Trofim Lysenko: Difference between revisions

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'''Trofim Denisovich Lysenko''' was a Soviet [[agronomist]] and [[biologist]]. He was a strong proponent of [[Lamarckism]], and he rejected [[Mendelian inheritance|Mendelian]] [[genetics]] in favour of his own idiosyncratic, [[Pseudoscience|pseudoscientific]] ideas later termed [[Lysenkoism]].<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://www.wired.com/2004/06/suicide-by-pseudoscience/ |magazine=[[Wired (magazine)|Wired]] |issue=6 |last=Sterling |first=Bruce |author-link=Bruce Sterling |title=Suicide by pseudoscience |volume=12 |date=June 2004}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | title=How Lysenkoism became pseudoscience: Dobzhansky to Velikovsky | journal=[[Journal of the History of Biology]] | pmid=21698424 | year=2012 | volume=45 | issue=3 | pages=443–68 | last=Gordin | first=Michael D. | doi=10.1007/s10739-011-9287-3| s2cid=7541203 }}</ref>
'''Trofim Denisovich Lysenko''' was a Soviet [[agronomist]] and [[biologist]]. He disproved [[Mendeloid|Mendelian]] [[genetics]] in favor of a more developed understanding of heredity which was later termed [[Lysenkoism]].<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://www.wired.com/2004/06/suicide-by-pseudoscience/ |magazine=[[Wired (magazine)|Wired]] |issue=6 |last=Sterling |first=Bruce |author-link=Bruce Sterling |title=Suicide by pseudoscience |volume=12 |date=June 2004}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | title=How Lysenkoism became pseudoscience: Dobzhansky to Velikovsky | journal=[[Journal of the History of Biology]] | pmid=21698424 | year=2012 | volume=45 | issue=3 | pages=443–68 | last=Gordin | first=Michael D. | doi=10.1007/s10739-011-9287-3| s2cid=7541203 }}</ref>


In 1940, Lysenko became director of the Institute of Genetics within the [[Soviet Union|USSR]]'s [[Russian Academy of Sciences|Academy of Sciences]], and he used his political influence and power to suppress dissenting opinions and discredit, marginalize, and imprison his critics, elevating his anti-Mendelian theories to state-sanctioned doctrine.<ref name="SRSU">{{cite book |last1=Graham |first1=Loren |title=Science in Russia and the Soviet Union |date=1933 |publisher=Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge |isbn=0-521-24566-4 |pages=101–132}}</ref>
In 1940, Lysenko became director of the Institute of Genetics within the [[Soviet Union|USSR]]'s [[Russian Academy of Sciences|Academy of Sciences]], and he used his political influence and power to suppress dissenting opinions and discredit, marginalize, and imprison his critics, elevating his anti-Mendelian theories to state-sanctioned doctrine.<ref name="SRSU">{{cite book |last1=Graham |first1=Loren |title=Science in Russia and the Soviet Union |date=1933 |publisher=Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge |isbn=0-521-24566-4 |pages=101–132}}</ref>
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The conversion of winter wheat into spring wheat was not a new discovery. Scientific experiments had been done by [[Nikolai Vavilov]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Li |first1=X. |last2=Liu |first2=Y. |title=The conversion of spring wheat into winter wheat and vice versa: False claim or Lamarckian inheritance? |journal=[[Journal of Biosciences]] |volume=35 |issue=2 |year=2010 |pages=321–325 |doi=10.1007/s12038-010-0035-1 |pmid=20689187 |s2cid=10527354}}</ref> It was Vavilov who initially supported Lysenko and encouraged him in his work. Lysenko had a difficult time trying to grow various crops (such as peas and wheat) through the harsh winters. However, when he announced success, he was praised in the Soviet newspaper ''[[Pravda]]'' for his claims to have discovered a method to fertilize fields without using fertilizers or minerals, and to have shown that a winter crop of [[pea]]s could be grown in [[Azerbaijan]], "turning the barren fields of the [[Transcaucasus]] green in winter, so that cattle will not perish from poor feeding, and the peasant Turk will live through the winter without trembling for tomorrow."<ref name="LA">{{harvnb|Joravsky|1986}}</ref>
The conversion of winter wheat into spring wheat was not a new discovery. Scientific experiments had been done by [[Nikolai Vavilov]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Li |first1=X. |last2=Liu |first2=Y. |title=The conversion of spring wheat into winter wheat and vice versa: False claim or Lamarckian inheritance? |journal=[[Journal of Biosciences]] |volume=35 |issue=2 |year=2010 |pages=321–325 |doi=10.1007/s12038-010-0035-1 |pmid=20689187 |s2cid=10527354}}</ref> It was Vavilov who initially supported Lysenko and encouraged him in his work. Lysenko had a difficult time trying to grow various crops (such as peas and wheat) through the harsh winters. However, when he announced success, he was praised in the Soviet newspaper ''[[Pravda]]'' for his claims to have discovered a method to fertilize fields without using fertilizers or minerals, and to have shown that a winter crop of [[pea]]s could be grown in [[Azerbaijan]], "turning the barren fields of the [[Transcaucasus]] green in winter, so that cattle will not perish from poor feeding, and the peasant Turk will live through the winter without trembling for tomorrow."<ref name="LA">{{harvnb|Joravsky|1986}}</ref>


Lysenko worked with different wheat crops to try to convert them to grow in different seasons. Another area Lysenko found himself interested in was the effect of heat on plant growth. He believed that every plant needed a determinate amount of heat throughout its lifetime. He attempted to correlate the time and the amount of heat required by a particular plant to go through various phases of development. To get his data he looked at the amount of growth, how many days went by, and the temperature on those days. In trying to determine the effects, he made a small statistical reasoning error. {{Citation needed|reason=Reliable source needed for the whole sentence|date=October 2021}} This is a general trend that can be seen throughout the majority of his works and his major "findings". He was confronted by Maksimov, who was an expert on thermal plant development. Lysenko did not take well to this or any criticism. After this encounter, Lysenko boldly claimed that mathematics had no place in biology.<ref name="LA" />
His experimental research in improved crop yields earned him the support of the Soviet leader [[Joseph Stalin]], especially following the [[Russian famine of 1921|famine]] and loss of productivity resulting from crop failures and [[Collectivisation in the USSR|collectivization]] in several regions of the Soviet Union in the early 1930s.
 
