Ernst Mayr

Ernst Mayr (July 5, 1904, Kempten, Germany – February 3, 2005, Bedford, Massachusetts USA), was one of the 20th century's leading evolutionary biologists. He was at the same time a naturalist, an explorer, an ornithologist and science historian.

Biography

Mayr started his career with an introduction to Erwin Stresemann due to his claimed sighting of Red-crested Pochards in Germany, a species that had not been seen in Europe for 77 years. After a tough interrogation, Stresemann accepted and published the sighting as authentic. Mayr was invited to work as a volunteer at the Berlin Museum while studying medicine. He subsequently took great interest in ornithology and earned a doctorate in ornithology. He was introduced, during a congress in Budapest, to Lord Walter Rothschild, a rich banker and naturalist, who had a comprehensive private bird collection in Tring, England. Mayr was sent by him to New Guinea, collectioned several thousands bird skins (he named 26 new bird species during his lifetime) and, in the process, naming 38 new orchid species. During his stay in New Guinea, he was invited to accompany the Whitney South Seas Expedition to the Solomon Islands.

Related Topics:
Erwin Stresemann - Red-crested Pochard - Ornithology - Walter Rothschild - Tring - New Guinea - Orchid - Solomon Islands

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In 1931 he moved to the American Museum of Natural History, where he played the important role of brokering and acquiring the Rothschild collection of bird skins, who had sold his collection in order to pay off a blackmailer.

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As a traditionally trained biologist with little mathematical experience, Mayr was often highly critical of early mathematical approaches to evolution such as those of J. B. S. Haldane, famously calling in 1959 such approaches "bean bag genetics". He continued to reject the view that evolution is the mere change of gene frequencies in populations, maintaining that other factors such as reproductive isolations had to be taken into account. In a similar fashion, Mayr was also quite critical of molecular evolutionary studies such as those of Carl Woese.

Related Topics:
Mathematical - J. B. S. Haldane - 1959 - Gene - Reproductive isolations - Molecular evolution - Carl Woese

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In many of his writings, Mayr rejected reductionism in evolutionary biology, arguing that evolutionary pressures act on the whole organism, not on single genes, and that genes can have different effects depending on the other genes present. He advocated a study of the whole genome rather than of isolated genes only.

Related Topics:
Reductionism - Genome

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Current molecular studies in evolution and speciation indicate that although allopatric speciation seems to be the norm in groups (possibly those with greater mobility) such as the birds, there are numerous cases of sympatric speciation in many invertebrates (especially in the insects).

Related Topics:
Allopatric speciation - Sympatric speciation

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Mayr joined the faculty of Harvard University in 1953 and retired in 1975 as emeritus professor of zoology, showered with honors. Following his retirement, he went on to publish more than 200 articles, in a variety of journals—more than some reputable scientists publish in their entire careers. Even as a centenarian, he continued to write books. At his 100th birthday, he was interviewed by Scientific American magazine.

Related Topics:
Faculty - Harvard University - 1953 - 1975 - Emeritus - Zoology - Centenarian - Scientific American

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He received awards including the National Medal of Science, the Balzan Prize and the International Prize. He was never awarded a Nobel Prize, but he noted that there is no Prize for evolutionary biology, and that Darwin would not have received one, either.

Related Topics:
National Medal of Science - Balzan Prize - International Prize - Nobel Prize

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