Darwin, and After Darwin, Volume 3 of 3: Post-Darwinian Questions: Isolation and Physiological Selection — John Shaqi
Darwin, and After Darwin, Volume 3 of 3: Post-Darwinian Questions: Isolation and Physiological SelectionRomanes, George John
Science
Darwin, and After Darwin, Volume 3 of 3: Post-Darwinian Questions: Isolation and Physiological Selection
Romanes, George John
Evolution (Biology); Heredity
4. The next point to be noted is, that the cumulative divergence of type
thus induced can take place only in as many different lines as there are
different _cases_ of isolation. This is a point which Mr. Gulick has not
expressly noticed; but it is one that ought to be clearly recognized.
Seeing that isolation secures the breeding of similar forms by exclusion
(immediate or eventual) of those which are dissimilar, and that only in
as far as it does this can it be a factor in organic evolution, it
follows that the resulting segregation, even though cumulative, can only
lead to divergence of organic types in as many directions as there are
cases of isolation. For any one group of intergenerants only _serial_
transformation is possible, even though the transformation be cumulative
through successive generations in the single line of change. But there
is always a probability that during the course of such _serial
transformation in time_, some other case of isolation may supervene, so
as to divide the previously isolated group of intergenerants into two or
more further isolated groups. Then, of course, opportunity will be
furnished for _divergent transformation in space_--and this in as many
different lines as there are now different homogamous groups.
That this must be so is further evident, if we reflect that the
evolutionary power of isolation depends, not only on the _preventing_ of
intercrossing between the isolated portion of a species and the rest of
that species, but also upon the _permitting_ of intercrossing between
all individuals of the isolated portion, whereby the peculiar average of
qualities which they as a whole present may be allowed to assert itself
in their progeny--or, if the isolation has been from the first
discriminate, whereby the resulting homogamy may thus be allowed to
assert itself. Hence any one case of either species of isolation,
discriminate or indiscriminate, can only give rise to what Mr. Gulick
has aptly called "monotypic evolution," or a chain-like series of types
arising successively in time, as distinguished from what he has called
"polytypic evolution," or an arborescent multiplication of types
arising simultaneously in space.
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