John Ray
John Ray FRS (29 November 1627 – 17 January 1705) was a
Christian English naturalist widely regarded as one of the earliest of the English
parson-naturalists. Until 1670, he wrote his name as
John Wray. From then on, he used 'Ray', after "having ascertained that such had been the practice of his family before him". He published important works on
botany,
zoology, and
natural theology. His classification of plants in his ''
Historia Plantarum'', was an important step towards modern
taxonomy. Ray rejected the system of
dichotomous division by which species were classified by repeated sub-division into groups according to a pre-conceived series of characteristics they have or have not, and instead classified plants according to similarities and differences that emerged from observation. He was among the first to attempt a biological definition for the concept of ''
species'', as "a group of morphologically similar organisms arising from a common ancestor". Another significant contribution to taxonomy was his division of plants into those with two seedling leaves (
dicotyledons) or only one (
monocotyledons), a division used in taxonomy today.
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