iASK podcast -Péter Poczai: Heredity before Mendel
Channel: Institute of Advanced Studies Kőszeg (iASK) - Felsőbbfokú Tanulmányok Intézete
Date: 01/03/2023

Podcast with Péter Poczai, Plant Geneticist and Research Director of the Finnish Museum of Natural History, researcher colleague of the iASK.
The podcast focuses on Imre Festetics and his memory in Kőszeg. Festetics argued that changes observed in the generation of farm animals, plants, and humans are the result of scientific laws. Festetics empirically deduced that organisms inherit their characteristics, not acquire them. He recognized recessive traits and inherent variation by postulating that traits of past generations could reappear later, and organisms could produce progeny with different attributes. These observations represent an important prelude to Mendel’s theory of particulate inheritance insofar as it features a transition of heredity from its status as myth to that of a scientific discipline, by providing a fundamental theoretical basis for genetics in the twentieth century. The podcast also explores the connection between Kőszeg and Peter Poczai the author the book “Heredity before Mendel”.