280 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [APRIL 
Another of the objections which have been urged against 
natural selection is that this theory rests altogether too largely on 
an unwarranted analogy with the process of artificial selection, 
although this supposed analogy was a very convincing argument 
in the hands of Darwin. ° This analysis shows how natural selection 
is weak in at least three out of four of the requirements in which 
developmental selection excels, and how a much closer parallel or 
analogy may be drawn between developmental selection and 
artificial selection. 
That there are many details which do not permit a close parallel 
between natural and artificial selection may further be illustrated. 
For example, the breeder in practicing mass selection, plants a 
large number of seeds in a uniform soil, and seeks to eliminate all 
other environmental differences wherever possible. Pure breeding 
in isolated cultures is possible, and at some definite stage when the 
seedlings come up, or as they mature, they may be measured and 
selected by very nearly the same standard of size and growth vigor, 
color, size of fruit, disease resistance, etc. Natural selection must 
necessarily be a much less methodical process. In nature, survival 
must be determined on the basis of a total or all round fitness. 
Very often this survival is purely fortuitous. Naturally dis- 
seminated seeds are less likely to germinate simultaneously in a 
uniform environment than planted seeds in a cultivated soil. 
If seedlings do not get an even start, are not growing in a uniform 
environment, are not measured up to the same standard, and the 
unselected are not always destroyed, survival by chance plays a 
very important réle, and their apparent competition cannot be 
one of the greatest consequence. This has been urged as a very 
serious objection to natural selection even as a highly efficient 
selective mechanism, aside from the question of its power in 
originating species. Obviously the mechanism of developmental 
selection is much better fitted to bring about a competitive form 
of selection. It may be considered more efficient even than 
artificial selection, where uniformity of environment is only approxi- 
mate, and the standards of selection depend upon the discriminative 
powers of the breeder. Finally, developmental selection makes 
possible a very early decision, which is doubtless a most valuable 
