[allmendream]

Heredity as a causative factor? A causative factor of what? His entire theory had to do with heredity of discernible traits. His theory of inheritance of fixed features contrasted GREATLY with Lamarck’s notion of acquired characteristics, and was hardly dependent upon it (but dependence upon other theory is not a weakness but a strength of a theory, in this case it contrasts with a discarded hypothesis of Lamarck, it is not dependent upon it). Weisman’s work was well after Darwin’s. Darwin’s work is dependent upon the same heredity of traits that Mendel described, that he formulated it without knowledge of Mendel is amazing, but it doesn’t reveal a weakness in his theory, just his incomplete knowledge. He was also unaware of Endogenous Retroviral Sequences, is this a weakness in his theory of Evolution by Natural Selection?

[RobbyS]

Beg Pardon? His theory was based on his observations while on the Beagle, and he assumed that the changes her observed were based on enviromental factors. I agree that he was studying populations,and the very title is misleading, but once one gets beyond what he actually said and into the uses made of his conclusions, natural selection was treated as a cause by his followers. He himself was caught up in this. His book the Descent of Man, is based on what? Wholly speculative.