The Biological Sciences in the Nineteenth Century: Some Problems and Sources

Research for this paper was supported in part by grants from the American Philosophical Society and the National Science Foundation.

Edsall J. T. , “Proteins as macromolecules: An essay on the development of the macromolecule concept and some of its vicissitudes”, Archives of biochemistry & biophysics, Suppl. 1, 12–20 (1962); Mayr Ernst , “Where are we?”, Cold Spring Harbor Symposium for Quantitative Biology, xxiv (1959) 1–14; Waterman Talbot H. , “Revolution for biology”, American scientist, 1 (1962) 548–68.

Williams L. Pearce , “The physical sciences in the first half of the nineteenth century: Problems and sources,” History of science, i (1962) 1–15, claims that Naturphilosophie defined “as a deep belief in a fundamental, underlying unity of Nature, permeates the physical sciences” as well during this period.

Every reader will have his own choices of the best exposition of the philosophical bases of Naturphilosophie. A beginner's list should certainly include: Knittermeyer Heinrich , Schelling und die Romantische Schule, Geschichte der Philosophie in Einzeldarstellungen, Abt. VII, die Philosophie der neuesten Zeit I, Band 30/31 (Munich, 1929) ch. 2, “Schellings Leipziger Zeit und die Anfänge der Naturphilosophie” and ch. 4, “Die Romantische Naturphilosophie” Bréhier Emile , Schelling (Paris, 1912) Pt. I, ch. 2, “Les débuts de la philosophie de la nature”, and Pt. II, chap. 2, “La philosophie de la nature”; Aesch Alexander Gode-Von , Natural science in German romanticism (New York, 1941). A major bibliographical source for the influence of Naturphilosophie in medicine and physiology is Ernst Hirschfeld, “Romantische Medizin, zu einer künftigen Geschichte der Naturphilosophischen Ära”, Kyklos. Jahrbuch für Geschichte und Philosophie der Medizin, iii (1930) 1–89. See also Klein Marc , “Sur les résonances de la philosophie de la nature en biologie moderne et contemporaine”, Revue philosophique, cxxxxiv (1954) 514–543.

Knittermeyer , op. cit., 74, 79.

See for example, Mason S. F. , Main currents of scientific thought (New York, 1953) 281.

Knittermeyer , op. cit., 79.

Ibid., p. 95. For several of the pioneers in conservation of energy, the concept of conversion processes surely had its source in the Naturphilosophie notion of an underlying unity of all forces. See Kuhn T. S. , “Energy conservation as an example of simultaneous discovery”, in Critical problems in the history of science, ed. Clagett Marshall (Madison, Wisc., 1959) 321–346.

See Knittermeyer , op. cit., 198.

See for example, Singer Charles , A history of biology to about the year 1900 (New York and London, 1959) 221f and Knittermeyr , op. cit., passim. Also Nordenskiold Erik , The history of biology (New York, 1928) 286 ff.

The journal was published in several series between 1817 and 1848. It often contained poetry, political tracts and other subjects not generally thought of as scientific. Its sub-title changed several times but one title reflecting the full interest is Isis, eine Encyclopädische Zeitschrift, Vorzüglich für Naturgeschichte, Vergleichende Anatomie und Physiologie.

Strohl J. , Lorenz Oken und Georg Büchner (Zurich, 1936) 19, provides a list of over a dozen scientists influenced by Oken, including Oerstedt Owen Carus Burdach von Esenbeck Nees Russell E. S. , Form and function (London, 1916) 96–97, confirms many of these names and notes that in England at least one of Oken's ideas, the vertebral theory, a direct outgrowth of his philosophical biology, “was championed particularly by Richard Owen”. Owen is also the author of an Encyclopedia Britannica article on Oken.

In the same year, 1802, Lamarck also used the term as a means of indicating the continuity of the animal and plant series and the necessity for studying them both.

Treviranus Gottfried Reinhold , Biologie oder Philosophie der Lebenden Natur für Naturforscher und Aerzte (6 vols., Göttingen, 1802–1821).

Ibid., i, 38, 43–44; “Gleichförmigkeit der Erscheinungen bey ungleichförmigen Einwirkungen der Aussenwelt den unterscheidenden Charakter des Lebens ausmacht”.

Stauffer Robert C. , “Speculation and experiment in the background of Oersted's discovery of electromagnetism”, Isis, xlviii (1957) 33, 47–48.

For a brief account of Mayer's role see Kuhn T. S. , loc. cit.

