Georges Cuvier, Fossil Bones, and Geological Catastrophes; New Translations andInterpretations of the Primary Texts by Martin J. S. RudwickReview by: Edward EigenIsis, Vol. 90, No. 2 (Jun., 1999), pp. 374-375Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/237096 .

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BOOK REVIEWS-ISIS, 90: 2 (1999) BOOK REVIEWS-ISIS, 90: 2 (1999) BOOK REVIEWS-ISIS, 90: 2 (1999)

mann's language was frequently obscure, as Cer- cignani emphasizes-but a careful study shows the sophistication of Boltzmann's thinking and work: he did not reduce statistical mechanics to the equilibrium theory-as did most during the first half of the twentieth century-but sought to understand it in terms of nonequilibrium and ir- reversibility.

In addition to the topics already discussed, Cercignani's book offers a brief biography and covers kinetic theory before Boltzmann, Boltz- mann's equation and H theorem, the statistical interpretation of entropy, the problem of the in- ternal degrees of freedom, Boltzmann's contri- butions to other fields of physics, his philosophy, and his relations with his contemporaries. The volume concludes with an analysis of the influ- ence of his ideas on twentieth-century science and technology.

Because it is written in Italian, this book may not have the audience it deserves. I hope there will soon be an English translation.

ANGELO BARACCA

J. M. I. Klaver. Geology and Religious Senti- ment: The Effect of Geological Discoveries on English Society and Literature between 1829 and 1859. (Brill's Studies in Intellectual History, 80.) xvi + 216 pp., frontis., bibl., index. Leiden/ New York: Brill, 1997. $83.25, Dfl 133.

Interest in the complex relationship between ge- ology and religion in pre-Darwinian Britain has grown substantially since Charles Gillispie's classic Genesis and Geology (Harvard, 1951) ap- peared nearly fifty years ago. Under a title that promises a long-overdue synthetic treatment, J. M. I. Klaver offers, instead, a tightly focused look at the interplay of geology and religion in the ideas of four eminent Victorians: Charles Ly- ell, William Buckland, Adam Sedgwick, and William Whewell. He attends to "literature" only briefly (a dozen or so authors in forty pages) and to Victorian "society" not at all.

A disconcerting air of antiquity hangs over this book, as if it had been written twenty years ago and only now dusted off for publication. Claims that "most historical accounts" (p. xii) and "much recent research" (p. xiii) neglect ex- trascientific influences on scientific ideas are simply not credible in 1999. Klaver's main con- clusions are sound but hardly surprising to any- one familiar with the recent secondary literature. Few specialists would now dispute, for example, that Charles Lyell and such orthodox geologists as Adam Sedgwick had much in common, from

mann's language was frequently obscure, as Cer- cignani emphasizes-but a careful study shows the sophistication of Boltzmann's thinking and work: he did not reduce statistical mechanics to the equilibrium theory-as did most during the first half of the twentieth century-but sought to understand it in terms of nonequilibrium and ir- reversibility.

In addition to the topics already discussed, Cercignani's book offers a brief biography and covers kinetic theory before Boltzmann, Boltz- mann's equation and H theorem, the statistical interpretation of entropy, the problem of the in- ternal degrees of freedom, Boltzmann's contri- butions to other fields of physics, his philosophy, and his relations with his contemporaries. The volume concludes with an analysis of the influ- ence of his ideas on twentieth-century science and technology.

Because it is written in Italian, this book may not have the audience it deserves. I hope there will soon be an English translation.

ANGELO BARACCA

J. M. I. Klaver. Geology and Religious Senti- ment: The Effect of Geological Discoveries on English Society and Literature between 1829 and 1859. (Brill's Studies in Intellectual History, 80.) xvi + 216 pp., frontis., bibl., index. Leiden/ New York: Brill, 1997. $83.25, Dfl 133.

Interest in the complex relationship between ge- ology and religion in pre-Darwinian Britain has grown substantially since Charles Gillispie's classic Genesis and Geology (Harvard, 1951) ap- peared nearly fifty years ago. Under a title that promises a long-overdue synthetic treatment, J. M. I. Klaver offers, instead, a tightly focused look at the interplay of geology and religion in the ideas of four eminent Victorians: Charles Ly- ell, William Buckland, Adam Sedgwick, and William Whewell. He attends to "literature" only briefly (a dozen or so authors in forty pages) and to Victorian "society" not at all.

