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Abstract
Genetic assimilation is often mixed up with the Baldwin effect. For Waddington, genetic
assimilation was both a phenomenon and a specific mechanism of adaptive evolution
which was grounded in the concept of canalization. This theoretical link between canalization
and genetic assimilation, which was pivotal in Waddington's view, has been weakened
since the early 1960s. The aim of the present article is to emphasize the specificity
and to reassess the possible radicality of Waddington's proposal. What he claimed
to have elaborated was an actual and genuine mechanism of inheritance of acquired
characters that did not rely on soft Lamarckian inheritance. Consequently his "theory"
of genetic assimilation, unlike the Baldwin effect, might not be as easily integrated
in the framework of the Modern Synthesis.