Background
Arnold Lang was born on June 18, 1855, in Oftringen, Switzerland. He was the son of Adolf Lang, a cotton mill owner, who was also enthusiastically engaged in local politics. The family belonged to the Reformed Church.
anatomist educator naturalist scientist
Arnold Lang was born on June 18, 1855, in Oftringen, Switzerland. He was the son of Adolf Lang, a cotton mill owner, who was also enthusiastically engaged in local politics. The family belonged to the Reformed Church.
Lang completed primary school in 1867 and district school in 1870. He then attended the cantonal school in Aarau until 1873. Starting in March 1873 he studied science, especially zoology, in Geneva and then, from 1874 to 1876, in Jena. After receiving the doctorate at Jena in 1876, he qualified as privatdocent for zoology at Bern on May 26, 1876.
In 1878 and 1879 Lang was the Swiss representative at the zoological station in Naples, where he remained as an assistant until 1885. In November of that year, he went to Jena as privatdocent. In 1886, at the initiative of Ernst Haeckel, he was given the newly created post of Ritter professor of phylogenetic zoology.
In 1889 he accepted an appointment as a full professor of zoology and comparative anatomy at the University of Zurich. In addition, he became a professor of zoology at the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule, took over the directorship of the zoological collections, and founded a zoological institute. Along with his teaching duties, Lang assumed many further responsibilities, including membership on the Zurich school council, and played an active role in Swiss scientific societies. In the last years of his life, he successfully campaigned for the rebuilding of the University of Zurich.
In the autumn of 1891, a European fellowship for the best graduate in class enabled American experimental biologist Lilian Vaughan Morgan to go to Europe and study muscles in chitons at the University of Zurich with Arnold Lang. Norwegian biologist Kristine Bonnevie studied under Arnold Lang in Zürich in the years 1898-1899. He also taught zoologist Emily Arnesen and philosopher Heinrich Schmidt. From 1898 to 1900 he served as rector at the University of Zurich. Poor health forced him to retire on April 15, 1914.
Lang’s zoological works grew out of his research at Naples under the direction of Dohrn and were devoted to such topics as sessile crustaceans and the comparative anatomy and histology of the nervous system of the platyhelminths. He also wrote a monograph on the polyclads. In his popular Lehrbuch der vergleichenden Anatomie der wirbellosen Tiere, which was translated into English and French, Lang provided a critical account of the results of his own work and of other original papers on the subject. Moreover, his hybridization experiments with species of the genus Helix confirmed Mendel’s results. Finally, he established an important basis for experimental genetics with his presentation of the Anfangsgründe der Biometrik der Variation und Korrelation, which constituted a section of the compilation he published in 1914 under the title Die experimentelle Vererbungslehre in der Zoologie seit 1900.
Arnold Lang went down in history as a prominent naturalist and comparative anatomist, best known for his research on wildlife native to the Gulf of Naples and studies of muscles in chitons. From his research at Naples, he published a massive monograph on Polycladida and issued a textbook on the comparative anatomy of invertebrates that was subsequently translated into French and English. He was also very active as a professor; many of his doctoral students became outstanding scientists.
For his contribution to science Lang was awarded several honorary doctorates from the universities of Zurich.
In religious matters Lang characterized himself as an agnostic freethinker.
Lang’s interest in zoology was awakened in Geneva by Karl Vogt, who in 1874 gave him a letter of introduction to Haeckel in Jena. At the latter’s suggestion, Lang translated Lamarck’s Philosophie zoologique into German. In later writings, he repeatedly discussed Lamarck’s theory and questions pertaining to the history of the theory of evolution.
Through his studies on annelid phylogeny, and especially through his derivation of metamerism and his trophocoel theory of the formation of the entire alimentary canal, Lang participated vigorously in the debate over the problem of the origin of the bodily cavities in general.
Lang became a corresponding member of the Société des Médecins et Naturalistes de Jassy in 1888 and of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia in 1893. Furthermore, he was elected a member of the Royal Society of Sciences at Uppsala in 1901 and socius extraneus of the Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1910. Lang was also an honorary member of many other learned societies.
Corresponding member
Société des Médecins et Naturalistes de Jassy , France
1888 - 1914
Corresponding member
Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia , United States
1893 - 1914
Member
Royal Society of Sciences , Sweden
1901 - 1914
Socius extraneus
Swedish Academy of Sciences , Sweden
1910 - 1914
Humorous and sociable, Lang was also musically and artistically gifted.
Physical Characteristics: Lang worked intensively, without long periods of relaxation; as a result his arteriosclerotic heart complaint steadily worsened.
In 1887 Lang married Jeanne Mathilde Bachelin. They had one son and two daughters.
