Are the effects of use and disuse inherited? : an examination of the view held by Spencer and Darwin / William Paul Ball.

  • Ball, W. P. (William Platt)
Date:
1890
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Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: Are the effects of use and disuse inherited? : an examination of the view held by Spencer and Darwin / William Paul Ball. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    93/178 (page 77)
    TAMENESS OF BABBITS. 77 lowing considerations will show that the greater part, if not the whole, of the change must be attributed to selection rather than to the direct inheritance of acquired habit. (1) For a period which may cover thousands of generations, there has been an entire cessation of the natural selection which maintains the wildness (or excessive fear, caution, activity, &c.) so indis¬ pensably essential for preserving defenceless wild rabbits of all ages from the many enemies that prey upon them. (2) During this same extensive period of time man has usually killed off the wildest and bred from the tamest and most manageable. To some extent he has done this consciously. It is very conducive to successful breeding to keep only such as are quiet and tractable, says an authority on rabbits,^ and he enjoins the selection of the ^ E. S. Delamer on Pigeons and Rabbits, pp. 132, 103. For other points referred to, see pages 133, 102, 100, 95, 131.