冯·贝尔与重演律

K. E. VON BAER AND THE LAW OF RECAPITULATION

冯·贝尔(K.E.von Baer,1792—1876)生于爱沙尼亚,是一位著名的胚胎学家,近代胚胎学的重要奠基人。他的巨著《动物个体发育》是第一部比较胚胎学的著作,对胚胎学摆脱自然哲学的影响,有重要贡献。

The famous embryologist K. E. von Baer (1792-1876) had clearly rejected the law of parallelism in the 1820s, and expressed his opposition to the view of recapitulation in 1876. But there were widespread misconceptions regarding von Baer's law and the law of parallelism, the biogenetic law (or the theory of recapitulation) as identical. The three main points suggested in this paper would be responsible for such misconceptions. They resulted from: 1) the similarities between the law of parallelism and von Baer's law; 2) the mistake made by Darwin and the misunderstanding it gave rise to; 3) misunderstanding the real import of von Baer's law, especially its fourth clause.