Evolutionary genetics / edited by D.L. Jameson.

Date:
[1977], ©1977
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Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Credit: Evolutionary genetics / edited by D.L. Jameson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Editor's Comments on Linkages Two other cases come to mind where evolutionary genetics contro¬ versies were settled by adversary proceedings. In the late 1920s, Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryant decided the legal fate of Mr. Scopes of Tennessee and the educational fate of many school children throughout the country in proceedings lost by both sides. In 1939 a meeting of the Lenin All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sci¬ ences pitted N. I. Vavilov and T. D. Lysenko in adversary proceedings on the issue of Mendelian versus the inheritance of acquired characters. This event was followed by death for thousands and hunger for the people of the USSR and a political struggle not yet resolved (Medvedev, 1969). Each of the above proceedings concerned the nature of inheri¬ tance and of evolution, and none of them can claim to expose man or scientist in his highest glory. While the adversary process may be an unfortunate accompaniment of the controversial issue, it need not be so. Issues develop which reflect the divergent opinions of the scholars and the attention which the con¬ troversy draws provides for the dissemination of the information, and for the clarification of positions, and allows other individuals to partici¬ pate in the development of the field. Controversy tends to be exhibited at significant points in the development of thought and thus identifies the focus for both individuals and agencies to direct resources. The direct descendant of evolutionary genetics is population genetics, where issues have played a continuing role. Crow and Denniston are preparing a Benchmark volume. Issues in Population Genetics, which considers the development of this field. Another direct outgrowth of early evolu¬ tionary studies was the development of the understanding of the species and the processes by which species arise. This literature is sampled in the Benchmark volume Genetics of Speciation (Vol. 9). The belief in environmental influences on inheritance traced at the beginning of this volume from early times to Darwin persists in various forms and with divergent results. Kammerer (1924) designed a series of experiments to demonstrate the existence of the inheritance of acquired characters only to have the results obscured by inadequate procedures by his assistants. He committed suicide. Lysenko proposed that vernalization of seeds would produce inherited changes which would improve crops. Of course chemical. X-ray, and other radiation from the environment does produce genetic change, but these changes are not responsive to the inducing agent. That is, radiation does not produce mutations which are resistant to radiation but rather produces a variety of mutations of many kinds, some of which, by chance, reach proportions high enough to be retained or even fixed in the population. The study of mutations, first described and named by de Vries, re¬ ceived considerable stimulus by the discoveries of H. J. Muller that X- rays would increase the rates of mutations. Later identification of the role of chemical mutagens by Auerbach provided a basis for an expand- 321