L'origine delle specie (ed. 2)
- Lingua:
- inglese
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- Scelta o opera parziale
- Autorialità:
- Scritta dall'autore
- Stato del testo:
- Nessun rumore di scansione rilevato (misura automatica su tutto il testo, non verificata a mano)
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- ~170.000 parole · 804 passi
Cita quest'opera
- APACharles Darwin. (n.d.). On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection [L'origine delle specie (ed. 2)]. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/it/works/charles-darwin/on-the-origin-of-species-by-means-of-natural-selection
- MLACharles Darwin. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection [L'origine delle specie (ed. 2)]. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/it/works/charles-darwin/on-the-origin-of-species-by-means-of-natural-selection.
- ChicagoCharles Darwin. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection [L'origine delle specie (ed. 2)]. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/it/works/charles-darwin/on-the-origin-of-species-by-means-of-natural-selection.
Riferimento all’edizione riprodotta. SigPhi è la riproduzione digitale. Anno, editore e traduttore compaiono quando noti; «n.d.» indica un anno sconosciuto.
Di che cosa tratta
Come nascono le specie senza che nessuno le progetti: la selezione naturale — più discendenti di quanti ne sopravvivano, piccole variazioni ereditabili, tempo immenso — come meccanismo di tutta la diversità vivente.
Contesto e storia
Pubblicato nel novembre 1859, e esaurito il primo giorno. Darwin aveva covato l'idea per vent'anni, spaventato dalle sue conseguenze, e si decise a pubblicare solo quando Alfred Russel Wallace gli inviò la stessa teoria dalla Malesia. Evitò deliberatamente l'essere umano — «molta luce sarà gettata sull'origine dell'uomo», è tutto ciò che scrisse —, ma tutti capirono. Nessun libro di scienza ha cambiato tanto il modo in cui la specie umana vede sé stessa dentro la natura, e il dibattito che aprì non si è ancora chiuso.
Contesto editoriale, non una fonte citabile: a differenza dei passi dell'opera, questi dati non si possono verificare sul corpus.
will almost certainly entail changes in the mature animal. In monstrosities, the correlations between quite distinct parts are very curious; and many instances are given in Isidore Geoffroy St. Hilaire's great work on this subject. Breeders believe that long limbs are almost always accompanied by an elongated head. Some instances of correlation are quite whimsical: thus {12} cats with blue eyes are invariably deaf; colour and constitutional peculiarities go together, of which many remarkable cases could be given amongst animals and plants. From the facts collected by Heusinger, it appears that white sheep and pigs are differently affected from coloured individuals by certain vegetable poisons. Hairless dogs have imperfect teeth: long-haired and coarse-haired animals are apt to have, as is asserted, long or many horns; pigeons with feathered feet have skin between their outer toes; pigeons with short beaks have small feet, and those with long beaks large feet. Hence, if man goes on selecting, and thus augmenting, any peculiarity, he will almost certainly unconsciously modify other parts of the structure, owing to the mysterious laws of the correlation of growth. The result of the various, quite unknown, or dimly seen laws of variation is infinitely complex and diversified. It is well worth while carefully to study the several treatises published on some of our old cultivated plants, as on the hyacinth, potato, even the dahlia, &c.; and it is really surprising to note the endless points in structure and constitution in which the varieties and sub-varieties differ slightly from each other. The whole organisation seems to have become plastic, and tends to depart in some small degree from that of the parental type. Any variation which is not inherited is unimportant for us. But the number and diversity of inheritable deviations of structure, both those of slight and those of considerable physiological importance, is endless. Dr.…