i 7 2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



to those arising in a certain way, the onus lies on them of prov- 

 ing that those otherwise arising are not inheritable. Leaving 

 this counter-question aside, however, it will suffice if we ask 

 another counter-question. It is asserted that the dwindling of 

 organs from disuse is due to the successive survivals in posterity 

 of individuals in which the organs had varied in the direction of 

 decrease. Where now are the facts supporting this assertion ? 

 Not one has been assigned or can be assigned. Not a single case 

 can be named in which 'panmixia is a proved cause of diminution. 

 Even had the deductive argument for panmixia been as valid as 

 we have found it to be invalid, there would still have been re- 

 quired, in pursuance of scientific method, some verifying induc- 

 tive evidence. Yet though not a shred of siich evidence has been 

 given, the doctrine is accepted with acclamation, and adopted as 

 part of current biological theory. Articles are written and let- 

 ters published in which it is assumed that this mere speculation, 

 justified by not a tittle of proof, displaces large conclusions previ- 

 ously drawn. And then, passing into the outer world, this unsup- 

 ported belief affects opinion there too ; so that we have recently 

 had a Right Honorable lecturer who, taking for granted its truth, 

 represents the inheritance of acquired characters as an exploded 

 hypothesis, and thereupon proceeds to give revised views of 

 human affairs. 



Finally, there comes the reply that there are facts proving the 

 inheritance of acquired characters. All those assigned by Mr. 

 Darwin, together with others such, remain outstanding when we 

 find that the interpretation by panmixia is untenable. Indeed, 

 even had that hypothesis been tenable, it would have been inap- 

 plicable to these cases ; since in domestic animals, artificially fed 

 and often overfed, the supposed advantage from economy can not 

 be shown to tell; and since, in these cases, individuals are not 

 naturally selected during the struggle for life in which certain 

 traits are advantageous, but are artificially selected by man with- 

 out regard to such traits. Should it be urged that the assigned 

 facts are not numerous, it may be replied that there are no per- 

 sons whose occupations and amusements incidentally bring out 

 such facts; and that they are probably as numerous as those 

 which would have been available for Mr. Darwin's hypothesis, 

 had there been no breeders and fanciers and gardeners who, in 

 pursuit of their profits and hobbies, furnished him with evidence. 

 It may be added that the required facts are not likely to be 

 numerous, if biologists refuse to seek for them. 



See, then, how the case stands. Natural selection, or survival 

 of the fittest, is almost exclusively operative throughout the vege- 

 tal world and throughout the lower animal world, characterized 

 by relative passivity. But with the ascent to higher types of 