A disconcerting air of antiquity hangs over this book, as if it had been written twenty years ago and only now dusted off for publication. Claims that "most historical accounts" (p. xii) and "much recent research" (p. xiii) neglect ex- trascientific influences on scientific ideas are simply not credible in 1999. Klaver's main con- clusions are sound but hardly surprising to any- one familiar with the recent secondary literature. Few specialists would now dispute, for example, that Charles Lyell and such orthodox geologists as Adam Sedgwick had much in common, from

mann's language was frequently obscure, as Cer- cignani emphasizes-but a careful study shows the sophistication of Boltzmann's thinking and work: he did not reduce statistical mechanics to the equilibrium theory-as did most during the first half of the twentieth century-but sought to understand it in terms of nonequilibrium and ir- reversibility.

In addition to the topics already discussed, Cercignani's book offers a brief biography and covers kinetic theory before Boltzmann, Boltz- mann's equation and H theorem, the statistical interpretation of entropy, the problem of the in- ternal degrees of freedom, Boltzmann's contri- butions to other fields of physics, his philosophy, and his relations with his contemporaries. The volume concludes with an analysis of the influ- ence of his ideas on twentieth-century science and technology.

Because it is written in Italian, this book may not have the audience it deserves. I hope there will soon be an English translation.

ANGELO BARACCA

J. M. I. Klaver. Geology and Religious Senti- ment: The Effect of Geological Discoveries on English Society and Literature between 1829 and 1859. (Brill's Studies in Intellectual History, 80.) xvi + 216 pp., frontis., bibl., index. Leiden/ New York: Brill, 1997. $83.25, Dfl 133.

Interest in the complex relationship between ge- ology and religion in pre-Darwinian Britain has grown substantially since Charles Gillispie's classic Genesis and Geology (Harvard, 1951) ap- peared nearly fifty years ago. Under a title that promises a long-overdue synthetic treatment, J. M. I. Klaver offers, instead, a tightly focused look at the interplay of geology and religion in the ideas of four eminent Victorians: Charles Ly- ell, William Buckland, Adam Sedgwick, and William Whewell. He attends to "literature" only briefly (a dozen or so authors in forty pages) and to Victorian "society" not at all.

A disconcerting air of antiquity hangs over this book, as if it had been written twenty years ago and only now dusted off for publication. Claims that "most historical accounts" (p. xii) and "much recent research" (p. xiii) neglect ex- trascientific influences on scientific ideas are simply not credible in 1999. Klaver's main con- clusions are sound but hardly surprising to any- one familiar with the recent secondary literature. Few specialists would now dispute, for example, that Charles Lyell and such orthodox geologists as Adam Sedgwick had much in common, from

their shared distrust of "scriptural geology" to their faith-based fears of evolutionism and its implications. The books and articles that made such ideas commonplace are absent from Klaver's bibliography, which includes little pub- lished after 1980.

Klaver's style of analysis also belongs to an earlier era. Klaver focuses almost exclusively on his subjects' major published writings, occasion- ally leavening his discussions with excerpts from correspondence reprinted in their "Life and Let- ters" volumes. Klaver's careful readings reveal interesting nuances, particularly in the work of the under-studied Sedgwick, but such methods alone are inadequate to his purpose. Works such as Martin Rudwick's Great Devonian Contro- versy (Chicago, 1985) have raised the method- ological bar for historians of science. It is no longer sufficient to assume, as Klaver implicitly does, that scientists' public statements are dis- tortion-free windows on their private beliefs.

The book is most successful when Klaver sticks closest to the original texts; the contextual sections are problematic at best. The phrase "professional geologists" appears throughout them, as if in the 1830s it denoted a clearly de- fined group. The multiple senses of "uniformity" are routinely conflated. Thomas Huxley appears as the last survivor of the Lyell-Sedgwick gen- eration, to which he belonged neither profes- sionally nor intellectually.

Klaver's interpretations of Whewell, Buck- land, and Sedgwick may repay the attention of specialists, but this work as a whole offers few new insights.

A. BOWDOIN VAN RIPER

Martin J. S. Rudwick. Georges Cuvier, Fossil Bones, and Geological Catastrophes; New Translations and Interpretations of the Primary Texts. xvi + 301 pp., illus., apps., bibls., index. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1997. $34.95.