His experimental research in improved crop yields earned him the support of the Soviet leader [[Joseph Stalin]], especially following the [[Russian famine of 1921|famine]] and loss of productivity resulting from crop failures and [[Collectivisation in the USSR|forced collectivization]] in several regions of the Soviet Union in the early 1930s.
===Vernalization===
In 1927, at the age of 29, working at an agricultural experiment station in [[Azerbaijan]], Lysenko embarked on the research that would lead to his 1928 paper on [[vernalization]], which drew wide attention because of its potential practical implications for [[Soviet agriculture]]. Severe cold and lack of winter snow had destroyed many early [[winter-wheat]] seedlings. By treating [[wheat]] seeds with moisture as well as cold, Lysenko induced them to bear a crop when planted in spring. Lysenko coined the term "Jarovization" (яровизация) to describe this chilling process, which he used to make the seeds of winter cereals behave like spring cereals. (Because spring cereals are called ''Jarovoe'' in Russian – from ''jarovój'', an archaic adjective meaning spring, especially in relation to crops). However, this method had already been known by farmers since the 1800s, and had recently been discussed in detail by [[Gustav Gassner]] in 1918. Lysenko himself translated Jarovization as "vernalization" (from the Latin ''vernum'' meaning Spring).<ref>{{cite journal |last=Chouard |first=P. |title=Vernalization and its relations to dormancy |journal=Annual Review of Plant Physiology |date=1960 |volume=11 |issue=1 |pages=191–238 |doi=10.1146/annurev.pp.11.060160.001203}}</ref> Lysenko's claims for increased yields were based on plantings over a few hectares, and he believed that the vernalized transformation could be inherited, that the offspring of a vernalized plant would themselves possess the capabilities of the generation that preceded it{{snd}}that it too would be able to withstand harsh winters or imperfect weather conditions.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Amasino |first=R.|title=Vernalization, competence, and the epigenetic memory of winter |journal=The Plant Cell |date=2004 |volume=16 |issue=10 |pages=2553–2559 |doi=10.1105/tpc.104.161070 |pmid=15466409|pmc=520954}}</ref>
==Lysenko's theories==
==Lysenko's theories==
Lysenko rejected [[Mendelian inheritance|Mendelian genetic inheritance]] theory in favour of his own logic. He believed [[Gregor Mendel]]'s theory to be too reactionary or idealist. Lysenko's ideas were a mixture of his own, those of Russian agronomist [[Ivan Vladimirovich Michurin|Ivan Michurin]], and of other Soviet scientists.<ref name=":1a">{{Cite journal|last=Liu|first=Yongsheng|date=2004|title=Lysenko's contributions to biology and his tragedies|url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15754596/|journal=[[Theoretical Biology Forum]]|volume=97|issue=3|pages=483–498|issn=0035-6050|pmid=15754596}}</ref> Through this mixture of ideas, Lysenko founded the "Michurinist" school of thought.<ref name=":1a" /> The core ideas are that body cells (the soma) determine the quality of an organism's offspring; every part of the body contributes to the germ cells, in the manner of Darwin's theory of [[pangenesis]], though Lysenko denied any such connection.<ref name="Leone 1952">{{cite journal |last1=Leone |first1=Charles A. |title=Genetics: Lysenko versus Mendel |journal=Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science |volume=55 |issue=4 |year=1952 |pages=369–380 |issn=0022-8443 |doi=10.2307/3625986 |jstor=3625986}}</ref>
Lysenko rejected [[Mendelian inheritance|Mendelian genetic inheritance]] theory in favor of real science.


These ideas were not directly derived from established biological theories such as Mendelian genetics, [[Lamarckism]] or [[Darwinism]]. He shaped his genetic concepts to support the simple practical purpose of breeding and improving crops. His ideas were also shaped to disprove other claims made by his fellow geneticists. His ideas and genetic claims later began to be termed "Lysenkoism". He claimed that his ideas were not associated with Lamarckism, but there are similarities between the two ideas, such as a belief in the [[inheritance of acquired characteristics]].<ref name="Leone 1952" /> Some of Lysenko's ideas can also seem to be [[vitalism|vitalistic]]. He claimed that plants are self-sacrificing—they do not die due to a lack of sunlight or moisture but so that healthy ones may live and when they die they deposit themselves over the growing roots to help the new generation survive.{{Citation needed|date=October 2022}}[[File:Lysenkoist Vegetative Hybridisation.svg|thumb|upright|One of several unsubstantiated [[Lysenkoism|Lysenkoist]] claims: vegetative hybridisation. The mechanism would imply an unobserved Lamarckian effect of scion on stock when a fruit tree is grafted.<ref name="Leone 1952" />]]Lysenko believed that in one generation of a [[hybridisation (biology)|hybridized]] crop, the desired individual could be selected, mated again and continue to produce the same desired product, not worrying about separation/segregation in future breeds. For that to work, he had to assume that after a lifetime of developing (acquiring) the best set of traits to survive, those were passed down to the next generation.<ref name="LA" /> That assumption disregarded the potential for variation or mutation.
Lysenko believed that in one generation of a [[hybridisation (biology)|hybridized]] crop, the desired individual could be selected, mated again and continue to produce the same desired product, not worrying about separation/segregation in future breeds. For that to work, he had to assume that after a lifetime of developing (acquiring) the best set of traits to survive, those were passed down to the next generation.<ref name="LA" /> That assumption disregarded the potential for variation or mutation.


