{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 30/e01/p024","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"The key to this explanation Haeckel found by seeking out the evidences in the individual development of the higher organisms—in their ontogeny—showing that they really originated from lower forms of life. When one follows out the form-development of one of the higher organisms from the earliest germ up to its fully developed condition, the different stages are found to present configurations corresponding to the forms of lower organisms.[^2] At the outset of his individual existence man and every other animal is a simple cell. This cell divides itself, and from it arises a germinal vesicle consisting of many cells. From that develops the so-called “cup-germ,” the two-layered gastrula, which has the shape of a cup- or jug-like body. Now, the lower plant-animals (sponges, polyps, and so on) remain throughout their entire existence on a level of development which is equivalent to this cup-germ. Haeckel remarks thereupon: “This fact is of extraordinary importance. For we see that man, and generally every vertebrate, runs rapidly, in passing, through a two-leaved stage of formation, which in these lowest plant-animals is maintained throughout life” ( *Anthropogenesis*). Such a parallelism between the developmental stages of the higher organisms and the developed lower forms may be followed out through the entire evolutionary history. Haeckel clothes this fact in the words: “The brief ontogenesis or development of the individual is a rapid and abbreviated repetition, a condensed recapitulation of the prolonged phylogenesis or development of the species.” This sentence gives expression to the so-called fundamental biogenetic law. Why then do the higher organisms in the course of their development come to forms which resemble lower ones? The natural explanation is that the former have developed themselves out of the latter; that therefore every organism in its individual development shows us one after another the forms which have clung to it as heirlooms from its lower ancestors.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"I. Haeckel and His Opponents","site_heading":null,"date":null,"location":null,"word_count":309,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/30/e01/p024","alignment_confidence":"medium","alignment_reason":"beads:length","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"not_established","translator":null,"identified_edition":"TwoEssays","book_title":null,"publisher":null,"publisher_inferred":false,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Articles/GA030/English/TwoEssays/TwoEss_e01.html","evidence":null,"reason":"no_translator_named","note":"Neither the lecture's own page nor rsarchive's lecture list names a translator for it. No translator is established for this lecture: nothing at the level of the lecture names one. Do not attribute this English to a translator, and do not borrow a credit from another lecture of the volume. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/30/e01/p024"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/30/e01/p024","paragraph_aligned":true}],"german_anchor":{"de_prefix":"e01","de_passages":[{"locus":"GA 30/e01/p013","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/30/e01/p013"}],"bead_confidence":"medium","length_check":{"de_words":278,"en_words":309,"ratio":1.11,"partial":false},"correspondence":"established","note":"English passage numbering is edition-relative, so the same number need not name the same paragraph in the German. The German original passage(s) above are the edition-invariant anchor — fetch them (lang='de') to verify wording before quoting across editions."},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.14,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":17236,"original_word_count":15055,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"not_established","translator":null,"identified_edition":"TwoEssays","book_title":null,"publisher":null,"publisher_inferred":false,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Articles/GA030/English/TwoEssays/TwoEss_e01.html","evidence":null,"reason":"no_translator_named","note":"Neither the lecture's own page nor rsarchive's lecture list names a translator for it. No translator is established for this lecture: nothing at the level of the lecture names one. Do not attribute this English to a translator, and do not borrow a credit from another lecture of the volume. Cite the German for anything load-bearing.","warning":"No translator is recorded for this edition. An unattributed translation cannot be weighed as a witness: you cannot tell which hand made the choices in it. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 30/e01/p013"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"medium","note":"Every load-bearing name in the German counterpart appears in this English passage. That is a check on NAMES only: a translation can keep every name and still reverse who acts on whom, change a number, or soften a claim. Read the German for anything you intend to rest an argument on."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}