Robert Matthews
Last Updated: September 19. 2009 6:52PM UAE / September 19. 2009 2:52PM GMT
When the Austrian biologist Paul Kammerer was found dead, a gun by his side, in September 1926, the reason for his despair seemed obvious. For years there had been rumours that he was a fraud, and a few weeks earlier a leading researcher hinted at proof that Kammerer had invented data to support his crazy ideas about evolution.
While his obituaries tried to put a positive gloss on the debacle, many scientists believed his death proved his guilt, and his name was quickly forgotten by all but a few historians. But now the story of Kammerer has taken a dramatic new twist, following research suggesting that his “fraudulent” work was a major breakthrough decades ahead of its time. If confirmed, Kammerer will be seen as one of the pioneers of evolution theory, alongside the likes of Darwin himself.
The Austrian biologist Paul Kammerer’s experiments with the midwife toad were widely dismissed by the scientific community as fraudulent. AFP via Zooological Society
At the time he performed his notorious experiments, biologists were just beginning to combine Darwin’s theory of evolution with the idea of inheritance of traits via genes. No one had any idea what genes actually were, but most biologists were convinced they were the drivers of evolution, via the twin effects of natural selection and mutation. Most biologists, but not all, suspected there had to be more to evolution.
He became intrigued by the ideas of the 18th-century French naturalist Jean Lamarck, who had argued that if creatures acquired some useful trait during their lifetime, they could pass it on to their offspring, so they too would benefit. As an example, Lamarck pointed to the giraffe, which he said was simply a type of antelope that had steadily acquired a longer neck through stretching upwards to pick leaves off trees.
Even at the time, Lamarck’s ideas about the inheritance of acquired characteristics faced critics, who pointed out that, for example, the sons of blacksmiths are not born with bulging biceps. In any case, it was far from clear how a lifetime’s experiences could end up permanently modifying some trait of a living species.
By the start of the 20th century, Lamarck’s theory was regarded as patent nonsense by many leading biologists. Yet Kammerer, never one to follow the herd, believed the only way to know for sure was via the scientific method.
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