Lecture 2: History and Evidence

Question 1

Define animate cosmos

Answer 1

Universe is a living, harmonious whole, with a Soul

Question 2

Define demiurge

Answer 2

a creative power that organized the universe (not a God-like creator)

Question 3

What is the “great chain of beings”?

Answer 3

Arranged according “to the degree to which they are infected with potentiality”, expressed in their form at birth (humans at top)

Question 4

What is essentialism (eidos)?

Answer 4

Idealized form; essential properties define ‘group membership’

Question 5

What is Larmarck’s mechanism? (vitalism)

Answer 5

Giraffe’s ‘need’ to reach higher vegetation stimulates transmission of ‘longer’ neck to offspring, transmission of traits by “pangenesis”

Question 6

What is Darwinian mechanism

Answer 6

Long necked-girrafes leave more offspring with genes for long necks, transmission of traits through the ‘germ-plasm’ (gametes)

Question 7

Define homology

Answer 7

similarity of a structure due to descent from a common ancestor, it is evidence for evolution since it shows similar structures being used in different ways explained by descent from common ancestor