combine to protest against that easy and sweeping 

 answer of the Darwinians : "shall 'poor blind man' say what 

 characteristic, however slight and insignificant, is or is not 

 of advantage in the great complex of nature ?" As the 

 whole question after all resolves itself into one for which 

 "poor blind man" is attempting to find an answer satisfying 



