Patrick Geddes Revisiting Ideas Behind the Evolution of Sex :: Essays Papers

digest of the Reading and Its Impact in HistoryPatrick Geddes Revisiting Ideas Behind the evolution of charge During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, scientists armed with important discoveries and unfermented techniques began to reevaluate the theories of race and sex. One of the important thinkers of this time was the Scottish life scientist Patrick Geddes. Like many other scientists of the time, Geddes applied Darwinian evolutionary surmisal to other non-scientific contexts. Although Geddes is more commonly associated with social ideologies such as economics, education, and urbanization, this interrogative will be limited to the impact of his ideologies regarding societal gender roles and sex-determination on society and the scientific community. The book entitled Sex, co-written by Patrick Geddes and J. Arthur Thomson was published in 1914 and concentrated on these issues of sex. The authors extrapolated on initial claims from their first b ook together, The Evolution of Sex by utilizing more current discoveries. The foundations for the ideas inherent in both books stem from August Weismanns germ-plasm theory and Darwins evolutionary theory. commit of the latter theory is unsurprising since Geddes was the protg of T.H. Huxley, often referred to as Darwins bulldog because of his infamous advocation of Darwinian theories. Nonetheless, the importance of Geddes work on societal gender roles and sex-determination is evidenced through his descriptions that allude to male superiority, while maintaining the muckle that women are not defective.. Geddes work described the evolution of sex to point societal gender roles as naturally caused. The conception of roles as naturally caused implies fixed or invariable innate differences between the sexes which, through evolution, is do more apparent in higher organisms. This is central to the belief bottom of the inning Geddes basis of gender roles. In the second chapter of his book Sex, Geddes begins by attributing conditional relation to the microbial act of conjugation where two Vorticella connect to partially rallying genetic material before they separate. He describes these unicellular organisms as, Analogues of males and females among multi-cellular organisms they are homogeneous ova and spermatozoa which have not formed bodies (Geddes, 23). Here, Geddes is correlating the act of conjugation to the act of sexual intercourse by the coming together and the exchange of genetic information.