Page 386 - In The Name Of Allah, The All-Merciful And Most Merciful

In the Name of Allah, The All-Merciful and Most Merciful

Lamarck believed that giraffes
evolved from such animals as
antelopes. In his view, the
necks of these grass-eating an-
imals gradually grew longer,
and they eventually turned into
giraffes. The laws of inherit-
ance discovered by Mendel in
1865 proved that it was impos-
sible for properties acquired
during life to be handed on to
subsequent generations.
Lamarck’s giraffe fairy tale was
thus consigned to the wastebin
of history.

high trees, their necks were
extended from generation
to generation.
Darwin also gave simi-
lar examples. In his book
The Origin of Species, for in-
stance, he said that some
bears going into water to
find food transformed themselves into whales over time. 8
However, the laws of inheritance discovered by Gregor
Mendel (1822-84) and verified by the science of genetics, which
flourished in the twentieth century, utterly demolished the leg-
end that acquired traits were passed on to subsequent genera-
tions. Thus, natural selection fell out of favor as an evolutionary
mechanism.

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