Why Didn’t Darwin Discover Mendel’s Laws?

Mendel solved the logic of inheritance in his monastery garden, and there is no more technology than Darwin's garden in the Tang House. So why can't Darwin do this? According to an article in the journal Biology, Darwin's background, influence and research focus gave him a point of view that prevented him from interpreting the evidence around him, even in his own work.

Jonathan Howard of the University of Cologne in Germany believes that Darwin's commitment to quantitative variation as a raw material for evolution means that he cannot see the logic of inheritance.

"Quantitative variation is at the heart of Darwin's evolution, and quantitative variation is the last place where you can see the cleansing of Mendelian inheritance," Howard said. "Darwin is in trouble and cannot see the laws of inheritance in continuous variation. The true importance of discontinuous variation cannot be seen, and the laws of heredity can be discerned."

Moravian Priest and scientist Gregor Mendel (Gregor Mendel (1822-1884) studied the distinct genetic traits of pea plants, and he grew up in the monastery gardens of Brno. Mendel said that Trait inheritance follows a simple law and is later named after him. Mendel's work was rediscovered in the early 20th century, laying the foundation for heredity. Mendel has a good understanding of biology, but he has a good understanding of physics, statistics. The understanding of learning and probability theory is far superior to Darwin.

During and after the Beagle voyage from 1831 to 1836, Darwin's view of biology was greatly influenced by the geologist Charles Lyle, which led Darwin to focus on the infinitely small differences between individuals. There are infinite advantages or disadvantages in survival. For Darwin, choosing these variants in hundreds of thousands of generations is a key process in evolution.

Darwin's book, "Flowers of Different Forms on the Same Plant," details the breeding experiments involving well-defined "unit" features, yielding clear data that can be interpreted as the "Mendel" ratio. But these did not get the support of Darwin. He insisted that because he believed that only the quantitative variation contributed to evolution, the inheritance rules were too complicated to be clearly analyzed.

Genetics and variation play a central role in Darwin's development of evolution through natural selection. He believes that variability is caused by random, quasi-physical events outside of environmental control, as we think today. But he has never been freed from the false belief that changes in environmental decisions can also be inherited. This is another victim of his focus on quantitative characteristics, height, weight, etc., who are strongly influenced by environmental influences.

After Mendel's paper was published, he arranged to send 40 copies to research institutions and famous biologists around the world. So far, 29 were found, and 11 of them were missing. We don't know if he arranged to send it to Darwin. There is no Mendel's paper in Darwin's collection. However, Darwin's collection contains the works of the German botanists Hoffman and Fogg, all of which mention Mendel's work. Hoffman's book introduces Mendel's work on page 52. Darwin wrote reviews on the 50th, 51st, 53th, 54th and 55th pages of the book. Only the 52nd page has no comments, indicating that he read I skipped this page. Fokker's book introduces Mendel's work on pages 108-111, but the pages of this book in Darwin's collection are not cut (the books that were published at the time were to be cut to read), indicating that Darwin did not read. this part. So Darwin probably didn't read Mendel's paper. If Darwin read Mendel's paper, would he realize its importance and think that it is the genetic law he has been looking for? Probably not, after all, the famous biologists who read Mendel's papers at that time ignored it, and the importance of Mendel's thesis was recognized only after more than 30 years of genetics. At this time, Darwin has been dead for 18 years.

This year marks the 210th anniversary of Darwin