pangenesisn.

1868 C. Darwin Variation Animals & Plants II. 359 I venture to advance the hypothesis of Pangenesis, which implies that the whole organization, in the sense of every separate atom or unit, reproduces itself. Hence ovules and pollen-grains—the fertilized seed or egg, as well as buds—include or consist of a multitude of germs thrown off from each separate atom of the organism.

1892 J. A. Thomson Outl. Zool. 65 This hypothesis has been repeatedly modified, but, except in the general sense that the body may influence its reproductive cells, ‘pangenesis’ is discredited by most biologists.

1913 Encycl. Relig. & Ethics VI. 597/2 Heredity and variation, whatever their exact nature were throughout living things held to be phenomena of essentially the same character. This view Darwin sought to express in his well-known hypothesis of Pangenesis.

1992 A. Desmond & J. Moore Darwin 531 Even christening his theory ruffled domestic feathers: trying to convey his idea that every bodily cell buds off a representative part of itself, he called it ‘pangenesis.’

1889 Bot. Gaz. 14 64 The hypothesis..is called by Prof. de Vries that of ‘intracellular pangenesis.’

1962 Amer. Naturalist 96 96 A second, even more important, difference between the theory of intracellular pangenesis and Darwin's hypothesis is that each pangene transmits but a single character,..whereas Darwin's gemmules were thought to serve as carriers for the whole set of characters found in a definite tissue or organ.

1999 Isis 90 241 Darwin was the most important proponent of the approach De Vries favored; he described his theory of intracellular pangenesis as a revision of Darwin's ideas.