Darwin, and After Darwin, Volumes 1 and 3: An Exposition of the Darwinian Theory and a Discussion of Post-Darwinian QuestionsRomanes, George John
Science
Darwin, and After Darwin, Volumes 1 and 3: An Exposition of the Darwinian Theory and a Discussion of Post-Darwinian Questions
Romanes, George John
Evolution (Biology); Heredity
Nevertheless, that there are great distinctions between true sexual
propagation and this foreshadowing of it in conjugation I do not deny.
The question, however, is whether they be so great as to justify any
argument against an historical continuity between them. What, then, are
these remaining distinctions? Briefly, as we have seen, they are the
extrusion from egg-cells of polar bodies, and the occurrence, both in
egg-cells and their products (tissue-cells), of the process of
karyokinesis. But, as regards the polar bodies, it is surely not
difficult to suppose that, whatever their significance may be, it is
probably in some way or another connected with the high specialization
of the functions which an egg-cell has to discharge. Nor is there any
difficulty in further supposing that, whatever purpose is served by
getting rid of polar bodies, the process whereby they are got rid of was
originally one of utilitarian development--i. e. a process which at its
commencement did not betoken any difference of kind, or breach of
continuity, between egg-cells and cells of simpler constitution.
Lastly, with respect to karyokinesis, although it is true that the
microscope has in comparatively recent years displayed this apparently
important distinction between unicellular and multicellular organisms,
two considerations have here to be supplied. The first is, that in some
of the Protozoa processes very much resembling those of karyokinesis
have already been observed taking place in the nucleus preparatory to
its division. And although such processes do not present quite the same
appearances as are to be met with in egg-cells, neither do the
karyokinetic processes in tissue-cells, which in their sundry kinds
exhibit great variations in this respect. Moreover, even if such were
not the case, the bare fact that nuclear division is not invariably of
the simple or direct character in the case of all Protozoa, is
sufficient to show that the distinction now before us--like the one last
dealt with--is by no means absolute. As in the case of sexual
propagation, so in that of karyokinesis, processes which are common to
all the Metazoa are not wholly without their foreshadowings in the
Protozoa. And seeing how greatly exalted is the office of egg-cells--and
even of tissue-cells--as compared with that of their supposed ancestry
in protozoal cells, it seems to me scarcely to be wondered at if their
specializations of function should be associated with corresponding
peculiarities of structure--a general fact which would in no way
militate against the doctrine of evolution. Could we know the whole
truth, we should probably find that in order to endow the most primitive
of egg-cells with its powers of marshalling its products into a living
army of cell-battalions, such an egg-cell must have been passed through
a course of developmental specialization of so elaborate a kind, that
even the complex processes of karyokinesis are but a very inadequate
expression thereof.
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