who is the austrian monk whose work with pea plants helped him come up with a theory of heredity
Gregor Mendel Gregor Johann Mendel (Czech: Řehoř Jan Mendel;[1] 20 July 1822[2] – 6 January 1884) (English: /ˈmɛndəl/) was a scientist, Augustinian friar and abbot of St. Thomas' Abbey in Brno, Margraviate of Moravia. Mendel was born in a German-speaking family[3] in the Silesian part of the Austrian Empire (today's Czech Republic) and gained posthumous recognition as the founder of the modern science of genetics. Though farmers had known for millennia that crossbreeding of animals and plants could favor certain desirable traits, Mendel's pea plant experiments conducted between 1856 and 1863 established many of the rules of heredity, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance.[4]
Nature versus nurture The phrase in its modern sense was popularized by the English Victorian polymath Francis Galton, the modern founder of eugenics and behavioral genetics, discussing the influence of heredity and environment on social advancement.[5][6][7] Galton was influenced by the book On the Origin of Species written by his half-cousin, Charles Darwin.