Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Preface
- Contents
- LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
- CHAPTER I WHAT ARE “SPECIES” AND WHAT IS MEANT BY THEIR “ORIGIN”
- CHAPTER II THE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE
- CHAPTER III THE VARIABILITY OF SPECIES IN A STATE OF NATURE
- CHAPTER IV VARIATION OF DOMESTICATED ANIMALS AND CULTIVATED PLANTS
- CHAPTER V NATURAL SELECTION BY VARIATION AND SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST
- CHAPTER VI DIFFICULTIES AND OBJECTIONS
- CHAPTER VII ON THE INFERTILITY OF CROSSES BETWEEN DISTINCT SPECIES AND THE USUAL STERILITY OF THEIR HYBRID OFFSPRING
- CHAPTER VIII THE ORIGIN AND USES OF COLOUR IN ANIMALS
- CHAPTER IX WARNING COLORATION AND MIMICRY
- CHAPTER X COLOURS AND ORNAMENTS CHARACTERISTIC OF SEX
- CHAPTER XI THE SPECIAL COLOURS OF PLANTS: THEIR ORIGIN AND PURPOSE
- CHAPTER XII THE GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF ORGANISMS
- CHAPTER XIII THE GEOLOGICAL EVIDENCES OF EVOLUTION
- CHAPTER XIV FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEMS IN RELATION TO VARIATION AND HEREDITY
- CHAPTER XV DARWINISM APPLIED TO MAN
- INDEX
CHAPTER I - WHAT ARE “SPECIES” AND WHAT IS MEANT BY THEIR “ORIGIN”
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 August 2010
- Frontmatter
- Preface
- Contents
- LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
- CHAPTER I WHAT ARE “SPECIES” AND WHAT IS MEANT BY THEIR “ORIGIN”
- CHAPTER II THE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE
- CHAPTER III THE VARIABILITY OF SPECIES IN A STATE OF NATURE
- CHAPTER IV VARIATION OF DOMESTICATED ANIMALS AND CULTIVATED PLANTS
- CHAPTER V NATURAL SELECTION BY VARIATION AND SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST
- CHAPTER VI DIFFICULTIES AND OBJECTIONS
- CHAPTER VII ON THE INFERTILITY OF CROSSES BETWEEN DISTINCT SPECIES AND THE USUAL STERILITY OF THEIR HYBRID OFFSPRING
- CHAPTER VIII THE ORIGIN AND USES OF COLOUR IN ANIMALS
- CHAPTER IX WARNING COLORATION AND MIMICRY
- CHAPTER X COLOURS AND ORNAMENTS CHARACTERISTIC OF SEX
- CHAPTER XI THE SPECIAL COLOURS OF PLANTS: THEIR ORIGIN AND PURPOSE
- CHAPTER XII THE GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF ORGANISMS
- CHAPTER XIII THE GEOLOGICAL EVIDENCES OF EVOLUTION
- CHAPTER XIV FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEMS IN RELATION TO VARIATION AND HEREDITY
- CHAPTER XV DARWINISM APPLIED TO MAN
- INDEX
Summary
The title of Mr. Darwin's great work is—On the Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection and the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. In order to appreciate fully the aim and object of this work, and the change which it has effected not only in natural history but in many other sciences, it is necessary to form a clear conception of the meaning of the term “species,” to know what was the general belief regarding them at the time when Mr. Darwin's book first appeared, and to understand what he meant, and what was generally meant, by discovering their “origin.” It is for want of this preliminary knowledge that the majority of educated persons who are not naturalists are so ready to accept the innumerable objections, criticisms, and difficulties of its opponents as proofs that the Darwinian theory is unsound, while it also renders them unable to appreciate, or even to comprehend, the vast change which that theory has effected in the whole mass of thought and opinion on the great question of evolution.
The term “species” was thus defined by the celebrated botanist De Candolle: “A species is a collection of all the individuals which resemble each other more than they resemble anything else, which can by mutual fecundation produce fertile individuals, and which reproduce themselves by generation, in such a manner that we may from analogy suppose them all to have sprung from one single individual.”
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- DarwinismAn Exposition of the Theory of Natural Selection, with some of its Applications, pp. 1 - 13Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009