Anthropogeny

Anthropogeny is the study of human origins. It is not simply a synonym for human evolution by natural selection, which is only a part of the processes involved in human origins. Many other factors besides biological evolution were involved, ranging over climatic, geographic, ecological, social, and cultural ones. Anthropogenesis, meaning the process or point of becoming human, is also called hominization.

History of usage

The term anthropogeny was used in the 1839 edition of Hooper's Medical Dictionary and was defined as "the study of the generation of man". The term was popularized by Ernst Heinrich Haeckel (1834–1919), a German naturalist and zoologist, in his groundbreaking books, Natural History of Creation (German: Natürliche Schöpfungsgeschicht) (1868) and The Evolution of Man (German: Anthropogenie) (1874). Haeckel was one of the first biologists to publish on evolution. Haeckel used the term Anthropogeny to refer to the study of comparative embryology and defined it as "the history of the evolution of man". The term changed over time, however, and came to refer to the study of human origins.