Gregor Mendel: An Opponent of Descent with Modification

Olby R. C. , “Mendel no Mendelian?”, History of science, xvii (1979), 53–72, and Origins of Mendelism (London, 1985), 240. While much of what Dr Olby attributes to me in his book is accurate, the following statement is not: “Indeed, it would seem, on Callender's view, that the behaviour of Pisum was a disappointment to him [i.e. Mendel], only mitigated by his discovery of the constant forms among the hybrid progeny which showed new combinations of characters. This is indeed a revolutionary reinterpretation of the Versuche, which we consider Callender has taken too far.” Neither this view, nor anything approximating to it, was contained in the very brief summary of my conclusions which I sent to Dr Olby in 1974. Nevertheless this statement has since appeared elsewhere, e.g. in Meijer O. G. , “The essence of Mendel's discovery”, Proceedings of the symposium “The past, present, and future of genetics” (Brno, 1982).

Olby , Origins of Mendelism, 67.

One of the few is Nordenskiöld E. , The history of biology: A survey (New York, 1927), 591–2.

Linnaeus C. , Critica botanica (Leyden, 1737), trans. by Hort A. and printed for the Ray Society (London, 1938), 150.

Linnaeus C. , Somnus plantarum (Uppsala, 1755).

Linnaeus C. , Disquisitio de sexu plantarum, cited in Roberts H. F. , Plant hybridisation before Mendel (New York, 1965), 23.

Linnaeus C. , Systema vegetabilium, cited in Porter C. L. , The taxonomy of flowering plants (San Francisco, 1959), 62–63.

Koelreuter J. G. , “Vorläufige Nachricht von einegen das Geschlecht der Pflanzen betreffenden Versuchen und Beobachtungen nebst Fortsetzungen 1, 2, und 3” (1761–66), in Ostwald's Klassiker der exakten Wissenschaften , 41, 1a, 30, (Leipzig, 1893), cited in Roberts , op. cit. (ref. 6), 42.

ibid., 52–53.

Gaertner C. F. , Versuche und Beobachtungen über die Bastarderzeugung im Pflanzenreich (Stuttgart, 1849) 14–15.

ibid., 249–50.

ibid., 249–50.

ibid., 421–2.

Darwin C. , The effects of cross and self fertilisation in the vegetable kingdom, 2nd edn (London, 1888), 27.

Darwin C. , The origin of species (London, 1859), reprinted by Pelican Books (London, 1981), 266–7.

ibid., 267–8.

Darwin C. , The variation of animals and plants under domestication (London, 1868), ii, 252.

Darwin , Origin of species (ref. 15), 84.

Sturtevant A. H. , A history of genetics (New York, 1965). Meijer's O. G. description of Mendel as “a dissident evolutionist” (ref. 1) also fails to distinguish between descent with modification and crossing without mutation.

Darwin , Variation of animals (ref. 17), ii, 264.

Mendel G. , “Ueber einige aus künstlicher Befruchtung gewonnenen Hieracium-Bastarde”, Verhandlungen des naturforschenden Vereines in Brünn, viii (1870), 26–31, transl. and reprinted in Bateson W. , Mendel's Principles of Heredity (Cambridge, 1909), 363–4.

Mendel G. , “Versuche über Pflanzen-Hybriden”, Verh. Naturf. Ver. Brünn, iv (1866), 3–47, transl. and reprinted with notes by Bateson W. in Sinnott E. Dunn L. , and Dobzhansky T. , Principles of genetics, 5th edn (New York, 1958), 420.

ibid., 421.

ibid., 435.

ibid., 440–1.

ibid., 427.

ibid., 427.

ibid., 427.

ibid., 428–9.

ibid., 441.

ibid., 442–3.

Fisher R. A. , “Has Mendel's work been rediscovered”, Annals of science, i (1936), 115–37, p. 118.

De Beer G. , “Mendel, Darwin and Fisher (1865–1965)”, Notes and records of the Royal Society, xix (1964), 192–226, p. 208.

Krizenecky J. , Fundamenta genetica: The revised edition of Mendel's classic paper with a collection of 27 original papers published during the Rediscovery Era (Prague, 1965), 26–27.

Gedda L. , “Mendel's attitude to evolution”, Proceedings of the Gregor Mendel Colloquium (Brno, 1970), 157–9, p. 158.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 22), 438.

ibid., 438.

ibid., 439.

Orel V. , “The enigma of hybrid constancy in Mendel's Pisum paper perceived by Alfred Blomberg in 1872”, Hereditas, lxxiii (1973), 41–44, p. 42.

Heimans J. , “A recently discovered note on hybridisation in Mendel's handwriting”, Folia Mendeliana, v (1970), 13–24, p. 17.

ibid., 16.

Hoffmann H. , Untersuchungen zur Bestimmung des Werthes von Species und Varietät; Ein Beitrag zur Kritik der Darwin'schen Hypothese (Giessen, 1869), 112.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 22), 440.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 21), 246.

Mendel G. , “Gregor Mendel's Briefe an Carl Nägeli, 1866–1873”, Abhandlungen der Mathemalisch-Physischen Klasse der Königlich Sächsischen Gessellschaft der Wissenschaften, xxix (1905), 189–265. Transl. and reprinted in “The birth of genetics”, a supplement to Genetics, (1950), 3.

Sturtevant , op. cit. (ref. 19).

Mayr E. , The growth of biological thought: Diversity, evolution and inheritance (Cambridge, Mass., 1982), 723.

Nägeli C. , Ueber die systematische Behandlung der Hieracien rücksichtlich der Mittelformen (Sitzung der math.–phys. Classe vom 10 März, 1866).

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 45), 3.

Nägeli C. , “Intermediate forms in plants”, The gardener's chronicle and agricultural gazette (10 April 1867), 405.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 21), 364.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 45), 10 and 11.

ibid., 11–12.

ibid., 15.

ibid., 16.

ibid., 17.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 21), 366.

Dunn L. C. , A short history of genetics (New York, 1965), 14.

Cetl I. , “Mendel's hybridisation experiments with other plants than Pisum”, Folia biologia, xiv (1973), 3–42.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 45), 16.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 21), 365.

ibid., 366.

ibid., 365.

ibid., 366–7.

ibid., 367–8. In his recent paper, “Mendel's forerunners: Koelreuter, Wichura and Gaertner”, Folia mendeliana, xxi (1986), 49–67, Olby R. C. also questions whether Mendel accurately represented the views of Wichura. V. Orel made a similar point to me during a conversation in 1974, although, as far as I am aware, nothing of this matter appeared in print at that time.

Iltis H. , Gregor Johann Mendel, Leben, Werk und Wirklung (Berlin, 1924), transl. and published as Life of Mendel (London, 1966), 174.

Cetl , op. cit. (ref. 59), 14.

Mendel , op. cit. (ref. 45), 20.

ibid., 20–21.

ibid., 22.

ibid., 24.

ibid., 29.

ibid., 3.

Nägeli C. , Die Individualität in der Natur mit besonderer Berücksichtigung des Pflanzenreiches (Zurich, 1856), 70. Cited in Iltis, op. cit. (ref. 66), 186. Such Statements make nonsense of the claim by Gavin De Beer and others that Mendel's investigation could not have been inspired by a concern with the evolution controversy since Darwin did not make his view publicly known until 1858, the year before publication of the Origin. Darwin himself acknowledged that the essential principles of Natural Selection had been advanced as early as the 1820s, while the concept of descent with modification had been current decades before that.

Mayr E. , “The recent historiography of genetics”, Jounal of the history of biology, vi (1973), 125–54, p. 125.