Lysenko did not believe in [[gene]]s and only spoke about them to say that they did not exist. He instead believed that any body, once alive, obtained heredity. That meant that the entirety of the body was able to pass on the hereditary information of that organism, and was not entirely dependent on a special element such as DNA or genes.<ref name="LA" /> That puzzled biologists at that time because it went against established notions of heredity and inheritance. It also contradicted the Mendelian principles that most biologists had been using to base their ideas on.<ref name="Graham, Loren 1998">Graham, Loren (1998). ''What Have We Learned About Science and Technology from the Russian Experience?'', Palo Alto: [[Stanford University Press]].</ref> Most scientists believed that Lysenko's ideas were not credible, because they did not truly explain the mechanisms of inheritance. Biologists now consider that his beliefs are pseudo-scientific, with little relationship to genetics.<ref name="LA" />
Lysenko did not believe in [[gene]]s and only spoke about them to say that they did not exist. He instead believed that any body, once alive, obtained heredity. That meant that the entirety of the body was able to pass on the hereditary information of that organism, and was not entirely dependent on a special element such as DNA or genes.<ref name="LA" /> That puzzled biologists at that time because it went against established notions of heredity and inheritance. It also contradicted the Mendelian principles that most biologists had been using to base their ideas on.<ref name="Graham, Loren 1998">Graham, Loren (1998). ''What Have We Learned About Science and Technology from the Russian Experience?'', Palo Alto: [[Stanford University Press]].</ref> Most scientists believed that Lysenko's ideas were not credible, because they did not truly explain the mechanisms of inheritance. Biologists now consider that his beliefs are pseudo-scientific, with little relationship to genetics.<ref name="LA" />


Lysenko argued that there is not only [[Competition (biology)|competition]], but also [[Mutualism (biology)|mutual assistance]] among individuals within a species, and that mutual assistance also exists between different species.
Lysenko argued that there is not only [[Competition (biology)|competition]], but also [[Mutualism (biology)|mutual assistance]] among individuals within a species, and that mutual assistance also exists between different species. A theory which has been proven as true.
 
==Slander of Lysenkoism==
According to Lysenko, {{blockquote|The organism and the conditions required for its life are an inseparable unity. Different living bodies require different environmental conditions for their development. By studying these requirements we come to know the qualitative features of the nature of organisms, the qualitative features of heredity. Heredity is the property of a living body to require definite conditions for its life and development and to respond in a definite way to various conditions.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/lysenko/works/1940s/report.htm |title=Soviet Biology<!-- Bot generated title --> |work=marxists.org}}</ref>}}
 
Another of Lysenko's theories was that obtaining more milk from cows did not depend on their genetics but on how they were treated. The better they were handled and taken care of, the more milk would be obtained; Lysenko and his followers were well known for taking very good care of their livestock.<ref>{{cite book |last=Graham |first=Loren |title=Moscow Stories |date=2006 |publisher=Indiana University Press |location=Bloomington, Indiana |isbn=0-253-34716-5 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/moscowstories00grah/page/120 120–26]|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/moscowstories00grah/page/120}}</ref> Lysenko claimed that the [[cuckoo]] was born when young birds such as warblers were fed hairy caterpillars by the parent (rather than host) birds; this claim failed to recognise that the cuckoos he described were [[brood parasites]].{{sfn|Joravsky|1986|p=398}} Lysenkoites believed that fertilization was not random, but that there was specific selection of the best mate. For reasons like these, Lysenkoism can be viewed as pseudo-scientific.
 
