Pangénesis y vitalismo científico

Abstract

The provisional hipothesis of the pangenesis has been interpreted as a materialist and mechanistic explanation of heritance, surely because Darwin himself considered that the gemmules were corporal particles; nevertheless, analyzing the principles in which these suppositions on pangenesis rest we can appreciate how they are interlocked with notions of scientific vitalism, mainly Blumenbach́s vitalist principle nisus formativus.