<P> Lamarckism ( or Lamarckian inheritance ) is the idea that an organism can pass on characteristics that it has acquired during its lifetime to its offspring ( also known as heritability of acquired characteristics or soft inheritance ) . It is named after the French biologist Jean - Baptiste Lamarck ( 1744 -- 1829 ) , who incorporated the action of soft inheritance into his evolutionary theories as a supplement to his orthogenetic concept of an inherent progressive tendency driving organisms continuously towards greater complexity , in parallel but separate lineages with no extinction . Lamarck did not originate the idea of soft inheritance , which proposes that individual efforts during the lifetime of the organisms were the main mechanism driving species to adaptation , as they supposedly would acquire adaptive changes and pass them on to offspring . </P>
<P> Lamarckism ( or Lamarckian inheritance ) is the idea that an organism can pass on characteristics that it has acquired during its lifetime to its offspring ( also known as heritability of acquired characteristics or soft inheritance ) . It is named after the French biologist Jean - Baptiste Lamarck ( 1744 -- 1829 ) , who incorporated the action of soft inheritance into his evolutionary theories as a supplement to his orthogenetic concept of an inherent progressive tendency driving organisms continuously towards greater complexity , in parallel but separate lineages with no extinction . Lamarck did not originate the idea of soft inheritance , which proposes that individual efforts during the lifetime of the organisms were the main mechanism driving species to adaptation , as they supposedly would acquire adaptive changes and pass them on to offspring . </P>
who was the first scientist to state that species change over time
who was the first scientist to state that species change over time
French biologist Jean - Baptiste Lamarck
French biologist Jean - Baptiste Lamarck