Sukachev Institute of Forest Research, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Academgorodok, Krasnoyarsk 660036, Russia

Abstract

Neo-Darwinism is a result of synthesis of Darwinian concept of natural selection with Weismannian concept of germ plasm. The concept of germ plasm is based on a hypothesis that phenotypic traits are completely determined by genes. Hence, neo-Darwinism describes evolution as a process of alternation of gene frequencies under the effect of natural selection. This is an inadequate approach to the study of evolution. In the course of evolution, genes change their functions, whereas phenotypic characters change their corresponding genes. As a result, every step of evolutionary transformation changes the structure of phenotype-to-genotype correspondence. Therefore, phenotypic evolution cannot be described in genetic terms, the same as to human languages cannot be translated one into another whenever the meaning of words is constantly changing. Consequently, Weismannian germ-plasm concept adequately describes the relation of characters to genes only during stasis, but is inapplicable to evolution.