Читать книгу Principles of Microbial Diversity - James W. Brown - Страница 33

The earliest forms of evolutionary thought had each species (up to but not including humans) moving up the “evolutionary ladder,” a climbable form of the chain of being. Evolution, in this view, was linear and progressive; species evolved from one rung to the next as an effect of a progressive force (Fig. 2.2).

Although the notion of an evolutionary ladder is pre-Darwinian and hopelessly incorrect, we are discussing it here because this scheme is firmly embedded in modern biological unconscious thought. You even hear the term “evolutionary ladder” used fairly often by research scientists who actually know better (at least, one hopes they do). The terms “higher” and “lower” eukaryotes, and “missing link,” which are in common use, are relics of this view.