Talk:Wilhelm Olbers Focke

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Notable?

It's not at all clear from the article at present that this botanist satisfies the notability criterion. At present he seems to be worth including because, once upon a time, he wrote a book in which Mendel's (subsequently famous) work is passingly, and dismissively, noted. A book which Darwin possessed (at least at one point) but didn't note the skeptical reference to Mendel in. Is that it? As such the article just reads like someone having a go at Darwin (... for not reading every sentence of every book that ever passed his way). --Plumbago (talk) 08:23, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Certainly notable. This botanist even has a botanist abbreviation. The fact that Darwin never mentioned Mendel's experiments has been a rather big deal. It's hypothesized that if he had known about Mendel (by reading Focke's book), he might have been more bold with his theory and had published it sooner. That's why that line is important and shouldn't be viewed as a swipe at Darwin. If it is a bit awkward, perhaps it just needs to be reworded. --Rkitko ^(talk) 02:27, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]