Jean-Baptiste Lamarck

About Jean-Baptiste Lamarck

Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744–1829) was a pioneering French naturalist whose primary historical significance stems from his early, though ultimately incorrect, comprehensive theory of biological evolution. While his name is often associated with the concept now known as Lamarckism-the inheritance of acquired characteristics-his work was crucial for formalizing the idea that species change over time. This contribution solidifies his standing as an influential figure, reflected in his #869 rank on MIT’s Historical Popularity Index among thousands of notable figures.

Despite this importance, Lamarck’s modern internet footprint is significantly smaller than his historical weight would suggest, indicating a notable attention gap. In 2025, his Wikipedia pages accrued just 144K views. To contextualize this underattention, we can observe that the far more historically influential Khalil Gibran (#370 importance) received only 35K views, meaning Lamarck currently receives four times the attention of Gibran despite ranking over 500 spots lower in historical importance. However, his attention is still lagging relative to his own rank.

Furthermore, the momentum of interest appears to be decreasing: his 2025 momentum, comparing Q1 to Q3, dropped by -22%, and the year-over-year change shows a -20.6% decline in views, suggesting that this crucial biologist is steadily receding from contemporary digital awareness.