Book Title: Jainism Precepts and Practice
Author(s): Puranchand Nahar, Krishnakant Ghosh
Publisher: Caxton Publications

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Page 159
________________ Heredity THE KARMA PHENOMENOLOGY. and adaptation to the environment as working out these differencees in the spheres of organic evolution. But such eminent biologists as Dr. August Weisman and a man good many others of equal authority and repute deny that hereditary tendencies of the parents predominate in one; of the grand-father in another, those of the grandmother in the third and the like. Not this alone. Weisman goes further and reasons out that the acquired tendencies are never trans mitted to the offsprings He believes in the 'continuity of germ-plasm' and is of opinion that the inequalities are caused by the differences in germ-cells'. "I have called this substance germ-plasm", says Weisman, "and have assumed that it possesses a highly coniplex structure, conferring upon it the power of developing into a complex organism" Heredity-Vol I. p. 170). Dr. Weis 1 man states further "there is therefore conti nuity of the germ-plasm from one generation to another. One might represent the germ-plasm by the metaphor of a long creeping root-stock from which plants arise at intervals, these latter representing the 289 Dr. Weisand 37

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