436 The American Naturalist. [May, 
general philosophical interpretation of evolution is now inde- 
pendently announced from an.entirely different field of work 
by Driesch. We may waive our applications of these facts to 
theories, but let us not turn our backs to the facts themselves! 
THE OUTLOOK For INDUCTION. 
The problems I have described are the main ones. No longer 
misled by palingenic variation under revival of an ancient 
environment, let us set ourselves rigidly to the analysis and 
investigation of the responses of the organism to. new environ- 
ment, in all four stages of development. Are these responses 
adaptive? Is there a teleological mechanism in living matter 
as Pflüger” has expressed it? Is this mechanism in the adult 
reflected and accumulated in the germ? 
One most hopeful outlook is in Experimental Evolution. 
Bacon in his Nova Atlantis three centuries ago projected an 
institute for such experiments, which when it finally material- 
izes should be known as the Baconian Institute. The late Mr. 
Romanes proposed to establish such a station at Oxford, and 
went so far as to institute an important series of private ex- 
periments, which were unfortunately interrupted by his death. 
What we wish to ascertain is, whether new ontogenic varia- 
tions become phylogenic, and how much time this requires. 
The conditions of a crucial experiment may be stated as fol- 
lows: An organism A, with an environment or habit A, is 
transferred to environment or habit B, and after one or more 
generations exhibits variations B; this organism is then re- 
transferred to environment or habit A, and if it still"exhibits, 
even for single generation, or transitorily, any of the varia- 
tions B, the experiment is a demonstration of the inheritance 
of ontogenic variations. These are virtually the conditions 
rightly demanded by Neo-Darwinians for an absolute demon- 
stration, either of Lamarck’s or Buffon’s principle of the in- 
heritance of embryogenic or somatogenic variation but it is 
important to observe that such return to a former environment 
is very rare in a state of nature.. There is no record that. such 
2 Pflüger: Die teleologischen Mechanik der lebenden Natur. Bonn. 1877. 
