{ "built": "2026-10-31T05:46:51.251Z", "rule": "Top 10 claims by dataset-resolvability testability score for each of the two thinkers whose claims carry that score (Darwin, Thompson), excluding claims that already have a directory under claim-tests/. Ties broken by id. Frozen before any agent run.", "source": "docs/claims.json", "excluded_already_tested": [ "thompson1917-ch03-10", "thompson1917-ch10-02", "thompson1917-ch11-06", "thompson1917-ch16-13" ], "claims": [ { "id": "darwin1859-ch09-03", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch09-03", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. IX: On the Imperfection of the Geological Record", "kind": "historical-inference", "label": "Denudation of the Weald implies roughly 300 million years since the late Chalk", "statement": "Assuming sea erosion of about one inch per century on a 500-foot cliff, the denudation of the Weald required about 300 million years, so far more than 300 million years have elapsed since the latter part of the Secondary period.", "quote": "At this rate, on the above data, the denudation of the Weald must have required 306,662,400 years; or say three hundred million years.", "testability": 0.945 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch12-08", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch12-08", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. XII: Geographical Distribution, continued", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Frogs, toads and newts are absent from oceanic islands", "statement": "Batrachians (frogs, toads and newts) are naturally absent from oceanic islands, not because conditions there are unsuitable (introduced frogs thrive) but because they and their spawn are killed by sea-water and so cannot cross the sea.", "quote": "Bory St. Vincent long ago remarked that Batrachians (frogs, toads, newts) have never been found on any of the many islands with which the great oceans are studded. I have taken pains to verify this assertion, and I have found it strictly true.", "testability": 0.883 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch12-02", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch12-02", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. XII: Geographical Distribution, continued", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Fresh-water fish species are not shared between distant continents", "statement": "The same species of fresh-water fish never occur in the fresh waters of distant continents, although within a continent fish species often range widely and irregularly, different river systems sharing some species but not others.", "quote": "In regard to fish, I believe that the same species never occur in the fresh waters of distant continents. But on the same continent the species often range widely and almost capriciously; for two river-systems will have some fish in common and some different.", "testability": 0.88 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch12-09", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch12-09", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. XII: Geographical Distribution, continued", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "No native terrestrial mammals on islands more than 300 miles from a continent", "statement": "No native terrestrial mammal inhabits any island more than about 300 miles from a continent or large continental island, even though small mammals thrive when introduced there, because terrestrial mammals cannot cross wide stretches of sea.", "quote": "as yet I have not found a single instance, free from doubt, of a terrestrial mammal (excluding domesticated animals kept by the natives) inhabiting an island situated above 300 miles from a continent or great continental island;", "testability": 0.871 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch01-09", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch01-09", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. I: Variation under Domestication", "kind": "historical-inference", "label": "Domestic dogs descend from several wild species", "statement": "Domestic dogs have probably descended from several distinct wild species rather than from a single one.", "quote": "from geographical and other considerations, I think it highly probable that our domestic dogs have descended from several wild species.", "testability": 0.86 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch01-10", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch01-10", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. I: Variation under Domestication", "kind": "historical-inference", "label": "All domestic pigeon breeds descend from the rock-pigeon", "statement": "All domestic pigeon breeds, however different, have descended from the rock-pigeon (Columba livia) and its geographical sub-species, not from several aboriginal wild stocks.", "quote": "I can feel no doubt that all our domestic breeds have descended from the Columba livia with its geographical sub-species.", "testability": 0.86 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch11-13", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch11-13", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. XI: Geographical Distribution", "kind": "historical-inference", "label": "The Glacial period was simultaneous across the whole world", "statement": "The Glacial period, which lasted a very long time at each place, was at least in part simultaneous across the whole world, or at least along broad longitudinal belts from pole to pole, so that global temperature was lower at the same time.", "quote": "If this be admitted, it is difficult to avoid believing that the temperature of the whole world was at this period simultaneously cooler.", "testability": 0.859 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch12-04", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch12-04", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. XII: Geographical Distribution, continued", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Oceanic islands have fewer species than equal continental areas", "statement": "Oceanic islands are inhabited by far fewer species of all kinds than continental areas of equal size, a difference not explained by physical conditions.", "quote": "The species of all kinds which inhabit oceanic islands are few in number compared with those on equal continental areas", "testability": 0.859 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch11-16", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch11-16", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. XI: Geographical Distribution", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Northern species naturalise far more often in the south than the reverse", "statement": "At the present day many European species have become naturalised and partly displaced the natives in La Plata and to a lesser degree in Australia, whereas extremely few southern-hemisphere species have become naturalised anywhere in Europe.", "quote": "Just in the same manner as we see at the present day, that very many European productions cover the ground in La Plata, and in a lesser degree in Australia, and have to a certain extent beaten the natives; whereas extremely few southern forms have become naturalised in any part of Europe,", "testability": 0.855 }, { "id": "darwin1859-ch12-10", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/darwin1859-ch12-10", "project": "darwin-origin", "thinker": "Charles Darwin", "work": "On the Origin of Species", "year": 1859, "chapter": "Ch. XII: Geographical Distribution, continued", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Bats occur on almost every island, often as endemic species", "statement": "Although terrestrial mammals are absent from oceanic islands, bats occur on almost every island, and remote islands often have their own endemic bat species, because bats can fly across wide spaces of sea and are then modified in their new homes.", "quote": "Though terrestrial mammals do not occur on oceanic islands, ærial mammals do occur on almost every