But Lysenko argued that the inheritance of acquired characteristics was more philosophically akin to Marxist philosophy than was the Mendelian genetics champion

But Lysenko argued that the inheritance of acquired characteristics was more philosophically akin to Marxist philosophy than was the Mendelian genetics championed by Europeans and Americans, as well as the vast majority of Soviet geneticists. Stalin, who was promoting the idea that if the economy was transformed, everything would change for all and the generations to come, was enamored with Lysenko’s idea that manipulating the conditions of the environment changed not only the genetics of the organisms in that environment, but their descendants as well A dictator and a sycophantic scientific advisor is a poisonous mix.