Helmholtz Hermann , “Bericht über die Theorie der Physiologischen Wärmeerscheinungen für 1845”, i, 3–11; “Wärme, physiologisch.” (1845), ii, 680–725; “Ueber die Wärmeentwickelung bei der Muskelaction” (1847), ii, 745–763, in Wissenschaftliche Abhandlungen (Leipzig, 1883). Mayer J. R. , “Die Organische Bewegung in ihrem Zusammenhange mit dem Stoffwechsel, ein Beitrag zur Naturkunde”, Die Mechanik der Wärme in Gesammelten Schriften (Stuttgart, 1874) 15–126.

Meyer A. W. , Human generation, conclusions of Burdach, Dollinger and von Baer (Standford, 1956).

Ibid., 65.

Russell E. S. , op. cit.

Owen Richard , Encyclopedia Britannica.

Mendelsohn Everett , “Schwann's mistake”, Acts of the Xth international congress of history of science (in press).

Jones Ernest , The life and work of Sigmund Freud, 1856–1900: The formative years and the great discoveries (New York, 1953) i, 43.

Temkin Owsei , “The idea of descent in post-Romantic German biology: 1848–1858”, Forerunners of Darwin, ed. Glass Bentley (Baltimore, 1959) 353–355.

Ibid., 355. Temkin cites a number of works in footnote 6, p. 324.

Cited by Temkin, from Virchow Rudolf , “Standpoints in scientific medicine (1877)”, Disease, life and man; selected essays, ed. and trans., Rather L. J. (Stanford, 1958) 145.

Jones , Freud, p. 43.

Virchow , op. cit., 142.

Ibid., 142.

Virchow Rudolf , “Standpoints in scientific medicine (1847)”, in Virchow , op. cit., 28. This essay bears the same title as the one referred to above written some thirty years later and served as the motivation for the summing up after thirty years.

Ibid.

See for example Rothschuh K. E. , Geschichte der Physiologie (Berlin, 1953) 124, 151; also “Ansteckende Ideen in der Wissenschaftsgeschichte, gezeigt an der Entstehung und Ausbreitung der romantischen Physiologie”, Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift, lxxxvi (1961) 396–402.

See for example: Temkin Owsei , “German concepts of ontogeny and history around 1800”, Bulletin of the history of medicine, xxiv (1950) 227–246, where he claims that just this interest in the philosophical background led to Germany's prominence in this field of study. Walzel Oskar , German romanticism, trans. Lussky A. E. (New York, 1932) 245, suggests that in the later period the Naturphilosophen turned more and more toward neurological investigations.

This is just what Temkin has provided in his study on ontogeny (see n. 33).

Cited in Owsei Temkin , “Materialism in French and German physiology of the early nineteenth century”, Bull. hist. med., xx (1946) 324, from Vogt Carl , Physiologische Briefe für Gebildete aller Stände (Stuttgart and Tübingen, 1845–47) 206.

Ackerknecht Erwin H. , “Beiträge zur Geschichte der Medizinal-reform von 1848”, Archiv für Geschichte der Medizen, xxv (1932) 61–109, 113–183.

Ackerknecht Erwin H. , Rudolf Virchow, doctor, statesman, anthropologist (Madison, Wisc., 1953).

Ibid., 44.

Ibid., 44 ff. In his cellular pathology, Ackerknecht claims, Virchow's political and biological judgments were mutually re-inforcing.

Temkin Owsei , “Materialism in French and German physiology”. Bulletin of the history of medicine, xx (1946) 322–327.

See my own recent study, “Cell theory and the development of general physiology”, Archives international d'histoire des sciences lxv (1964).

Loeb Jacques , The mechanistic conception of life, biological essays (Chicago, 1912) 4.

See my study Heat and life: Development of the theory of animal heat (Cambridge, Mass., 1964) for a detailed analysis of the steps leading up to this change.

Loeb Jacques , op. cit., 5. See also Goodfield G. J. , The growth of scientific physiology. Physiological method and the mechanist-vitalist controversy, illustrated by the problems of respiration and animal heat (London, 1960).

Hertwig Oscar , “The growth of biology in the nineteenth century”, Board of Regents report of the Smithsonian Institute (Washington, D.C., 1900) 473.

Ibid., 472.

Ibid., 472.

Ibid., 474.

Cranefield Paul F. , “The organic physics of 1847 and the biophysics of today”, Journal of the history of medicine, xii (1957) 407–23.

Ibid., 422–423.

Hertwig , op. cit., 472.

Ernest Nagel deals with the philosophical background of biological reduction in his new book, The structure of science, problems in the logic of scientific explanation (New York, 1961), ch. 12, “Mechanistic explanation and organismic biology”.

The terms he uses most often are “propriétés vitales” or “propriétés physiologiques”.

Bernard Claude , La science expérimentale (Paris, 1878) 53–54.