island.", "testability": 0.85 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch03-05", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch03-05", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. III: The Rate of Growth", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Human stature grows fast in infancy, steadily in childhood, then quickens in the teens", "statement": "The human curve of growth in stature shows rapid increase in infancy, a long period of slower, nearly steady growth in early boyhood, a marked quickening in the early teens, and finally a gradual arrest as full height is reached.", "quote": "The curve of growth for length or stature in man indicates a rapid increase at the outset, that is to say during the quick growth of babyhood; a long period of slower, but still rapid and almost steady growth in early boyhood; as a rule a marked quickening soon after the boy is in his teens, when he comes to “the growing age”", "testability": 0.928 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch17-13", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch17-13", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. XVII: On the Theory of Transformations, or the Comparison of Related Forms", "kind": "historical-inference", "label": "Perissodactyls are more closely related to hares and rabbits than to other ungulates", "statement": "Since the rabbit's skull is derived from that of a primitive rhinoceros by a simple uniform downward flexure, the Perissodactyla are more closely related to the Leporidae than to other ungulates, and the Leporidae more closely to Perissodactyla than to other rodents.", "quote": "For my part, I would go further; for I think there is strong reason to believe that the Perissodactyles are more closely related to the Leporidae than the former are to the other Ungulates, or than the Leporidae are to the rest of the Rodentia.", "testability": 0.919 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch03-08", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch03-08", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. III: The Rate of Growth", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Boys and girls share a growth-velocity curve differing mainly in phase", "statement": "The curves of growth velocity in boys and girls are of very similar shape but differ in amplitude and especially in phase, the girl's adolescent acceleration beginning and ending earlier than the boy's.", "quote": "In short, throughout all this period, it is a very _similar_ curve in the two sexes; but it has its notable differences, in amplitude and especially in _phase_.", "testability": 0.913 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch15-01", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch15-01", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. XV: On the Shapes of Eggs, and of Certain Other Hollow Structures", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Eggs are prolate spheroids, never oblate", "statement": "Hard-shelled eggs, while often pointed, are never flattened or discoidal: they are prolate, never oblate, solids of revolution.", "quote": "It is an obvious but by no means negligible fact that the egg, while often pointed, is never flattened or discoidal; it is a prolate, but never an oblate, spheroid.", "testability": 0.895 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch04-13", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch04-13", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. IV: On the Internal Form and Structure of the Cell", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Chromosome numbers of germ-nuclei mostly lie between six and sixteen", "statement": "Although chromosome number is constant within a species, the range of numbers across plants and animals is small: few organisms have fewer than six chromosomes in the germ-nuclei and fewer still have more than sixteen.", "quote": "(as regards the germ-nuclei) few organisms have less than six chromosomes, and fewer still have more than sixteen", "testability": 0.888 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch03-07", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch03-07", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. III: The Rate of Growth", "kind": "mathematical-law", "label": "Weight tends to vary as the cube of linear dimensions during growth", "statement": "Whatever the law of increase in a linear dimension, volume and therefore weight tend to vary as the cube of linear dimensions, which mainly (though not wholly) explains why the human weight curve differs in shape from the stature curve.", "quote": "whatever be the law of increment in a linear dimension, the law of increase in volume, and therefore in weight, will be that these latter magnitudes tend to vary as the cubes of the linear dimensions.", "testability": 0.881 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch03-17", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch03-17", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. III: The Rate of Growth", "kind": "empirical-generalization", "label": "Plaice weight-length coefficient peaks near the size of sexual maturity", "statement": "In plaice the weight-length coefficient k = W/L^3 is not constant but rises to a maximum and then slowly declines with increasing size, the maximum falling near 30 cm, about the size at which sexual maturity begins.", "quote": "we see that _k_ is by no means constant, but steadily increases to a maximum, and afterwards slowly declines with the increasing size of the fish", "testability": 0.857 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch14-02", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch14-02", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. XIV: On Leaf-Arrangement, or Phyllotaxis", "kind": "prediction", "label": "Sunflower spirals intersect isogonally, rarely orthogonally", "statement": "Against Church, the spirals in a sunflower disc intersect isogonally (at a constant angle), and orthogonal intersection is only a particular and probably infrequent case.", "quote": "The spirals intersect isogonally, but orthogonal intersection would be only one particular case, and in all probability a very infrequent one, in the intersection of logarithmic spirals developed about a common pole.", "testability": 0.853 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch03-24", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch03-24", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. III: The Rate of Growth", "kind": "historical-inference", "label": "Arizona tree rings show a regular 150-year climate periodicity", "statement": "Century-smoothed annual ring widths of Arizona yellow pines show that the climate of Arizona over the past 500 years fluctuated with a regular period of almost exactly 150 years, probably mainly in moisture rather than temperature.", "quote": "from which we seem compelled to draw the direct conclusion that the climate of Arizona, during the last 500 years, has fluctuated with a regular periodicity of almost precisely 150 years.", "testability": 0.852 }, { "id": "thompson1917-ch05-24", "iri": "https://w3id.org/delphi/resource/claim/thompson1917-ch05-24", "project": "thompson-growth-form", "thinker": "D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson", "work": "On Growth and Form", "year": 1917, "chapter": "Ch. V: The Forms of Cells", "kind": "mechanism", "label": "The biconcave red blood corpuscle is not a surface-tension equilibrium figure", "statement": "The biconcave mammalian red blood corpuscle is not a surface of constant mean curvature and so cannot be a fluid drop in equilibrium under surface tension alone; some other force, possibly osmotic inequilibrium or fluid-crystal forces of its cholesterin-like constituents, must maintain its shape, which changes to a sphere in diluted blood.", "quote": "Accordingly, from the point of view of surface tension alone, the blood-corpuscle is not a surface of equilibrium; or in other words, it is not a fluid drop suspended in another liquid.", "testability": 0.851 } ] }