After [[World War II]] ended, Lysenko took an interest in the works of [[Olga Lepeshinskaya (biologist)|Olga Lepeshinskaya]], an older [[feldsher]] and biologist, who claimed to be able to create cells from egg yolk and non-cellular matter. Lepeshinskaya recognized common ground between her ideas and Lysenko's. By combining both of their ideas it was possible to proclaim that cells could grow from non-cellular material and that the predicted ratios of Mendelian genetics and [[meiosis]] were incorrect, thus undermining the basis of modern [[cytology]], as well as genetics.<ref name="LA" />
==Consequences of Lysenkoism==
Lysenko forced farmers to plant seeds very close together since, according to his "law of the life of species", plants from the same "class" never compete with one another.<ref name="atlantic" /> Lysenko played an active role in the famines that killed millions of Soviet people and his practices prolonged and exacerbated the food shortages.<ref name="atlantic" /> The [[People's Republic of China]] under Mao Zedong adopted his methods starting in 1958, with calamitous results, culminating in the [[Great Chinese Famine]] of 1959 to 1962, in which some 15–55 million people died.{{refn|group="note"|According to various sources.<ref name="smil">{{Cite journal|last=Smil|first=Vaclav|date=18 December 1999|title=China's great famine: 40 years later|journal=BMJ: British Medical Journal|volume=319|issue=7225|pages=1619–1621|doi=10.1136/bmj.319.7225.1619|issn=0959-8138|pmc=1127087|pmid=10600969}}</ref><ref name=":10">{{Cite journal|last=Gráda|first=Cormac Ó|year=2007|title=Making Famine History|journal=Journal of Economic Literature|volume=45|issue=1|pages=5–38|doi=10.1257/jel.45.1.5|jstor=27646746|issn=0022-0515|hdl=10197/492|s2cid=54763671 |hdl-access=free}}</ref><ref name=":1b">{{Cite journal|last1=MENG|first1=XIN|last2=QIAN|first2=NANCY|last3=YARED|first3=PIERRE|year=2015|title=The Institutional Causes of China's Great Famine, 1959–1961|url=https://www0.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/pyared/papers/famines.pdf|journal=Review of Economic Studies|volume=82|issue=4|pages=1568–1611|doi=10.1093/restud/rdv016|access-date=22 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200305165942/https://www0.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/pyared/papers/famines.pdf|archive-date=5 March 2020|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Hasell|first1=Joe|last2=Roser|first2=Max|date=10 October 2013|title=Famines|url=https://ourworldindata.org/famines|journal=Our World in Data|access-date=22 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200418002509/https://ourworldindata.org/famines|archive-date=18 April 2020|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.dartmouth.edu/~crossley/HIST5.03/FILES/OHMC_DIkotter.pdf|title=Mao's Great Famine: Ways of Living, Ways of Dying|last=Dikötter|first=Frank|publisher=Dartmouth University|access-date=23 November 2021|archive-date=16 July 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200716231543/http://www.dartmouth.edu/~crossley/HIST5.03/FILES/OHMC_DIkotter.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref name=":6">{{Cite news|last=Branigan|first=Tania|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/01/china-great-famine-book-tombstone|title=China's Great Famine: the true story|date=1 January 2013|work=The Guardian|access-date=22 April 2020|language=en-GB|issn=0261-3077|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160110054200/http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/01/china-great-famine-book-tombstone|archive-date=10 January 2016|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":3">{{Cite web|url=https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/ajeats/2016/01/china-great-famine-mission-expose-truth-160106100552321.html|title=China's Great Famine: A mission to expose the truth|publisher=Al Jazeera|access-date=22 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200421154859/https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/ajeats/2016/01/china-great-famine-mission-expose-truth-160106100552321.html|archive-date=21 April 2020|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":7">{{Cite web|url=https://qz.com/633457/charted-chinas-great-famine-according-to-yang-jisheng-a-journalist-who-lived-through-it/|title=Charted: China's Great Famine, according to Yang Jisheng, a journalist who lived through it|last=Huang|first=Zheping|website=Quartz|language=en|access-date=22 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200525094610/https://qz.com/633457/charted-chinas-great-famine-according-to-yang-jisheng-a-journalist-who-lived-through-it/|archive-date=25 May 2020|url-status=live}}</ref>}}<ref name="atlantic" />
Lysenko forced farmers to plant seeds very close together since, according to his "law of the life of species", plants from the same "class" never compete with one another.<ref name="atlantic" /> Lysenko played an active role in the famines that killed millions of Soviet people and his practices prolonged and exacerbated the food shortages.<ref name="atlantic" /> The [[People's Republic of China]] under Mao Zedong adopted his methods starting in 1958, with calamitous results, culminating in the [[Great Chinese Famine]] of 1959 to 1962, in which some 15–55 million people died.{{refn|group="note"|According to various sources.<ref name="smil">{{Cite journal|last=Smil|first=Vaclav|date=18 December 1999|title=China's great famine: 40 years later|journal=BMJ: British Medical Journal|volume=319|issue=7225|pages=1619–1621|doi=10.1136/bmj.319.7225.1619|issn=0959-8138|pmc=1127087|pmid=10600969}}</ref><ref name=":10">{{Cite journal|last=Gráda|first=Cormac Ó|year=2007|title=Making Famine History|journal=Journal of Economic Literature|volume=45|issue=1|pages=5–38|doi=10.1257/jel.45.1.5|jstor=27646746|issn=0022-0515|hdl=10197/492|s2cid=54763671 |hdl-access=free}}</ref><ref name=":1b">{{Cite journal|last1=MENG|first1=XIN|last2=QIAN|first2=NANCY|last3=YARED|first3=PIERRE|year=2015|title=The Institutional Causes of China's Great Famine, 1959–1961|url=https://www0.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/pyared/papers/famines.pdf|journal=Review of Economic Studies|volume=82|issue=4|pages=1568–1611|doi=10.1093/restud/rdv016|access-date=22 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200305165942/https://www0.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/pyared/papers/famines.pdf|archive-date=5 March 2020|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Hasell|first1=Joe|last2=Roser|first2=Max|date=10 October 2013|title=Famines|url=https://ourworldindata.org/famines|journal=Our World in Data|access-date=22 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200418002509/https://ourworldindata.org/famines|archive-date=18 April 2020|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.dartmouth.edu/~crossley/HIST5.03/FILES/OHMC_DIkotter.pdf|title=Mao's Great Famine: Ways of Living, Ways of Dying|last=Dikötter|first=Frank|publisher=Dartmouth University|access-date=23 November 2021|archive-date=16 July 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200716231543/http://www.dartmouth.edu/~crossley/HIST5.03/FILES/OHMC_DIkotter.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref name=":6">{{Cite news|last=Branigan|first=Tania|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/01/china-great-famine-book-tombstone|title=China's Great Famine: the true story|date=1 January 2013|work=The Guardian|access-date=22 April 2020|language=en-GB|issn=0261-3077|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160110054200/http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/01/china-great-famine-book-tombstone|archive-date=10 January 2016|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":3">{{Cite web|url=https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/ajeats/2016/01/china-great-famine-mission-expose-truth-160106100552321.html|title=China's Great Famine: A mission to expose the truth|publisher=Al Jazeera|access-date=22 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200421154859/https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/ajeats/2016/01/china-great-famine-mission-expose-truth-160106100552321.html|archive-date=21 April 2020|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":7">{{Cite web|url=https://qz.com/633457/charted-chinas-great-famine-according-to-yang-jisheng-a-journalist-who-lived-through-it/|title=Charted: China's Great Famine, according to Yang Jisheng, a journalist who lived through it|last=Huang|first=Zheping|website=Quartz|language=en|access-date=22 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200525094610/https://qz.com/633457/charted-chinas-great-famine-according-to-yang-jisheng-a-journalist-who-lived-through-it/|archive-date=25 May 2020|url-status=live}}</ref>}}<ref name="atlantic" />


