| 释义 |
Darwin|ˈdɑːwɪn|
The name of Charles Darwin (see Darwinian a. 2), used attrib. (also ellipt.) to designate a race of tulips with tall stems and large self-coloured flowers.
1889F. Darwin Let. 13 Apr. in E. H. Krelage Drie Eeuwen Bloembollenexport (1946) II. 553 Allow me to thank you for your courteous note in which you tell me of your wish to name after my father a new strain of tulips... I hope I shall see the ‘Darwin Tulips’ at Paris. 1891Gardeners' Chron. 4 July 10/3 The Darwin Tulips are of Flemish origin. a1916H. H. Munro Toys of Peace (1919) 237 The Darwin tulips haven't survived the fact that most of the cats of the neighbourhood held a parliament in the middle of the tulip bed. 1922F. M. Ford Let. 24 Oct. (1965) 145, 200 Darwin tulips. 1969Hay & Synge Dict. Garden Plants 368/2 The old tulips of the Dutch flower painters..are usually not so vigorous as the Darwins or Darwin hybrids.
b. Used in the possessive: see Darwinian a. 3.
Add:2. (Without cap. initial.) A proposed unit of rate of evolutionary change, equal to an increase or decrease in the size of some specified character by a factor of e per million years; one thousand millidarwins.
1949J. B. S. Haldane in Evolution III. 55/2 It may be found desirable to coin some word, for example a darwin, for a unit of evolutionary rate, such as an increase or decrease of size by a factor of e per million years, or, what is practically equivalent, an increase or decrease of 1/1000 per 1000 years. If so the horse rates would range round 40 millidarwins. 1970Nature 17 Jan. 296/2 From Homo erectus at Choukoutien to H. sapiens the rate of decrease in both upper and lower canines was nearly 1 darwin. 1983E. C. Minkoff Evolutionary Biol. xix. 321/2 The evolutionist J. B. S. Haldane has proposed that a relative change by a factor of e (the base of natural logarithms) per million years be known as a darwin. |