e. that
acquired characters can be transmitted] would be forthcoming. The
transmission of mutilations has been frequently asserted, and has
been even recently again brought forward, but all the supposed
instances have broken down when carefully examined" (p. 390).
Here, then, we are told that proof of the occasional transmission of
mutilations would be sufficient to establish the fact, but on p. 267
we find that no single fact is known which really proves that
acquired characters can be transmitted, "_for the ascertained facts
which seem to point to the transmission of artificially produced
diseases cannot be considered as proof_." [Italics mine.] Perhaps;
but it was mutilation in many cases that Professor Weismann
practically admitted to have been transmitted when he declared that
Obersteiner had verified Brown-Sequard's experiments.
That Professor Weismann recognizes the vital importance to his own
theory of the question whether or no mutilations can be transmitted
under any circumstances, is evident from a passage on p.
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