LYSENKOISM WAS A Soviet pseudoscientific theory of genetics and agriculture that was promoted by Trofim Lysenko, a Soviet Jew agronomist, in the mid-20th century. Lysenkoism denied the established science of genetics and evolutionary biology and proposed a theory of heredity predicated on Jean-Baptiste Lamarck’s fatuous hypothesis of acquired characteristics.
Lysenko claimed that characteristics acquired by an organism during its lifetime could be passed on to its progeny, contrary to the well-established principle of genetics that only genetic information can be inherited. He also claimed that plants and animals could be trained to adapt to different environments and that this adaptation could be passed on to future generations.
Lysenkoism was supported by the Soviet government, which saw it as a way to promote Soviet-style socialism in agriculture, and Lysenko’s ideas were adopted as official state policy in the Soviet Union in the 1940s. Scientists who opposed Lysenko’s ideas were persecuted…
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The Tactical Hermit 