The subtitle of this book, "New Translations and Interpretations of the Primary Texts," is appro- priate for a presentation of the geological writ- ings of Georges Cuvier (1769-1832), who con- sidered fossils of extinct species "documents" that provided access to the unrecorded history of the prehuman world, separated from our own, he claimed, by a geological catastrophe. Martin Rudwick has collected nineteen texts, which ex- tend from the twenty-two-year-old Cuvier's let- ters to his schoolmate (written in 1791 and 1792) criticizing the nascent field of geology-letters

their shared distrust of "scriptural geology" to their faith-based fears of evolutionism and its implications. The books and articles that made such ideas commonplace are absent from Klaver's bibliography, which includes little pub- lished after 1980.

Klaver's style of analysis also belongs to an earlier era. Klaver focuses almost exclusively on his subjects' major published writings, occasion- ally leavening his discussions with excerpts from correspondence reprinted in their "Life and Let- ters" volumes. Klaver's careful readings reveal interesting nuances, particularly in the work of the under-studied Sedgwick, but such methods alone are inadequate to his purpose. Works such as Martin Rudwick's Great Devonian Contro- versy (Chicago, 1985) have raised the method- ological bar for historians of science. It is no longer sufficient to assume, as Klaver implicitly does, that scientists' public statements are dis- tortion-free windows on their private beliefs.

The book is most successful when Klaver sticks closest to the original texts; the contextual sections are problematic at best. The phrase "professional geologists" appears throughout them, as if in the 1830s it denoted a clearly de- fined group. The multiple senses of "uniformity" are routinely conflated. Thomas Huxley appears as the last survivor of the Lyell-Sedgwick gen- eration, to which he belonged neither profes- sionally nor intellectually.

Klaver's interpretations of Whewell, Buck- land, and Sedgwick may repay the attention of specialists, but this work as a whole offers few new insights.

A. BOWDOIN VAN RIPER

Martin J. S. Rudwick. Georges Cuvier, Fossil Bones, and Geological Catastrophes; New Translations and Interpretations of the Primary Texts. xvi + 301 pp., illus., apps., bibls., index. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1997. $34.95.

The subtitle of this book, "New Translations and Interpretations of the Primary Texts," is appro- priate for a presentation of the geological writ- ings of Georges Cuvier (1769-1832), who con- sidered fossils of extinct species "documents" that provided access to the unrecorded history of the prehuman world, separated from our own, he claimed, by a geological catastrophe. Martin Rudwick has collected nineteen texts, which ex- tend from the twenty-two-year-old Cuvier's let- ters to his schoolmate (written in 1791 and 1792) criticizing the nascent field of geology-letters

their shared distrust of "scriptural geology" to their faith-based fears of evolutionism and its implications. The books and articles that made such ideas commonplace are absent from Klaver's bibliography, which includes little pub- lished after 1980.

Klaver's style of analysis also belongs to an earlier era. Klaver focuses almost exclusively on his subjects' major published writings, occasion- ally leavening his discussions with excerpts from correspondence reprinted in their "Life and Let- ters" volumes. Klaver's careful readings reveal interesting nuances, particularly in the work of the under-studied Sedgwick, but such methods alone are inadequate to his purpose. Works such as Martin Rudwick's Great Devonian Contro- versy (Chicago, 1985) have raised the method- ological bar for historians of science. It is no longer sufficient to assume, as Klaver implicitly does, that scientists' public statements are dis- tortion-free windows on their private beliefs.

The book is most successful when Klaver sticks closest to the original texts; the contextual sections are problematic at best. The phrase "professional geologists" appears throughout them, as if in the 1830s it denoted a clearly de- fined group. The multiple senses of "uniformity" are routinely conflated. Thomas Huxley appears as the last survivor of the Lyell-Sedgwick gen- eration, to which he belonged neither profes- sionally nor intellectually.

Klaver's interpretations of Whewell, Buck- land, and Sedgwick may repay the attention of specialists, but this work as a whole offers few new insights.

A. BOWDOIN VAN RIPER

Martin J. S. Rudwick. Georges Cuvier, Fossil Bones, and Geological Catastrophes; New Translations and Interpretations of the Primary Texts. xvi + 301 pp., illus., apps., bibls., index. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1997. $34.95.

