I mean, it wasn’t a horrible theory at the time, and there was even some evidence for it (because the blacksmiths sons were very likely also blacksmiths, and thus also muscular). Even Darwin couldn’t explain HOW his theory evolution was actually supposed to function, he basically just said that it did.
Unfortunately, even after we discovered genes, people were still following Lamarck, and it’s offshoot, Lysonkoism got a LOT of people killed, despite by then being verifiably false.
There’s also epigenetics, which could be described as a very limited version of Lamarckism that actually holds water. That’s stretching definitions, but it does involve lifestyle conditions in one generation that affect future generations. So far, it’s mostly restricted to things like famine in one generation leading to increased fat storage in future generations, iirc.
I mean, it wasn’t a horrible theory at the time, and there was even some evidence for it (because the blacksmiths sons were very likely also blacksmiths, and thus also muscular). Even Darwin couldn’t explain HOW his theory evolution was actually supposed to function, he basically just said that it did.
Unfortunately, even after we discovered genes, people were still following Lamarck, and it’s offshoot, Lysonkoism got a LOT of people killed, despite by then being verifiably false.
There’s also epigenetics, which could be described as a very limited version of Lamarckism that actually holds water. That’s stretching definitions, but it does involve lifestyle conditions in one generation that affect future generations. So far, it’s mostly restricted to things like famine in one generation leading to increased fat storage in future generations, iirc.
interesting
Lamarkism is a basic correlation / causation mix-up to be fair.
So could have been Darwinism before the discovery of the genes.