Kevin Mundo
1. I think an individual who had one of the greatest influences on Darwin' development of his theory Natural Selection was Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. He has somewhat of a positive influence towards Darwin's ideas because he too believed that evolution occurred and proceeded in accordance with natural laws which was similar to what Darwin had said with Natural Selection which stated that those animals that were better equipped with traits that adapted to the society were selected naturally by nature to survive and have better access to resources due to their stronger genes.
2. Jean-Baptiste Lamarck contributed to the scientific community because he was one of the early proponents of the idea that evolution occurred and proceeded in accordance with natural laws, which was something similar to what Darwin was trying to explain with Natural Selection. Lamarck also gave the term biology a broader meaning and he established the theory of inheritance of acquired characteristics, which was called soft inheritance. They both thought life had changed slowly over time and was still changing over time.
3. The bullet points that can be related to Jean-Baptiste Lamarck are the ones that say "if the environment changes, the traits that are helpful or adaptive to that environment will be different," and "Who gets better access to these limited resources?" as well as "Organisms with better access to resources will be more successful in their reproductive efforts." This all relates to Jean's theory of Soft Inheritance as well as his belief that evolution occurred due to and according with natural laws. This strongly supported Darwin's views and could have been a strong reason why Darwin believed in Natural Selection. Although they both had very similar ideas they also had very different ideas as well.
4. At first Darwin was hesitant to present his ideas to the world and it took him about 23 years to build a good foundation on his ideas and his thoughts. So maybe Darwin still would have developed his theory of natural selection but Lamarck definitely had an impact on him gaining confidence and then sharing his concept with the world. So I think yes, Lamarck had a positive impact on Darwin and his theory at the time because he was another person who believed somewhat what Darwin believed.
5. The attitude of the church affected Darwin and the publication of his book in many ways. First of all since what he believed kind of contradicted and went against what the church believed he knew he could be looked down upon and his reputation as a naturalist and coming from of a family of physicists and scientist, would be ruined. Darwin was afraid this would happen so he withheld his concept from the public for quite some while. If he was wrong he knew it would be embarrassing so he waited until he was more certain and got ideas and concepts from others that were very similar like Lamarck's theory.
Hello!
ReplyDeleteI also agree on the importance of Lamarck's ideas and what inspiration they may have given Darwin. Though we cannot ask Darwin personally who imprinted on him the most, Lamarck's staple laws and ideas play a large role in Darwin's theory relating to adaptations.
I think it's also important to know that Lamarck's observations and laws came before Darwin's time; that he was inspired by a scientist who made these discoveries many years prior. Though Lamarck's ideas may have been faulty in some areas, Darwin seemed to use them as a foundation for his own thoughts, so I completely agree with what you have said!
I appreciate that you mentioned Lamarck's thoughts on the natural law. When you mention Lamarck asking the question of "How does a species get better access to resources" as well as the relation of resource gain contributing to population growth, the way you worded it was excellent. Darwin could not have founded the theory without the perspective of Lamarck and his works.
ReplyDeleteIn general, you have good information on Lamarck's theory, but you don't explain how it is different from Darwin's theory. You are careful to recognize the similarities. What are the differences that meant that Lamarck was wrong but Darwin was correct?
ReplyDeleteI agree with the bullet point on the environment. This was a key point in Lamarck's theory, namely how an organism would change its behavior in response to a changing environment, resulting in a physical change.
The points on resources are not actually applicable to Lamarck as he didn't pull in the issue of competition for resources as a driving force of his mechanism. These are extensions of Malthus contribution to Darwin's (and Wallace's) theory.
There are two other points that could be attributed to Lamarck as well. One is that the traits must be heritable. Both Darwin and Lamarck recognized this crucial point, otherwise, traits couldn't get passed on reliably. Finally, both recognized the importance of reproduction in the process.
A point that is important because Lamarck and Darwin argued in direct opposition to each other is the idea that "Individuals don't evolve, populations do". Lamarck actually argued that individuals DO evolve. Darwin's mechanism didn't predict individual evolution as it acted on existing variation in the population. You can only see evolutionary change at the level of the population across generations, not within generations in an individual.
No one would argue that Lamarck had a positive impact on Darwin's work, and I also agree that Darwin could well have developed his theory without Lamarck. To suggest otherwise it perhaps placing too much importance on Lamarck's contribution and not enough importance on those who contributed more directly and positively to Darwin's ideas, such as Lyell and Malthus.
Very good explanation for the possible reasons why Darwin delayed publication for more than 20 years, in relation to the repercussions he and his family might have experienced as a result of the church's influence.