The subtitle of this book, "New Translations and Interpretations of the Primary Texts," is appro- priate for a presentation of the geological writ- ings of Georges Cuvier (1769-1832), who con- sidered fossils of extinct species "documents" that provided access to the unrecorded history of the prehuman world, separated from our own, he claimed, by a geological catastrophe. Martin Rudwick has collected nineteen texts, which ex- tend from the twenty-two-year-old Cuvier's let- ters to his schoolmate (written in 1791 and 1792) criticizing the nascent field of geology-letters

374 374 374

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.13 on Fri, 9 May 2014 17:41:58 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

BOOK REVIEWS-ISIS, 90: 2 (1999) BOOK REVIEWS-ISIS, 90: 2 (1999)

full of theories and systems-to the "Prelimi- nary Discourse" of his magisterial Recherches sur les ossemens fossiles (1812), a collection of the memoirs he published, beginning in 1804, in the Annales of the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris, where he spent his career. Rudwick' s "editorial narrative and commentary" provides a general biographical and conceptual context, highlighting the difficulties Cuvier him- self faced in interpreting the geological and fos- sil record, as well as biblical and other "textual resources" that offered gnomic accounts of floodlike catastrophes. Cuvier's texts are essen- tial reading for anyone interested in the emer- gence of geology and paleontology as scientific disciplines, as well as for anyone interested in nineteenth-century historicism.

The text most likely to attract readers' interest, one written for a general educated audience, is the "Preliminary Discourse." This work is not merely a recapitulation of Cuvier's scientific ar- guments but a masterpiece of scientific prose that was reprinted, Rudwick notes, long after it was obsolete in strictly scientific terms. The rendition offered here demonstrates the extent to which the 1813 English translation commissioned by Rob- ert Jameson, which long remained in print, con- tributed to the misconception that Cuvier was a biblical literalist. Especially when read along with the more specialized texts, it demonstrates the coherent reasoning underlying Cuvier's no- torious rejection of organic evolution, a theory he identified with Lamarck. Among these more specialized texts those of particular note are "Memoir on the Almost Complete Skeleton of a Little Quadruped of the Opossum Genus, Found in the Plaster Stone Near Paris," which shows Cuvier employing his formidable skills as a comparative anatomist in identifying fossil spe- cies; "Report of the National Institute on the Work by Mr. Andre Entitled Theory of the Pres- ent Surface of the Earth," which pits fact against theory in the practice of geology; and "Essay on the Mineral Geography of the Environs of Paris," written with Alexandre Brongniart, which gives a vivid sense of the empirical foun- dations on which Cuvier's conjectures were based. Two previously unpublished texts that Rudwick includes here-one a set of lecture notes interesting for its skeletal outline of prop- ositions-also appear untranslated in an appen- dix.

Rudwick's translations are highly readable, if occasionally at the expense of Cuvier's elevated style. And his bibliographic reconstruction of Cuvier's own cryptic footnotes will be indis- pensable to historians of science. Numerous il-

full of theories and systems-to the "Prelimi- nary Discourse" of his magisterial Recherches sur les ossemens fossiles (1812), a collection of the memoirs he published, beginning in 1804, in the Annales of the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris, where he spent his career. Rudwick' s "editorial narrative and commentary" provides a general biographical and conceptual context, highlighting the difficulties Cuvier him- self faced in interpreting the geological and fos- sil record, as well as biblical and other "textual resources" that offered gnomic accounts of floodlike catastrophes. Cuvier's texts are essen- tial reading for anyone interested in the emer- gence of geology and paleontology as scientific disciplines, as well as for anyone interested in nineteenth-century historicism.

The text most likely to attract readers' interest, one written for a general educated audience, is the "Preliminary Discourse." This work is not merely a recapitulation of Cuvier's scientific ar- guments but a masterpiece of scientific prose that was reprinted, Rudwick notes, long after it was obsolete in strictly scientific terms. The rendition offered here demonstrates the extent to which the 1813 English translation commissioned by Rob- ert Jameson, which long remained in print, con- tributed to the misconception that Cuvier was a biblical literalist. Especially when read along with the more specialized texts, it demonstrates the coherent reasoning underlying Cuvier's no- torious rejection of organic evolution, a theory he identified with Lamarck. Among these more specialized texts those of particular note are "Memoir on the Almost Complete Skeleton of a Little Quadruped of the Opossum Genus, Found in the Plaster Stone Near Paris," which shows Cuvier employing his formidable skills as a comparative anatomist in identifying fossil spe- cies; "Report of the National Institute on the Work by Mr. Andre Entitled Theory of the Pres- ent Surface of the Earth," which pits fact against theory in the practice of geology; and "Essay on the Mineral Geography of the Environs of Paris," written with Alexandre Brongniart, which gives a vivid sense of the empirical foun- dations on which Cuvier's conjectures were based. Two previously unpublished texts that Rudwick includes here-one a set of lecture notes interesting for its skeletal outline of prop- ositions-also appear untranslated in an appen- dix.

