Desmond Morris: Most Influential Biologists in 20th Century

He was born in 1928 at Purton, England. He finished his Bachelor’s at University of Birmingham and his Ph.D. at Oxford.
His studies were largely focused on behaviors of animals. He is a well known zoologist, ethologist (scientists who study animal behavior) and a sociobiologist.

His most influential work, the world famous best seller The Naked Ape, was published in 1967. In it he has discussed the behaviors of humans in relation to other animals, mainly other primates and he argues that man even after going through all the evolutionary and cultural transformations, still is an animal who is trying to fulfill its basic animal needs. This was a controversial book and gathered the attention of people from all over the world. He published a sequel to this in 1969 under the title The Human Zoo discussing the modern human behaviors and it’s resemblance to the behavior of animals in captivity. His work is considered as some of the earliest work on Sociobiology. Recently, in 2004 he published another well known book, The Naked Woman discussing the parts of female body and their importance in an evolutionary point of view.
Other than being an eminent biologist, he is a talented artist too. He has conducted many solo art exhibitions in Britain as well as other European countries.
He is un-doubtfully one of the greatest and most influential zoologists in all time.