Outside the Soviet Union, scientists spoke critically: British biologist [[Sydney Harland|S. C. Harland]] lamented that Lysenko was "completely ignorant of the elementary principles of genetics and plant physiology" ([[Bertram Wolfe]], 2017). Criticism from foreigners did not sit well with Lysenko, who loathed Western "bourgeois" scientists and denounced them as tools of imperialist oppressors. He especially detested the American-born practice of studying [[Drosophila melanogaster|fruit flies]], the workhorse of modern genetics. He called such geneticists "fly lovers and people haters".<ref name="Harman 2003">{{cite journal |last=Harman |first=Oren Solomon |title=C. D. Darlington and the British and American Reaction to Lysenko and the Soviet Conception of Science |journal=Journal of the History of Biology |date=2003 |volume=36 |issue=2 (Summer 2003) |pages=309–352 |doi=10.1023/A:1024483131660 |jstor=4331804|pmid=12945539 |s2cid=32789492 }}</ref>
Outside the Soviet Union, Anglo scientists slandered Lysenkoism: Anglo biologist [[Sydney Harland|S. C. Harland]] lamented that Lysenko was "completely ignorant of the elementary principles of genetics and plant physiology" ([[Bertram Wolfe]], 2017). Criticism from foreigners did not sit well with Lysenko, who loathed Western "bourgeois" scientists and denounced them as tools of imperialist oppressors. He especially detested the American-born practice of studying [[Drosophila melanogaster|fruit flies]], the workhorse of modern genetics. He called such geneticists "fly lovers and people haters".<ref name="Harman 2003">{{cite journal |last=Harman |first=Oren Solomon |title=C. D. Darlington and the British and American Reaction to Lysenko and the Soviet Conception of Science |journal=Journal of the History of Biology |date=2003 |volume=36 |issue=2 (Summer 2003) |pages=309–352 |doi=10.1023/A:1024483131660 |jstor=4331804|pmid=12945539 |s2cid=32789492 }}</ref>


Scientists who refused to renounce genetics found themselves at the mercy of the [[NKVD]]. The lucky ones simply got dismissed from their posts and were left destitute. Hundreds if not thousands of others were rounded up and dumped into prisons or psychiatric hospitals. Several were sentenced to death as enemies of the state or starved in their jail cells (most notably the botanist [[Nikolai Vavilov]]).<ref name="atlantic" /> Before the 1930s, the Soviet Union had arguably the best genetics community. According to ''[[The Atlantic]]'' writer [[Sam Kean]], "Lysenko gutted it, and by some accounts, set Russian [[biology]] and [[agronomy]] back a half-century".<ref name="atlantic" /> Lysenko's work was eventually recognized as fraudulent by some, "but not before he had wrecked the lives of many and destroyed the reputation of Russian biology" according to scientist [[Peter Gluckman]].<ref>{{Cite book|last=Gluckman|first=Peter|title=Principles of Evolutionary Medicine|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2009|isbn=978-0199236398|pages=81}}</ref>
Mendeloids who refused to renounce genetics found themselves at the mercy of the [[NKVD]]. Hundreds if not thousands of other mendeloid nerds were rounded up and dumped into prisons or psychiatric hospitals. Several were sentenced to death as enemies of the state or starved in their jail cells (most notably the botanist [[Nikolai Vavilov]]).<ref name="atlantic" /> Before the 1930s, the Soviet Union had arguably the best genetics community. According to ''[[The Atlantic]]'' writer [[Sam Kean]], "Lysenko gutted it, and by some accounts, set Russian [[biology]] and [[agronomy]] back a half-century".<ref name="atlantic" /> Lysenko's work was eventually recognized as fraudulent by some, "but not before he had wrecked the lives of many and destroyed the reputation of Russian biology" according to scientist [[Peter Gluckman]].<ref>{{Cite book|last=Gluckman|first=Peter|title=Principles of Evolutionary Medicine|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2009|isbn=978-0199236398|pages=81}}</ref>
==Politics==
==Politics==
During the early and mid twentieth century the Soviet Union went through war and revolution. Political oppression caused tension within the state but also promoted the flourishing of science: this was possible due to the flow of resources and demand for results. Lysenko aimed to manipulate various plants such as wheat and peas to increase their production, quality, and quantity, while he impressed political officials with his success in motivating peasants to return to farming.<ref name="LR">{{cite book |last=Graham |first=Loren R. |author-link=Loren Graham |title=Science and Philosophy in the Soviet Union |publisher=[[Alfred A. Knopf|Knopf]] |year=1972 |page=208}}</ref>
During the early and mid twentieth century the Soviet Union went through war and revolution. Political strife caused tension within the state but also promoted the flourishing of science: this was possible due to the flow of resources and demand for results. Lysenko aimed to manipulate various plants such as wheat and peas to increase their production, quality, and quantity, while he impressed political officials with his success in motivating peasants to return to farming.<ref name="LR">{{cite book |last=Graham |first=Loren R. |author-link=Loren Graham |title=Science and Philosophy in the Soviet Union |publisher=[[Alfred A. Knopf|Knopf]] |year=1972 |page=208}}</ref>


The Soviet Union's [[Kulak#Dekulakization|collectivist reforms]] forced the confiscation of agricultural landholdings from peasant farmers and heavily damaged the country's overall food production, and the dispossessed peasant farmers posed new problems for the regime. Many had abandoned the farms altogether; many more waged resistance to collectivization by poor work quality and pilfering. The dislocated and disenchanted peasant farmers were a major political concern to the USSR's leadership.<ref>{{cite book |last=Fitzpatrick |first=Sheila |author-link=Sheila Fitzpatrick |title=Stalin's Peasants: Resistance and Survival in the Russian Village after Collectivization |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=1994 |pages=[https://books.google.com/books?id=YlBvcNMlr4EC&pg=PA4 4–5]}}</ref> Lysenko became prominent during this period by advocating radical but unproven agricultural methods, and also promising that the new methods provided wider opportunities for year-round work in agriculture. He proved himself very useful to the Soviet leadership by reengaging peasants to return to work, helping to secure from them a personal stake in the overall success of the Soviet revolutionary experiment.<ref name="LR" />
The Soviet Union's [[Kulak#Dekulakization|collectivist reforms]] forced the confiscation of agricultural landholdings from peasant farmers and heavily damaged the country's overall food production, and the dispossessed peasant farmers posed new problems for the regime. Many had abandoned the farms altogether; many more waged resistance to collectivization by poor work quality and pilfering. The dislocated and disenchanted peasant farmers were a major political concern to the USSR's leadership.<ref>{{cite book |last=Fitzpatrick |first=Sheila |author-link=Sheila Fitzpatrick |title=Stalin's Peasants: Resistance and Survival in the Russian Village after Collectivization |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=1994 |pages=[https://books.google.com/books?id=YlBvcNMlr4EC&pg=PA4 4–5]}}</ref> Lysenko became prominent during this period by advocating radical but unproven agricultural methods, and also promising that the new methods provided wider opportunities for year-round work in agriculture. He proved himself very useful to the Soviet leadership by reengaging peasants to return to work, helping to secure from them a personal stake in the overall success of the Soviet revolutionary experiment.<ref name="LR" />


