• driving_crooner@lemmy.eco.br
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    3 days ago

    I don’t know where I read/listen it, but I have the memory of learning that he wanted to use rats for his experiments but the church didn’t wanted to pay for the rats so he has to do it with peas.

    • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org
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      2 days ago

      Also, they were considered “lewd”. And now we know that the genetics of rats is way too complex for him to spot any patterns.

      He also attempted to study bees but they were nasty, and he didn’t know that they mate while flying, rendering his breeding attempts fruitless.

  • Derpenheim@lemmy.zip
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    3 days ago

    He also got hilariously lucky in what he was doing. It’s worth a read into the modern-day reproductions (no pun intended) of his work to see just how unlikely he was to get his results as fast as he did.

    • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org
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      2 days ago

      It’s now believed that he altered the data, since they fit the 1:3 ratios way too well for populations where each has a ¼ probability. Still, very good work considering he might not have heard of the scientific method.

    • flora_explora@beehaw.org
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      3 days ago

      Have you got any links? A quick search didn’t show up anything in that direction, only how important Mendel was for modern genetics…

  • TrackShovel
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    3 days ago

    I believe he cooked his data, but it was the 1850s, and science was still along these lines:

    Watson, do you think a monkey falling out of a tree falls slower or faster than one blown out of a tree with 00 buckshot?

    I do say, Alfred, what an intriguing idea. I’ll grab the shotgun and you find a rock. We will meet back here in 15 minutes and find two monkeys.

    15 minutes later
    Alright, on the count of three, you throw the rock at your money and I’ll pull my trigger

    But it’s going to take time for the rock to get there - your shotgun is instant

    Fine you throw on two, and I pull on three. Ready? One, two…

  • 5714@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    3 days ago

    There is a German word for this: Erbsenzähler (pea counter), someone who is overly rigerous, exact or cheap.

  • Pnut@lemm.ee
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    3 days ago

    I went to college for horticulture four years ago. They still use this confusing rhetoric.