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Definition of "ontogeny" []

  • The origin and development of an individual organism from embryo to adult. Also called ontogenesis. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "ontogeny" in a sentence
  • "Though to say phylogeny recapitulates ontogeny is obviously wrong."
  • "More specifically it is through the history of nature as human nature, the enfolding of phylogeny in ontogeny, that psychoanalysis is intergenerated."
  • "Ernst Haeckel using the phrase ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny."