Ernst Haeckel
(1834-1913)
Ernst Haeckel was a German zoologist, naturalist, philosopher, physician, eugenicist, and marine biologist.
He is famous for the debunked theory that "ontology recapitulates phylogeny." He wrongly claimed that an individual organism's biological development, or
ontogeny, parallels step by step the species' evolutionary development, or
phylogeny.
He coined many terms in biology, including ontogeny and phylogeny, plus ecology, phylum, and
Protista
Haeckel discovered, described, illustrated, and named thousands of new species and mapped a genealogical tree relating all life forms. His published artwork includes over 100 detailed, multi-colour illustrations of animals and sea creatures, collected in his
Kunstformen der Natur ("Art Forms of Nature")
Sadly, Haeckel promoted scientific racism and embraced the idea of
Social Darwinism. He was the first person to characterize the Great War as the "first" World War, which he did as early as 1914.
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