Rudwick's translations are highly readable, if occasionally at the expense of Cuvier's elevated style. And his bibliographic reconstruction of Cuvier's own cryptic footnotes will be indis- pensable to historians of science. Numerous il-

lustrations from the original texts are reproduced to good effect, the explanatory captions evi- dently drawing on insights from Rudwick's study of geohistoric illustration, Scenes from Deep Time (Chicago, 1992). In his commentary for figure 10 (a mammal excavated from the gyp- sum around Paris), Rudwick explains how Cu- vier graphically indicated the critical distinction between those parts drawn from positive evi- dence and those inferred by analogy. Rudwick's attention to the primary texts qua documents ul- timately reveals how Cuvier's considerable sci- entific authority was (in part) a product of the literary culture of nineteenth-century science. Especially for readers accustomed to thinking of Cuvier as a zoologist who doubly erred in the debate over geological catastrophe and organic evolution, this book succeeds admirably in trans- lating his program for writing the history of the earth by interpreting the meaning of fossils.

EDWARD EIGEN

Jon Turney. Frankenstein's Footsteps: Science, Genetics, and Popular Culture. x + 276 pp., illus., bibl., index. New Haven, Conn.: Yale Uni- versity Press, 1998. $30.

We will never be rid of Frankenstein, Jon Tumey informs us in this nuanced and highly informa- tive account of the public image of the life sci- ences, even if we want to be. Frankensteinian images remain a potent element in the contem- porary vocabulary we use when discussing such biomedical innovations as the cloning of an adult sheep or the transplantation of animal organs into human beings. Beginning with Mary Shel- ley's 1818 novel, Tumey describes how the story of Victor Frankenstein's discovery of the secret of life became one of the most enduring myths of modernity. Emphasizing Shelley's subtle and complex story of creation, alienation, and de- struction, Tumey uses the Frankenstein story and its multiple retellings to frame the public history of biology in the nineteenth and twentieth cen- turies. In doing so, he challenges the claims ad- vanced by some scientists that the public re- sponse to recombinant DNA and cloning research represents the emergence of a com- pletely new general antiscience movement. He argues that the history of public ambivalence about the ability to manipulate life in the labo- ratory is not a recent phenomenon; the vital con- tinuities in cultural responses to biological in- novations, he insists, make reading Mary Shelley indispensable for understanding the reception of Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park.

lustrations from the original texts are reproduced to good effect, the explanatory captions evi- dently drawing on insights from Rudwick's study of geohistoric illustration, Scenes from Deep Time (Chicago, 1992). In his commentary for figure 10 (a mammal excavated from the gyp- sum around Paris), Rudwick explains how Cu- vier graphically indicated the critical distinction between those parts drawn from positive evi- dence and those inferred by analogy. Rudwick's attention to the primary texts qua documents ul- timately reveals how Cuvier's considerable sci- entific authority was (in part) a product of the literary culture of nineteenth-century science. Especially for readers accustomed to thinking of Cuvier as a zoologist who doubly erred in the debate over geological catastrophe and organic evolution, this book succeeds admirably in trans- lating his program for writing the history of the earth by interpreting the meaning of fossils.

EDWARD EIGEN

Jon Turney. Frankenstein's Footsteps: Science, Genetics, and Popular Culture. x + 276 pp., illus., bibl., index. New Haven, Conn.: Yale Uni- versity Press, 1998. $30.

We will never be rid of Frankenstein, Jon Tumey informs us in this nuanced and highly informa- tive account of the public image of the life sci- ences, even if we want to be. Frankensteinian images remain a potent element in the contem- porary vocabulary we use when discussing such biomedical innovations as the cloning of an adult sheep or the transplantation of animal organs into human beings. Beginning with Mary Shel- ley's 1818 novel, Tumey describes how the story of Victor Frankenstein's discovery of the secret of life became one of the most enduring myths of modernity. Emphasizing Shelley's subtle and complex story of creation, alienation, and de- struction, Tumey uses the Frankenstein story and its multiple retellings to frame the public history of biology in the nineteenth and twentieth cen- turies. In doing so, he challenges the claims ad- vanced by some scientists that the public re- sponse to recombinant DNA and cloning research represents the emergence of a com- pletely new general antiscience movement. He argues that the history of public ambivalence about the ability to manipulate life in the labo- ratory is not a recent phenomenon; the vital con- tinuities in cultural responses to biological in- novations, he insists, make reading Mary Shelley indispensable for understanding the reception of Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park.

375 375

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