Wesley R. Elsberry
Posts: 4991
Joined: May 2002
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Pangenesis was Darwin's proposed mechanism of inheritance. He proposed the existence of tiny "pangenes" or "gemmules" which would carry information about somatic cells to germ cells, where somehow this information would be incorporated into the gametes. This would have permitted the sort of Lamarckian inheritance that Darwin thought was correct, allowing for "use and disuse" to influence traits in succeeding generations. See Darwin's The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication for the original explication of the hypothesis.
The mode of evolution is neutral evolution. In the 1960s, gel electrophoresis results showed widespread "protein polymorphism" -- and lots of it. As the technology has gotten better, scientists have examined genetic sequences, and the amount of variation seen there indicates that many times more change is due to neutral evolution than to natural selection. I asked Richard Dawkins about this via calling in to a radio talk show he was on in the fall of 2004, and he said that when one looks at the molecular level, most of what one sees is neutral change, but that at the level of observable morphological traits, most of those are due to natural selection. Darwin said otherwise in his introduction to the Origin of Species: Furthermore, I am convinced that Natural Selection has been the main but not exclusive means of modification.
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Darwin was wrong when he claimed (without proof) that jesus never lived and that god had no part to play in the creation of man. How bout that?
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It'll be cool when we get some citations to where Darwin said that. I've put up references in what I discussed above; now it is your turn.
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"You can't teach an old dogma new tricks." - Dorothy Parker
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