al-Jāḥiẓ (real name Abu Uthman Amr ibn Bahr al-Kinani al-Fuqaimi al-Basri) (born in Basra, 781 – December 868/January 869) is an Arabic prose writer and author of works of literature, Mu'tazili theology, and politico-religious polemics.
In biology, Al-Jāḥiẓ introduces the concept of food chains and also proposes a scheme of animal evolution that entails natural selection, environmental determinism and possibly the inheritance of acquired characteristics.
