Kessler, Karl Fedorovich (1815-1881)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
In 1879 K. P. Kessler, zoologist and former rector of St. Petersburg University, read a paper entitled "The Law of Mutual Aid" before the members of the St. Petersburg Society of Naturalists.

Karl Fedorovich Kessler (In Russian: Карл Фёдорович Кесслер) ( November 19, 1815, Damrau - May 3, 1881 , St. Petersburg) Was a zoologist RussianAnd rector of St. Petersburg University.

In 1879 read a paper entitled On the law of mutual aid to members of the Society of Naturalists of St. Petersburg, where he presented an outline of his theory of cooperation, supplementing the still novel Darwinian theory of evolution. According to Kessler, the struggle for existence as formulated DarwinPuts too much emphasis on competition and ignores the complex cooperation, which actually give the key to understanding the dynamics of the living world. The struggle for existence operates in a interspecific level, While the more active cooperation in intraspecific level. Kessler sosenía that organic evolution was driven by both interspecific struggle for existence as mutual aid [vzaimnopomosh, In Russian ] intraspecific .All organisms, from their point of view, should stisfacer two basic needs : feeding ( leads to competition between groups for access to limited resources) And procreation ( leading to the intraspecific cooperation and mutual aid.) Organic evolution depend more on the union between individuals of the same species in the struggle between its members.

Kessler died shortly after presenting his theories, which had a significant impact on the scientific community. Were those that inspired the work of Peter Kropotkin and his theory of social evolution, outlined in his classic work, Mutual Aid : A factor of evolution (Mutual Aid.) They also inspired the study of A. F. Brandt Symbiosis and Co (1896).

PUBLICATIONS

 * Kessler, K. 1868. Materialy dlya poznaniya Onezhskago ozera i Obonezhskago kraya, preimushchestvenno v zoologicheskom' otnoshenii. Trudy Russkikh Estestvoispytatelei 1: 1-144. [(31.xii).1868.]