Kurt Ernestovich Fabri (; 1 May 1923 – 3 June 1990) was an

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

n-born

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

biologist A biologist is a scientist who conducts research in biology. Biologists are interested in studying life on Earth, whether it is an individual Cell (biology), cell, a multicellular organism, or a Community (ecology), community of Biological inter ...

and professor at

Moscow State University Moscow State University (MSU), officially M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University,. is a public university, public research university in Moscow, Russia. The university includes 15 research institutes, 43 faculties, more than 300 departments, a ...

who contributed to the scientific study of

animal behavior Ethology is a branch of zoology that studies the behaviour of non-human animals. It has its scientific roots in the work of Charles Darwin and of American and German ornithologists of the late 19th and early 20th century, including Charle ...

in the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

Biography

Born in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

, the young Kurt Fabri immigrated with his family to the

, where his father, the prominent

communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

writer and journalist Ernst Fabri was given

political asylum The right of asylum, sometimes called right of political asylum (''asylum'' ), is a juridical concept, under which people persecuted by their own rulers might be protected by another sovereignty, sovereign authority, such as a second country or ...

amid the political turmoil in their native

in 1932. Kurt Fabri began studying

biology Biology is the scientific study of life and living organisms. It is a broad natural science that encompasses a wide range of fields and unifying principles that explain the structure, function, growth, History of life, origin, evolution, and ...

at the M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University in 1940, but was conscripted into the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

after

Operation Barbarossa Operation Barbarossa was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and several of its European Axis allies starting on Sunday, 22 June 1941, during World War II. More than 3.8 million Axis troops invaded the western Soviet Union along ...

and served as an army medic and

German language German (, ) is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family, mainly spoken in Western Europe, Western and Central Europe. It is the majority and Official language, official (or co-official) language in Germany, Austria, Switze ...

translator in

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. He returned to his studies in 1946 and graduated from Moscow State University in 1949. During the 1950s, when much of the work on animal behavior was still regarded as a

pseudoscience Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable cl ...

by the Soviet scientific establishment, itself preoccupied with promoting pseudoscientific theories such as

Lysenkoism Lysenkoism ( ; ) was a political campaign led by the Soviet biologist Trofim Lysenko against genetics and science-based agriculture in the mid-20th century, rejecting natural selection in favour of a form of Lamarckism, as well as expanding upon ...

, Fabri held jobs at a library and a radio station and worked at the V. L. Durov Animal Theater."Fabri, Kurt Ernestovich (1923 - 1990)."

Department of Psychology. Retrieved 28 February 2011. Fabri returned to scientific work in 1964 as an animal behavior researcher at the Biophysics Institute at Pushchino-na-Oke and joined the faculty of Moscow State University as

lecturer Lecturer is an academic rank within many universities, though the meaning of the term varies somewhat from country to country. It generally denotes an academic expert who is hired to teach on a full- or part-time basis. They may also conduct re ...

ethology Ethology is a branch of zoology that studies the behavior, behaviour of non-human animals. It has its scientific roots in the work of Charles Darwin and of American and German ornithology, ornithologists of the late 19th and early 20th cen ...

in 1966. Throughout this time, Fabri corresponded with scientific experts and publications in

East Germany East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...

, and the Soviet Union. As an ethologist, Fabri contributed to the popularization of the work of the pioneering ethologists

Konrad Lorenz Konrad Zacharias Lorenz (Austrian ; 7 November 1903 – 27 February 1989) was an Austrian zoology, zoologist, ethology, ethologist, and ornithologist. He shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Nikolaas Tinbergen and Karl von ...

and

Nikolaas Tinbergen Nikolaas "Niko" Tinbergen ( , ; 15 April 1907 – 21 December 1988) was a Dutch biologist and ornithologist who shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Karl von Frisch and Konrad Lorenz for their discoveries concerning the ...

in the USSR."Kurt Ernestovich Fabri".
''Voprosy psikhologii'' (''Questions of Psychology'') Vol. 90, No. 5. pp. 183-184. Retrieved 28 February 2011. Fabri headed a

research group A research group is a group of researchers often from the same faculty, specialized on the same subject, working together on the issue or topic. The success of a research group depends on several factors: clearly defined goals, research emphasi ...

of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the USSR in 1966-1971, investigating the psychological aspects of the interaction of pre-school children with animals. He earned his

candidate of sciences A Candidate of Sciences is a Doctor of Philosophy, PhD-equivalent academic research degree in all the post-Soviet countries with the exception of Ukraine, and until the 1990s it was also awarded in Central and Eastern European countries. It is ...

degree for a dissertation in biology in 1967. Awarded a

doctor of sciences A Doctor of Sciences, abbreviated д-р наук or д. н.; ; ; ; is a higher doctoral degree in the Russian Empire, Soviet Union and many Commonwealth of Independent States countries. One of the prerequisites of receiving a Doctor of Sciences ...

degree in psychology for his seminal 1976 monograph on the foundations of zoopsychology, he was appointed full professor of general psychology of Moscow State University's faculty of psychology in 1983. The main areas of Fabri's scientific work consisted of investigating the

ontogenesis Ontogeny (also ontogenesis) is the origination and development of an organism (both physical and psychological, e.g., moral development), usually from the time of fertilization of the egg to adult. The term can also be used to refer to the stu ...

of animal behavior and psychology, psychological development, the psychology of primates, and the ethological and biopsychological prerequisites of anthropogenesis.

Selected publications

Fabri authored more than two hundred publications during his scientific career. * «Хватательная функция руки приматов и факторы ее эволюционного развития»
(''The Grasping Function of the Primate Hand and Factors in its Evolutionary Development''). Leningrad, 1964.
«Основы зоопсихологии»

(''Foundations of Zoopsychology''). Moscow, 1976. (Second edition 1993). * «Игры животных и игры детей (сравнительно-психологические аспекты)», Вопросы психологии №3 С 26-34
("Animal Games and Children's Games (Comparative Psychological Aspects)", ''Voprosy psikhologii uestions of Psychology' 3, pp. 26–34), 1982.
«Игра у животных»

(''The Play of Animals''). Moscow, 1985. * «Введение в общую и прикладную ихтиопсихологию»
(''Introduction to General and Applied Ichthyopsychology''). Moscow, 1988.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fabri, Kurt 1923 births 1990 deaths Austrian emigrants to the Soviet Union Ethologists Moscow State University alumni Academic staff of Moscow State University Soviet military personnel of World War II Soviet non-fiction writers Soviet male writers Soviet zoologists People granted political asylum in the Soviet Union Male non-fiction writers