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On Growth and Form
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{{Short description|Book by the Scottish D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson 1917}} {{good article}} {{Use dmy dates|date=November 2014}} {{Use British English|date=November 2014}} {{Infobox book <!-- |italic title = (see above) --> | name = ''On Growth and Form'' | image = On Growth and Form 1st Edition 1917 title page.jpg | caption = Title page of first edition | author = [[D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson]] | illustrator = Thompson | country = United Kingdom | subject = [[Mathematical biology]] | genre = Descriptive science | publisher = Cambridge University Press | pub_date = 1917 | pages = 793<br>1942 edition, 1116 | awards = [[Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal]] | oclc = | dewey = | congress = | wikisource = }} '''''On Growth and Form''''' is a book by the Scottish [[mathematical biology|mathematical biologist]] [[D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson]] (1860β1948). The book is long β 793 pages in the first edition of 1917, 1116 pages in the second edition of 1942. The book covers many topics including the effects of scale on the shape of animals and plants, large ones necessarily being relatively thick in shape; the effects of surface tension in shaping soap films and similar structures such as cells; the [[logarithmic spiral]] as seen in mollusc shells and ruminant horns; the arrangement of leaves and other plant parts ([[phyllotaxis]]); and Thompson's own method of transformations, showing the changes in shape of animal skulls and other structures on a [[Cartesian coordinate system|Cartesian grid]]. The work is widely admired by biologists, anthropologists and architects among others, but is often not read by people who cite it.<ref name=Ball/> [[Peter Medawar]] explains this as being because it clearly pioneered the use of [[Mathematical biology|mathematics in biology]], and helped to defeat mystical ideas of [[vitalism]]; but that the book is weakened by Thompson's failure to understand the role of [[evolution]] and evolutionary history in shaping living structures. [[Philip Ball]] and [[Michael Ruse]], on the other hand, suspect that while Thompson argued for physical mechanisms, his rejection of [[natural selection]] bordered on vitalism.
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