Old beliefs: `Pangenesis' & `Telegony' & more
 ---------------------------------------------


 Pangenesis - "all-producing" - a pet belief of Darwin's
    
 Darwin thought that tiny particles called `gemmules' were produced by body
 cells and that these eventually traveled to the sex organs and influenced
 future offspring.

 Important thing was - he thought these `gemmules' picked up on parents'
 activities and passed those temporary traits on to any children.

 That is, he thought skills or characteristics acquired during the life of
 the parent could be inherited by offspring

 reality note:
 now we'd call that sort of belief `Lamarckian' - and illogical.


 More - Darwin seriously speculated that these imaginary `gemmules' passed
 from male to female in sperm and so might be a reason for some women "coming
 to resemble their husbands".

 reality note:
 many women & men choose partners with the bone structure of their parent(s):
 hence couples can resemble each other later in life. Check any newspaper
 archives.  

 ---

 Telegony -  "offspring at a distance" - a belief held from before and through
 Victorian times.
    
 Some folk, including Darwin, believed that males could somehow pass on traits
 to later children of a woman, even though the children were fathered by another
 man!

 Unbelievably, Telegony was taught, and decreed as a fact in text books for
 up to 70 years without any real attempt at verification. No viable experiment
 was ever made, the idea being dropped from science fashion only when Mendel's
 basic logic began to dominate.
      
 ---

 More chauvinism from Darwin - in `The Origin of Species' he began a chapter
 on sexual selection :- "Man is more courageous, pugnacious, and energetic
 than woman and has more inventive genius".

 reality note:
 Disagree - when women have the chance of equal education they can outshine men,
 and have more scientific integrity - see www.perceptions.couk.com/greatest.html

 ---

 More of Darwin's chauvinism (& racism) - "Woman seems to differ from man in
 mental disposition ... these faculties are characteristic of the lower races,
 and therefore of a past and lower state of civilization." ("The Descent of Man -")

 reality note:
 Disagree - that's unscientific and untrue - see www.perceptions.couk.com/genes4.html
 
 ---

 Maybe see  www.perceptions.couk.com/uef/wallace.html for real `evolution'


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