quinta-feira, janeiro 01, 2004

Like a whale

"In North America the black bear was seen by Hearne swimming for hours with widely open mouth, thus catching, like a whale, insects in the water. Even in so extreme a case as this, if the supply of insects were constant, and if better adapted competitors did not already exist in the country, I can see no difficulty in a race of bears being rendered, by natural selection, more and more aquatic in their structure and habits, with larger and larger mouths, till a creature was produced as monstrous as a whale."

Darwin, Charles, "The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or, The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Strugle for Life", On the origin and transitions of organic beings with peculiar habits and structure


"In North America the black bear was seen by [Samuel] Hearne swimming for hours with widely open mouth, thus catching, like a whale, insects in the water. Even in so extreme a case as this, if the supply of insects were constant, and if better adapted competitors did not already exist in the country, I can see no difficulty in a race of bears being rendered, by natural selection, more and more aquatic in their structure and habits, with larger and larger mouths, till a creature was produced as monstrous as a whale."
Darwin, Charles; "The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection" (On the origin and transitions of organic beings with peculiar habits and structure)