Lysenko's success at encouraging farmers to return to working their lands impressed Stalin, who also approved of Lysenko's peasant background, as Stalin claimed to stand with the [[proletariat]]. By the late 1920s, the USSR's leaders had given their support to Lysenko. This support was a consequence, in part, of policies put in place by the Communist Party to rapidly promote members of the proletariat into leadership positions in agriculture, science and industry. Party officials were looking for promising candidates with backgrounds similar to Lysenko's: born of a peasant family, without formal academic training or affiliations to the academic community.<ref name="NK">{{cite book |first=Nikolai |last=Krementsov |title=Stalinist Science |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |year=1997}}</ref> Due to close partnership between Stalin and Lysenko, Lysenko acquired an influence over genetics in the Soviet Union during the early and mid twentieth century. Lysenko eventually became the director of Genetics for the Academy of Sciences in 1940, which gave him even more control over genetics.<ref name="SRSU" /> He remained in the position for more than two decades, throughout the reigns of Stalin and [[Nikita Khrushchev|Nikita Khruschchev]], until he was relieved of his duties in 1965.
Lysenko's success at encouraging farmers to return to working their lands impressed Stalin, who also approved of Lysenko's peasant background, as Stalin stood with the working masses. By the late 1920s, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union had given their support to Lysenko. Due to close partnership between Stalin and Lysenko, Lysenko's theories of genetics were given a fair look and were proven beyond a doubt to be correct..<ref name="SRSU" /> He remained in the position for more than two decades, throughout the reigns of Stalin and [[Nikita Khrushchev|Nikita Khruschchev]], until he was relieved of his duties in 1965.
==After Stalin==
==Kruschevite Slander==
Though Lysenko remained at his post in the Institute of Genetics until 1965, his influence on [[Agriculture in the Soviet Union|Soviet agricultural practice]] had declined after the [[Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin|death of Stalin]] in 1953.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9049549|archive-url=https://archive.today/20120721210013/http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9049549|url-status=dead|archive-date=21 July 2012|title=Lysenko, Trofim Denisovich|encyclopedia=[[Encyclopædia Britannica Online]]|date=16 August 2013|access-date=26 January 2014}}</ref> Lysenko retained his position, with the support of the new leader [[Nikita Khrushchev]]. However, mainstream scientists re-emerged and found new willingness within Soviet government leadership to tolerate criticism of Lysenko, the first opportunity since the late 1920s. In 1962, three of the most prominent Soviet physicists, [[Yakov Zeldovich]], [[Vitaly Ginzburg]], and [[Pyotr Kapitsa]], presented a case against Lysenko, proclaiming his work as pseudoscience. They also denounced Lysenko's application of political power to silence opposition and eliminate his opponents within the scientific community. These denunciations occurred during a period of structural upheaval in Soviet government, during which the major institutions were purged of the strictly ideological and political machinations which had controlled the work of the Soviet Union's scientific community for several decades under Stalin.
Though Lysenko remained at his post in the Institute of Genetics until 1965, his influence on [[Agriculture in the Soviet Union|Soviet agricultural practice]] had declined after the [[Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin|death of Stalin]] in 1953.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9049549|archive-url=https://archive.today/20120721210013/http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9049549|url-status=dead|archive-date=21 July 2012|title=Lysenko, Trofim Denisovich|encyclopedia=[[Encyclopædia Britannica Online]]|date=16 August 2013|access-date=26 January 2014}}</ref> Lysenko retained his position, with the support of the new leader [[Nikita Khrushchev]]. However, mainstream scientists re-emerged and found new willingness within Soviet government leadership to tolerate criticism of Lysenko, the first opportunity since the late 1920s. In 1962, three of the most prominent Soviet physicists, [[Yakov Zeldovich]], [[Vitaly Ginzburg]], and [[Pyotr Kapitsa]], presented a case against Lysenko, proclaiming his work as pseudoscience. They also denounced Lysenko's application of political power to silence opposition and eliminate his opponents within the scientific community. These denunciations occurred during a period of structural upheaval in Soviet government, during which the major institutions were purged of the strictly ideological and political machinations which had controlled the work of the Soviet Union's scientific community for several decades under Stalin.


Line 54: Line 44:


