Konrad Lorenz
Konrad Zacharias Lorenz (German pronunciation: [ˈkɔnʁaːt tsaxaˈʁiːas ˈloːʁɛnts] ; 7 November 1903 – 27 February 1989) was an Austrian zoologist, ethologist, and ornithologist. He shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Nikolaas Tinbergen and Karl von Frisch. He is often regarded as one of the founders of modern ethology, the study of animal behavior. He developed an approach that began with an earlier generation, including his teacher Oskar Heinroth.[1]
Konrad Lorenz
27 February 1989 (aged 85)
Austrian
- ForMemRS (1964)[1]
- Kalinga Prize (1969)
- Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1973)
Lorenz studied instinctive behavior in animals, especially in greylag geese and jackdaws. Working with geese, he investigated the principle of imprinting, the process by which some nidifugous birds (i.e. birds that leave their nest early) bond instinctively with the first moving object that they see within the first hours of hatching. Although Lorenz did not discover the topic, he became widely known for his descriptions of imprinting as an instinctive bond. In 1936, he met Tinbergen, and the two collaborated in developing ethology as a separate sub-discipline of biology. A Review of General Psychology survey, published in 2002, ranked Lorenz the 65th most cited scholar of the 20th century in the technical psychology journals, introductory psychology textbooks, and survey responses.[2]
Lorenz's work was interrupted by the onset of World War II and in 1941 he was recruited into the German Army as a medic.[3] In 1944, he was sent to the Eastern Front where he was captured by the Soviet Red Army and spent four years as a German prisoner of war in Soviet Armenia. After the war, he regretted his membership in the Nazi Party.[4]
Lorenz wrote numerous books, some of which, such as King Solomon's Ring, On Aggression, and Man Meets Dog, became popular reading. His last work Here I Am – Where Are You? is a summary of his life's work and focuses on his famous studies of greylag geese.
Personal life[edit]
Lorenz married his childhood friend, Margarethe Gebhardt, a gynaecologist, daughter of a market gardener who lived near the Lorenz family;[18] they had a son and two daughters. He lived at the Lorenz family estate, which included a "fantastical neo-baroque mansion", previously owned by his father.[6][19]
Politics[edit]
Nazism[edit]
Lorenz joined the Nazi Party in 1938 and accepted a university chair under the Nazi regime. In his application for party membership he wrote, "I'm able to say that my whole scientific work is devoted to the ideas of the National Socialists." His publications during that time led in later years to allegations that his scientific work had been contaminated by Nazi sympathies. His published writing during the Nazi period included support for Nazi ideas of "racial hygiene" couched in pseudoscientific metaphors.[24][25][26][27][28][29]
In his autobiography, Lorenz wrote:
Lorenz's best-known books are King Solomon's Ring and On Aggression, both written for a popular audience. His scientific work appeared mainly in journal articles, written in German; it became widely known to English-speaking scientists through its description in Tinbergen's 1951 book The Study of Instinct, though many of his papers were later published in English translation in the two volumes titled Studies in Animal and Human Behavior.
Konrad & Adolf Lorenz Museum KALM https://www.kalm.at