On the Genesis of Species (Paperback)


Excerpt: ...to see how external 166 conditions can have produced, or even tended to have produced them. For example, we may take the migration of one eye of the sole to the other side of its head. What is there here either in the darkness, or the friction, or in any other conceivable external cause, to have produced the first beginning of such an unprecedented displacement of the eye? Mr. Spencer has beautifully illustrated that correlation which all must admit to exist between the forms of organisms and their surrounding external conditions, but by no means proved that the latter are the cause of the former. PLEURONECTIDAE, WITH THE PECULIARLY PLACED EYE IN DIFFERENT POSITIONS. Some internal conditions (or in ordinary language some internal power and force) must be conceded to living organisms, otherwise incident forces must act upon them and upon non-living aggregations of matter in the same way and with similar effects. If the mere presence of these incident forces produces so ready a response in animals and plants, it must be that there are, in their case, conditions disposing and enabling them so to respond, according to the old maxim, Quicquid recipitur, recipitur ad modum recipientis, as the same rays of light which bleach a piece of silk, blacken nitrate of silver. If, therefore, we 167 attribute the forms of organisms to the action of external conditions, i.e. of incident forces on their modifiable structure, we give but a partial account of the matter, removing a step back, as it were, the action of the internal condition, power, or force which must be conceived as occasioning such ready modifiability. But indeed it is not at all easy to see how the influence of the surface of the ground or any conceivable condition or force can produce the difference which exists between the ventral and dorsal shields of the carapace of a tortoise, or by what differences of merely external causes the ovaries of the two sides of the body can be made equal in a bat and..

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Excerpt: ...to see how external 166 conditions can have produced, or even tended to have produced them. For example, we may take the migration of one eye of the sole to the other side of its head. What is there here either in the darkness, or the friction, or in any other conceivable external cause, to have produced the first beginning of such an unprecedented displacement of the eye? Mr. Spencer has beautifully illustrated that correlation which all must admit to exist between the forms of organisms and their surrounding external conditions, but by no means proved that the latter are the cause of the former. PLEURONECTIDAE, WITH THE PECULIARLY PLACED EYE IN DIFFERENT POSITIONS. Some internal conditions (or in ordinary language some internal power and force) must be conceded to living organisms, otherwise incident forces must act upon them and upon non-living aggregations of matter in the same way and with similar effects. If the mere presence of these incident forces produces so ready a response in animals and plants, it must be that there are, in their case, conditions disposing and enabling them so to respond, according to the old maxim, Quicquid recipitur, recipitur ad modum recipientis, as the same rays of light which bleach a piece of silk, blacken nitrate of silver. If, therefore, we 167 attribute the forms of organisms to the action of external conditions, i.e. of incident forces on their modifiable structure, we give but a partial account of the matter, removing a step back, as it were, the action of the internal condition, power, or force which must be conceived as occasioning such ready modifiability. But indeed it is not at all easy to see how the influence of the surface of the ground or any conceivable condition or force can produce the difference which exists between the ventral and dorsal shields of the carapace of a tortoise, or by what differences of merely external causes the ovaries of the two sides of the body can be made equal in a bat and..

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Product Details

General

Imprint

Rarebooksclub.com

Country of origin

United States

Release date

October 2012

Availability

Supplier out of stock. If you add this item to your wish list we will let you know when it becomes available.

First published

October 2012

Authors

Dimensions

246 x 189 x 5mm (L x W x T)

Format

Paperback - Trade

Pages

98

ISBN-13

978-1-153-75696-9

Barcode

9781153756969

Categories

LSN

1-153-75696-X



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