Zum Thema Evolution:
Al-Jahiz (in Arabic الجاحظ) (real name Abu Uthman Amr ibn Bahr al-Kinani al-Fuqaimi al-Basri) (born in Basra, c. 781 – December 868 or January 869) was a famous Arab scholar, believed to have been an Afro-Arab of East African descent.[4][5] He was an Arabic prose writer and author of works on Arabic literature, biology, zoology, history, early Islamic philosophy, Islamic psychology, Mu'tazili theology, and politico-religious polemics.
Kitab al-Hayawan (Book of Animals)
The Kitab al-Hayawan is an encyclopedia of seven volumes of anecdotes, poetic descriptions and proverbs describing over 350 varieties of animals. It is considered as the most important work of al-Jahiz.
In the Book of Animals, al-Jahiz first speculated on the influence of the environment on animals and developed an early theory of evolution. Al-Jahiz considered the effects of the environment on the likelihood of an animal to survive, and first described the struggle for existence [6] and an early theory on natural selection.[7] Al-Jahiz' ideas on the struggle for existence in the Book of Animals have been summarized as follows:
"Animals engage in a struggle for existence; for resources, to avoid being eaten and to breed. Environmental factors influence organisms to develop new characteristics to ensure survival, thus transforming into new species. Animals that survive to breed can pass on their successful characteristics to offspring."[8]
Al-Jahiz was also the first to discuss food chains, and wrote the following example of a food chain:[9]
"The mosquitoes go out to look for their food as they know instinctively that blood is the thing which makes them live. As soon as they see the elephant, hippopotamus or any other animal, they know that the skin has been fashioned to serve them as food; and falling on it, they pierce it with their proboscises, certain that their thrusts are piercing deep enough and are capable of reaching down to draw the blood. Flies in their turn, although they feed on many and various things, principally hunt the mosquito ... All animals, in short, can not exist without food, neither can the hunting animal escape being hunted in his turn."
He was also an early adherent of environmental determinism and explained how the environment can determine the physical characteristics of the inhabitants of a certain community. He used his theories on natural selection and environmental determinism to explain the origins of different human skin colors, particularly black skin, which he believed to be the result of the environment. He cited a stony region of black basalt in the northern Najd as evidence for his theory:[10]
"[It] is so unusual that its gazelles and ostriches, its insects and flies, its foxes, sheep and asses, its horses and its birds are all black. Blackness and whiteness are in fact caused by the properties of the region, as well as by the God-given nature of water and soil and by the proximity or remoteness of the sun and the intensity or mildness of its heat."
In the 11th century, al-Khatib al-Baghdadi accused al-Jahiz of having plagiarized parts of his work from the Kitāb al-Hayawān of Aristotle,[11] but modern scholars have noted that there was only a limited Aristotelian influence in al-Jahiz's work, and that al-Baghdadi may have been unacquainted with Aristotle's work on the subject.[12] In particular, there is no Aristotelian precedant for al-Jahiz's ideas on topics such as natural selection, environmental determinism and food chains.
Wikipedia: Jahiz
