Hindu Achievements in Exact Science: A Study in the History of Scientific Development c21.9

c21.9

(3) Weisman's theory of "germinal continuity" is the greatest discovery of modern embryology. It is now held that "somatic" cells contribute absolutely nothing to the original germ-plasm, that no parent ever produces a germ cell, that the individual inherits nothing from his parents, but both he and they obtain their characteristics from a common source, and that the line of descent or inheritance is from germ-cell to germ-cell, not from parents.⁶⁷ This recent idea about the physical basis of inheritance brings out the distinction between germ-cells and body-cells (somatic). It was guessed to a certain extent by the Hindu biologists also in their controversy regarding the transmission of congenital deformities and constitutional diseases of parents to offspring.