He is known for his own evolutionary theory, nomogenesis (a form of orthogenesis incorporating mutationism) as opposed to the theories of Darwin and Lamarck.
Lev Berg was born in Bessarabia in a Jewish family, the son of Simon Gregoryevich Berg, a notary, and Klara Lvovna Bernstein-Kogan. He graduated from the Second Kishinev Gymnasium in 1894.[1] Like some of his relatives, Berg converted to Christianity in order to pursue his studies at Moscow State University.[2]
At Moscow University, Berg studied hydrobiology and geography. He later studied ichthyology and in 1928 was awarded he was also a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Berg studied and determined the depth of the lakes of Central Asia, including Balkhash and Issyk-Kul. He developed Dokuchaev's doctrine of natural zones, which became one of the foundations of the Soviet biology. Among his pioneering monographs on climatology were "Climate and Life" (1922) and "Foundations of Climatology" (1927).
During his lifetime, Berg was a towering presence in the science of ichthyology.[3] In 1916, he published four volumes of the study of Fishes of Russia. The fourth edition was issued in 1949 as Freshwater Fishes of the Soviet Union and Adjacent Countries and won him the Stalin Prize.[4] He was said to have discovered the symbiotic relationship between lampreys and salmon. Berg's name is featured in the Latin appellations of more than 60 species of plants and animals.
Berg is best known for his evolutionary theory called nomogenesis, which was a type of orthogenesisormutationism. Berg's ideas were collected in his book Nomogenesis; or, Evolution Determined by Law and was first published in 1922 in Russia; it was later translated into English in two editions the first appearing in 1926 and the later edition appearing in 1969. In the book Berg collected a large amount of empirical data which offered a strong criticism of Darwin's theory of evolution.[6]
Berg's theory of nomogenesis combined arguments from paleontology, zoology and botany to claim that evolution is not a random process. The theory emphasized the limitations of natural selection which determine the directionality of evolution.[7]
Berg claimed that the variation of characters in species is confined within certain limits due to both internal and external factors. The limitation of the variability, Berg argued, left hardly any space for natural selection; he claimed this was supported by the paleontological record because all the phylogenetic branches look more or less like straight lines. Berg distanced himself from both Darwinism and Lamarckism. Instead he proposed the mutationist concept of directed mass mutations as the main mechanism for directing evolution.[6]
"New species arise by means of mass transformation of a great number of individuals, which happens due to Waagen mutations... This mass transformation is a phenomenon of geological magnitude. It is connected with the alteration of the fauna of a certain horizon and comes about in certain periods only to be absent for a long time"[8]
Thus Berg claimed evolution was caused by mass mutations, which are directed by internal and external factors, so that new species occur with a high probability of being almost perfectly adapted. According to Berg, newly evolved species beget the subordinate taxonomic categories, and appear to be perfectly adapted to their environments. Although Berg's theory was anti-Darwinian, and anti-Lamarckian, it still advocated adaptive evolution.[6]
J. B. S. Haldane called Nomogenesis "by far the best anti-Darwinian book of this century".[9]
In 1910, Berg married fellow Bendery native Polina Abramovna Kotlovker. They separated shortly after the birth of their second child and though Polina sued, the Russian Orthodox Church granted custody to her Christian husband. Berg's mother helped raise the children, Simon (born 1911) and Raissa (born 1913). Berg married Maria Mikhailovna Ivanova, the daughter of a ship's commander, in 1923.[10]
Berg was honored for a lifetime of scientific achievement by the Imperial Russian Geographical Society and presented with the P. P. Semyonov-Tyan-Shansky Gold Medal.[3]
The research ship Lev Berg, named after him, currently rests on the dried bottom of the Aral Sea.[13] In 1971, it was involved in the Aral smallpox incident.
"Freshwater fishes of the U.S.S.R. and adjacent countries. Volume 1-3. Israel Program for Scientific Translations Ltd, Jerusalem. 1962-65 (Russian version published 1948-49)."[19]
The Tropical lanternbelly, Acropoma leobergi is a species of the genus Acropoma described as having a luminous behind the anus that resembles a "U" in shape. The species is native to the Arafura Sea.[23]
^Smalley, Ian; Markovic, Slobodan; O’Hara-Dhand, Ken; Wynn, Peter (June 2010). "A man from Bendery: L.S. Berg as geographer and loess scholar". Geologos. 16 (2). Bogucki Wydawnictwo Naukowe: 111–119. hdl:10593/566. ISSN1426-8981.
^Lev Semenovich Berg; Akademii︠a︡ nauk SSSR. (1926). Russian discoveries in the Pacific. Published by the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Retrieved 22 May 2011.
^Lev Semenovich Berg (1965). Classification of fishes both recent and fossil. Reprinted by Document Reproduction Unit, Thai National Documentation Centre, Applied Scientific Research Corp. of Thailand. Retrieved 22 May 2011.
Data related to Lev Semyonovich Berg at Wikispecies
