Paul Kammerer

Paul Kammerer (17 August 1880, in Vienna – 23 September 1926, in Puchberg am Schneeberg) was an Austrian biologist who studied and advocated Lamarckism, the theory that organisms may pass to their offspring characteristics acquired in their lifetime, meaning variation would be directed towards creating adaptations.

[3] In a letter, Kammerer stated that after reading Noble's paper, he re-examined his specimen and confirmed that India ink had been injected into the pads.

[5] Criminologist Edward Sagarin wrote, "Kammerer maintained his total innocence and declared his ignorance of the forger's identity.

[6] Science historian Peter J. Bowler wrote that most biologists believe that Kammerer was a fraud and that even the others claim that he misinterpreted the results of his experiments.

Albert Einstein called the idea of seriality "interesting, and by no means absurd",[9] and Carl Jung drew upon Kammerer's work in his essay Synchronicity.

[12] The British zoologist Harold Munro Fox attempted to replicate some of Kammerer's experiments but produced negative results.

One center of ferment was the University of Vienna[15] where, on the traditional Saturday morning student parades, bloody battles were fought.

Kammerer was known by his public lectures and newspaper articles as an ardent pacifist and Socialist; it was also known that he was going to build an institute in Soviet Russia.

[4]As a consequence of Noble's refutation, interest in Lamarckian inheritance diminished except in the Soviet Union where it was championed by Trofim Lysenko.

Sander Gliboff, a historian of biology and professor in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science, Indiana University, has commented that although Kammerer's conclusions proved false, his evidence was probably genuine and he did not simply argue for Lamarckism and against Darwinism as the theories are now understood.