Sir Charles Lyell and the Species Question
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Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society Sir Charles Lyell and the Species Question: Lyell's reflections on species reveal the gathering crisis in science after 1850 brought about by fossil discoveries, growing knowledge of geographical distribution, and the ideas of Darwin and Wallace Author(s): Leonard G. Wilson Reviewed work(s): Source: American Scientist, Vol. 59, No. 1 (January–February 1971), pp. 43-55 Published by: Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27829436 . Accessed: 12/12/2012 22:22 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to American Scientist. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded on Wed, 12 Dec 2012 22:22:44 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Leonard G. Wilson Sir Charles Lyell and the Species Question LyelVs reflectionson species reveal the gathering crisis in science after 1850 broughtabout byfossil discoveries, growingknowledge of geographical distribution, and the ideas ofDarwin and Wallace Ever since 1832 when, in the second volume of his Principles of Geology (7), he had discussed Lamarck's theory with devastating criticism, Sir Charles Lyell had been committed to the view that species were real and stable entities that might be driven to ex tinction but could not be altered. His own work on the succession of Tertiary formations had acquainted him with thousands of species of Tertiary fossil shells, saw and he that in the long course of geological time through the Tertiary period successive fossil faunas did not change abruptly but gradually. From one period to another some of the species became extinct, to new be replaced by ones, but a larger proportion survived. Over a series of periods, however, the relentless extinction of old species and their replace ment by new ones gradually produced an almost complete change of fauna. Lyell had interpreted the extinction of species as an inevitable consequence of two factors: first, the changes in physical conditions, both in particular localities over and the whole earth's surface, brought about by the steady action of geological processes, and second, the accompanying fluctuations in the Sir Charles Lyell, 1797^1875. Leonard G. of other on Wilson, professor of the history of medicine at the University populations species which the life of a Minnesota, has a number on both the of published ofpapers historyof particular species depended or by which itwas men medicine and the the the history of biological sciences, particularly history aced. He was convinced that species were real en ofphysiology. He is currentlyworking on a detailed biographyin three in the fact in to success volumesof Sir Charles Lyell. Thefirst volume, covering LyelVs lifeto 7847 tities, part by that order live and the therevolution he in will be a impactof wrought geology, published fully species had to be adapted to a particular mode now by the Yale University Press. Wilson is writing the second volume, a of life, particular set of physical conditions, and a whichdeals with LyelVs four visitsto America between 7847 and 7853; the saw set of with vigorous and growing country Lyell in his American travels, which particular relationships surrounding extended Nova Scotia to and the the Its exact from Louisiana; influence of geology species. elaborate and adaptations to enable on of North America LyelVs scientific views. The present article is to in one it live enormously complex set of conditions the Introduction to an edition Sir Charles adapted from of Lyell's made it unfit for life in set Scientific Journals on the necessarily any other of Species Question, recently published conditions. by Yale University Press. Address: College ofMedical Sciences, Univer Furthermore, the very exactness of its MN 55455. meant one sityof Minnesota, Minneapolis, adaptations that no character of a species 1971 January-February 43 This content downloaded on Wed, 12 Dec 2012 22:22:44 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions a could be changed arbitrarily without throwing the of changes and process of historical development on was on interdependent complex of adaptations out of bal earth. This necessity imposed him by the a ance. Lyell therefore thought that before species great development in the science of geology, which new con could modify itself so as to be adapted to condi had begun in the late seventeenth century, had cen tions it would be displaced by other species already tinued vigorously throughout the eighteenth fitted to the new conditions, and thereby would be tury, and was in full flood in the early nineteenth rendered extinct. century. The development of geology had shown two things: first, that the stratified rocks of the earth's which had been laid down Lyell's discussion of the relationship of species to surface, horizontally under were not of one but a their environments was deeply influenced by his water, age represented series of formations at different reading of Lamarck's Philosophie zoologique (1809) in deposited times; that successive formations must often have 1827, just as his discussion of the reality and fixity of second, been wide of time and species was developed in reaction to Lamarck's view separated by periods great because contained the remains of of their artificiality and transformability. Lamarck events, they plants and animals so different as to be referred to different argued that the structures and habits of plants and and because the strata horizontal animals are produced by their adaptation to the creations, originally beneath the water not were now elevated to environment. In a sense Lyell agreed, because he only form land but were often found in an inclined held that both structure and peculiarities of habit dry or even vertical The elevation and dis existed in order to bring about the adaptation of a position. of the strata on such a scale species to its environment. Yet he differed funda placement grand sug disturbances and of the mentally from Lamarck in that he thought these gested catastrophic shakings earth's surface. adaptations were a manifestation of design in nature. They represented a particular detail in the overall of creation?a that the plan plan comprehended Discoveries in paleontology immensities of both space and time and included in In 1812 the French compara its the entire succession of Georges Cuvier, great provisions geological on tive anatomist, collected his various memoirs epochs and changes. different fossil animals, published during the preceding sur years, and issued them together as Recherches les Lyell's view of the continued and uniform succession an ossemens fossiles (2). He included introductory of time was not evolu species through geological essay, "Discours sur les revolutions de la surface du was tionary. His scientific attitude of mind oriented succes globe," in which he sought to show that the to the century and to the fundamentally eighteenth sion of distinct fauna that had existed during the past world view by Isaac Newton's Principia. In own suggested history of the earth (revealed largely by his this view, the world was a vast ordered scheme, its researches) was to be accounted for by a series of determined everywhere and at all times phenomena great revolutions, or catastrophic disturbances, of natural laws. These laws by prevailed throughout the surface of the earth that destroyed each fauna in the world because they had been established in the turn. In the Tertiary strata of the Paris basin, which God, who had created the world. beginning by included the gypsum beds of Montmartre, there was an alternation of freshwater and marine sedi The Newtonian world view was basically ahistorical, ments, each accompanied by an abrupt change in in that it considered the natural order of the world fossil life, a fact that suggested to Cuvier that these to continue once it had been established an unchanged catastrophes may have taken the form of invasion by its creator. The planets had continued to revolve of the sea over the land. about the sun from the moment of creation, held in their orbits the laws of elliptical by unchanging Also in 1812 there was discovered at Lyme Regis in and inertia. Newton's did not gravitation system Dorsetshire, in beds of the Blue Lias, one of the series allow for a succession of on the earth's surface in changes of Secondary formations lying beneath the Chalk nor was he aware that the earth have a was might England, the skeleton of a large reptile. It at to the of history prior present appearance things. first taken to be a crocodile, but after several addi tional skeletons had been found and carefully com For Charles Lyell, considering in his mind's eye the pared, the Rev. William Daniel Conybeare of Oxford a natural order of the world in the 1820s, the Newton decided in 1820 that this animal was essentially life in the ian scheme was no longer adequate. Newton's view lizard with paddle-like limbs adapted for of the world had been timeless ;Lyell had to envision sea, and he named it Ichthyosaurus. In 1821 Gideon a natural order that would allow for a long succession Mantell, a surgeon of Lewes in Sussex, discovered 44 American Scientist, Volume 59 This content downloaded on Wed, 12 Dec 2012 22:22:44 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions state at to the remains of a new and gigantic fossil reptile in the of geology the time and survey the exciting was Wealden (Jurassic), a formation lying just below the array of then recent fossil discoveries.