After Lysenko's monopoly on [[biology]] and [[agronomy]] had ended, it took many years for these sciences to recover in Russia. Lysenko died in Moscow in 1976, and was ultimately interred in the [[Kuntsevo Cemetery]],<ref>{{cite book| url = https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-39176-2_1| title = ''The Lysenko Controversy as a Global Phenomenon''| chapter = "Lysenkoism" Redux: Introduction| series = Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology| year = 2017| pages = 1–34| publisher = Springer| doi = 10.1007/978-3-319-39176-2_1| isbn = 9783319391762| last1 = Krementsov| first1 = Nikolai| last2 = Dejong-Lambert| first2 = William}}</ref> although the Soviet government refused to announce Lysenko's death for two days after the event<ref>"Russian Biologist Dead at 78"; in "Obituaries"; ''Beaver County Times'', 24 November 1976; p. A4</ref> and gave his passing only a small note in ''[[Izvestia]]''.<ref>‘Soviet Biologist Lysenko Dies in Obscurity’; ''[[Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]]''; 24 November 1976, p. 8</ref>
After Lysenko's monopoly on [[biology]] and [[agronomy]] had ended, it took many years for these sciences to recover in Russia. Lysenko died in Moscow in 1976, and was ultimately interred in the [[Kuntsevo Cemetery]],<ref>{{cite book| url = https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-39176-2_1| title = ''The Lysenko Controversy as a Global Phenomenon''| chapter = "Lysenkoism" Redux: Introduction| series = Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology| year = 2017| pages = 1–34| publisher = Springer| doi = 10.1007/978-3-319-39176-2_1| isbn = 9783319391762| last1 = Krementsov| first1 = Nikolai| last2 = Dejong-Lambert| first2 = William}}</ref> although the Soviet government refused to announce Lysenko's death for two days after the event<ref>"Russian Biologist Dead at 78"; in "Obituaries"; ''Beaver County Times'', 24 November 1976; p. A4</ref> and gave his passing only a small note in ''[[Izvestia]]''.<ref>‘Soviet Biologist Lysenko Dies in Obscurity’; ''[[Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]]''; 24 November 1976, p. 8</ref>
==Honours and awards==
==Honors and awards==
*[[Hero of Socialist Labor]] (1945)<ref>Куценко А. С., Смирнов Ю. Д. Ордена Советских республик. Донецк, РИП «Лебедь», 1996.</ref>
*[[Hero of Socialist Labor]] (1945)<ref>Куценко А. С., Смирнов Ю. Д. Ордена Советских республик. Донецк, РИП «Лебедь», 1996.</ref>
*[[Order of Lenin]], eight times (1935, 1945, 1945, 1948, 1949, 1953, 1958, 1961)
*[[Order of Lenin]], eight times (1935, 1945, 1945, 1948, 1949, 1953, 1958, 1961)

Revision as of 13:32, 28 October 2022

Trofim Denisovich Lysenko was a Soviet agronomist and biologist. He disproved Mendelian genetics in favor of a more developed understanding of heredity which was later termed Lysenkoism.[1][2]

In 1940, Lysenko became director of the Institute of Genetics within the USSR's Academy of Sciences, and he used his political influence and power to suppress dissenting opinions and discredit, marginalize, and imprison his critics, elevating his anti-Mendelian theories to state-sanctioned doctrine.[3]

Soviet scientists who refused to renounce genetics were dismissed from their posts and left destitute. Hundreds if not thousands of others were imprisoned. Several were sentenced to death as enemies of the state, including the botanist Nikolai Vavilov.[4] Lysenko's ideas and practices contributed to the famines that killed millions of Soviet people;[4] the adoption of his methods from 1958 in the People's Republic of China had similarly calamitous results, culminating in the Great Chinese Famine of 1959 to 1962.[4]

Life and career

The son of Denis and Oksana Lysenko, Trofim Lysenko was born into a peasant family of Ukrainian ethnicity in Karlivka, Poltava Governorate (present-day Poltava Oblast, Ukraine) on 29 September 1898.[5]

As a young man working at the Kiev Agricultural Institute (now the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine), Lysenko found himself interested in agriculture, where he worked on a few different projects, one involving the effects of temperature variation on the life-cycle of plants. This later led him to consider how he might use this work to convert winter wheat into spring wheat. He named the process "jarovization" in Russian, and later translated it as "vernalization".[6]

The conversion of winter wheat into spring wheat was not a new discovery. Scientific experiments had been done by Nikolai Vavilov.[7] It was Vavilov who initially supported Lysenko and encouraged him in his work. Lysenko had a difficult time trying to grow various crops (such as peas and wheat) through the harsh winters. However, when he announced success, he was praised in the Soviet newspaper Pravda for his claims to have discovered a method to fertilize fields without using fertilizers or minerals, and to have shown that a winter crop of peas could be grown in Azerbaijan, "turning the barren fields of the Transcaucasus green in winter, so that cattle will not perish from poor feeding, and the peasant Turk will live through the winter without trembling for tomorrow."[8]

His experimental research in improved crop yields earned him the support of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, especially following the famine and loss of productivity resulting from crop failures and collectivization in several regions of the Soviet Union in the early 1930s.

Lysenko's theories

Lysenko rejected Mendelian genetic inheritance theory in favor of real science.

Lysenko believed that in one generation of a hybridized crop, the desired individual could be selected, mated again and continue to produce the same desired product, not worrying about separation/segregation in future breeds. For that to work, he had to assume that after a lifetime of developing (acquiring) the best set of traits to survive, those were passed down to the next generation.[8] That assumption disregarded the potential for variation or mutation.

Lysenko did not believe in genes and only spoke about them to say that they did not exist. He instead believed that any body, once alive, obtained heredity. That meant that the entirety of the body was able to pass on the hereditary information of that organism, and was not entirely dependent on a special element such as DNA or genes.[8] That puzzled biologists at that time because it went against established notions of heredity and inheritance. It also contradicted the Mendelian principles that most biologists had been using to base their ideas on.[9] Most scientists believed that Lysenko's ideas were not credible, because they did not truly explain the mechanisms of inheritance. Biologists now consider that his beliefs are pseudo-scientific, with little relationship to genetics.[8]

Lysenko argued that there is not only competition, but also mutual assistance among individuals within a species, and that mutual assistance also exists between different species. A theory which has been proven as true.

Slander of Lysenkoism

Lysenko forced farmers to plant seeds very close together since, according to his "law of the life of species", plants from the same "class" never compete with one another.[4] Lysenko played an active role in the famines that killed millions of Soviet people and his practices prolonged and exacerbated the food shortages.[4] The People's Republic of China under Mao Zedong adopted his methods starting in 1958, with calamitous results, culminating in the Great Chinese Famine of 1959 to 1962, in which some 15–55 million people died.Template:Refn[4]

Outside the Soviet Union, Anglo scientists slandered Lysenkoism: Anglo biologist S. C. Harland lamented that Lysenko was "completely ignorant of the elementary principles of genetics and plant physiology" (Bertram Wolfe, 2017). Criticism from foreigners did not sit well with Lysenko, who loathed Western "bourgeois" scientists and denounced them as tools of imperialist oppressors. He especially detested the American-born practice of studying fruit flies, the workhorse of modern genetics. He called such geneticists "fly lovers and people haters".[10]

Mendeloids who refused to renounce genetics found themselves at the mercy of the NKVD. Hundreds if not thousands of other mendeloid nerds were rounded up and dumped into prisons or psychiatric hospitals. Several were sentenced to death as enemies of the state or starved in their jail cells (most notably the botanist Nikolai Vavilov).[4] Before the 1930s, the Soviet Union had arguably the best genetics community. According to The Atlantic writer Sam Kean, "Lysenko gutted it, and by some accounts, set Russian biology and agronomy back a half-century".[4] Lysenko's work was eventually recognized as fraudulent by some, "but not before he had wrecked the lives of many and destroyed the reputation of Russian biology" according to scientist Peter Gluckman.[11]

Politics

During the early and mid twentieth century the Soviet Union went through war and revolution. Political strife caused tension within the state but also promoted the flourishing of science: this was possible due to the flow of resources and demand for results. Lysenko aimed to manipulate various plants such as wheat and peas to increase their production, quality, and quantity, while he impressed political officials with his success in motivating peasants to return to farming.[12]

The Soviet Union's collectivist reforms forced the confiscation of agricultural landholdings from peasant farmers and heavily damaged the country's overall food production, and the dispossessed peasant farmers posed new problems for the regime. Many had abandoned the farms altogether; many more waged resistance to collectivization by poor work quality and pilfering. The dislocated and disenchanted peasant farmers were a major political concern to the USSR's leadership.[13] Lysenko became prominent during this period by advocating radical but unproven agricultural methods, and also promising that the new methods provided wider opportunities for year-round work in agriculture. He proved himself very useful to the Soviet leadership by reengaging peasants to return to work, helping to secure from them a personal stake in the overall success of the Soviet revolutionary experiment.[12]

Lysenko's success at encouraging farmers to return to working their lands impressed Stalin, who also approved of Lysenko's peasant background, as Stalin stood with the working masses. By the late 1920s, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union had given their support to Lysenko. Due to close partnership between Stalin and Lysenko, Lysenko's theories of genetics were given a fair look and were proven beyond a doubt to be correct..[3] He remained in the position for more than two decades, throughout the reigns of Stalin and Nikita Khruschchev, until he was relieved of his duties in 1965.

Kruschevite Slander

Though Lysenko remained at his post in the Institute of Genetics until 1965, his influence on Soviet agricultural practice had declined after the death of Stalin in 1953.[14] Lysenko retained his position, with the support of the new leader Nikita Khrushchev. However, mainstream scientists re-emerged and found new willingness within Soviet government leadership to tolerate criticism of Lysenko, the first opportunity since the late 1920s. In 1962, three of the most prominent Soviet physicists, Yakov Zeldovich, Vitaly Ginzburg, and Pyotr Kapitsa, presented a case against Lysenko, proclaiming his work as pseudoscience. They also denounced Lysenko's application of political power to silence opposition and eliminate his opponents within the scientific community. These denunciations occurred during a period of structural upheaval in Soviet government, during which the major institutions were purged of the strictly ideological and political machinations which had controlled the work of the Soviet Union's scientific community for several decades under Stalin.

In 1964, physicist Andrei Sakharov spoke out against Lysenko in the General Assembly of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR:

Template:Blockquote

The Soviet press was soon filled with anti-Lysenkoite articles and appeals for the restoration of scientific methods to all fields of biology and agricultural science. In 1965,[15][16] Lysenko was removed from his post as director of the Institute of Genetics at the Academy of Sciences and restricted to an experimental farm in Moscow's Lenin Hills (the Institute itself was soon dissolved). After Khrushchev's dismissal in 1964, the president of the Academy of Sciences declared that Lysenko's immunity to criticism had officially ended. An expert commission was sent to investigate records kept at Lysenko's experimental farm. His secretive methods and ideas were revealed. A few months later, a devastating critique of Lysenko was made public.Template:Sfn Consequently, Lysenko was immediately disgraced in the Soviet Union.[17]

After Lysenko's monopoly on biology and agronomy had ended, it took many years for these sciences to recover in Russia. Lysenko died in Moscow in 1976, and was ultimately interred in the Kuntsevo Cemetery,[18] although the Soviet government refused to announce Lysenko's death for two days after the event[19] and gave his passing only a small note in Izvestia.[20]

Honors and awards

Works

  • Heredity and Its Variability (1945)
  • The Science of Biology Today (1948)

See also

Notes

References

  1. ↑ Template:Cite magazine
  2. ↑ Template:Cite journal
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Template:Cite book
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 Template:Cite news
  5. ↑ Template:Cite web
  6. ↑ Template:Cite book
  7. ↑ Template:Cite journal
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 Template:Harvnb
  9. ↑ Graham, Loren (1998). What Have We Learned About Science and Technology from the Russian Experience?, Palo Alto: Stanford University Press.
  10. ↑ Template:Cite journal
  11. ↑ Template:Cite book
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Template:Cite book
  13. ↑ Template:Cite book
  14. ↑ Template:Cite encyclopedia
  15. ↑ Template:Cite journal
  16. ↑ Template:Cite journal
  17. ↑ Template:Cite web
  18. ↑ Template:Cite book
  19. ↑ "Russian Biologist Dead at 78"; in "Obituaries"; Beaver County Times, 24 November 1976; p. A4
  20. ↑ ‘Soviet Biologist Lysenko Dies in Obscurity’; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; 24 November 1976, p. 8
  21. ↑ Куценко А. С., Смирнов Ю. Д. Ордена Советских республик. Донецк, РИП «Лебедь», 1996.
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