There is one extremely interesting recent study of this field: Wightman W. P. D. , The emergence of general physiology: Lecture delivered in the Queen's University of Belfast (Belfast, 1956).

“Elementary organism” was one of the several terms Bernard used to designate cells.

“La manifestation des phenomenes de la vie est soumise aussi à cette double condition qui se trouve, d'une part dans l'être vivant, c'est-à-dire dans l'organism manifestant le phénomène, et d'autre part dans le milieu où vit cet être organisé”, Leçons sur les propriétés des tissus vivant (Paris, 1866) 6.

F. L. Holmes has recently completed an analysis of Bernard's concept of the milieu intérieur, as his doctoral dissertation at Harvard University, 1962. A small part of this study has recently been published: “The milieu intérieur and the cell theory”, Bulletin of the history of medicine, xxxvii (1963) 315–335.

Bernard Claude , Leçons sur les phénomènes de la vie communs aux animaux et aux végétaux (Paris, 1878) 16.

Bernard Claude , De la physiologie générale (Paris, 1872) 56.

Verworn Max , “Modern physiology”, Monist, iv (1893–94) 355–374.

Ibid., 361.

Ibid., 374.

The programme Verworn recommended would be based on comparative physiology using unicellular animals or simple plant structures. He urged the use of the new microscopical techniques for observation as well as microscopic vivisection and adoption of micro-chemical methods: ibid., 370–373.

See Donald Fleming's excellent appraisal of the new literature in “The centenary of the ‘Origin of species’”, Journal of the history of ideas, xx (1959) 437–446.

See for example Smith Sydney , “The origin of ‘The Origin’, as discerned from Charles Darwin's notebooks and his annotations in the books he read between 1837 and and 1842”, Advancement of science, no. 64 (1960) 391–401.

Peckham Morse (ed.), The origin of species by Charles Darwin, a variorum text (Philadelphia, 1959).

Ellegård Alvar , Darwin and the general reader: The reception of Darwin's theory of evolution in the British periodical press, 1859–1872 (Gothenburg studies in English, viii, 1958).

Lurie Edward , Louis Agassiz, a life in science (Chicago, 1960). See also the same author's edition of Louis Agassiz's Essay on classification (Cambridge, Mass., 1962). See also Mayr Ernst , “Agassiz, Darwin, and evolution”, Harvard Library Bulletin, xviii (1959) 165–194.

Willey Basil , Darwin and Butler, two versions of evolution (New York, 1960). See also Simpson George Gaylord , “Lamarck, Darwin and Butler, three approaches to evolution”, American scholar (Spring, 1961) 238–249.

Coleman William , Georges Cuvier, zoologist, a study in the history of evolution theory (Cambridge, Mass., 1964).

de Beer Gavin Sir , Darwin's journal, Bulletin of the British Museum (Nat. Hist.) Historical series, ii, 1 (London, 1959); Darwin's Notebooks on Transmutation of Species, ibid., ii, 2–5 (London, 1960). Another start was made on editing the Notebooks by Bartlett Paul H. , A transcription of Darwin's first notebook on “Transmutation of species” , in Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology, cxxii, 6 (Cambridge, 1960).

In a preliminary article Robert C. Stauffer outlines his reasons for undertaking the study and publication of the manuscript: “‘On the Origin of Species’: An unpublished version”, Science, cxxx (1959) 1449–1452.

The autobiography of Charles Darwin, 1809–1882. With original omissions restored. Edited with appendix and notes by his grand-daughter, Nora Barlow (New York, 1959).

Himmelfarb Gertrude , Darwin and the Darwinian revolution (New York, 1959). As this paper goes to press I have just seen a new ‘life’ by de Beer Gavin Sir , Charles Darwin, evolution by natural selection (London, 1963).

In her criticism of Darwinian and neo-Darwinian evolutionary thought, Miss Himmelfarb clearly associates herself with the analysis of modern evolutionary theory by Grene Marjorie “Two evolutionary theories”, British journal of the philosophy of science, ix (1958) 110–127, 185–193. For a detailed criticism of Miss Himmelfarb's book see Appleman Philip , “The logic of evolution: Some reconsiderations”, Victorian studies, iii (1959) 115–125.

The experimental aspects of Darwin's scientific career have received scant attention, yet his letters are filled with accounts of experiments he conducted.

One study of Darwin's post-Origin evolutionary ideas is being carried out by Vorzimmer Peter , “The development of Darwin's evolutionary thought after 1859”, doctoral dissertation, unpublished, Cambridge University, 1963; see also his “Charles Darwin and blending inheritance”, Isis, liv (1963) 371–390.

The several exceptions to this lack of interest in the late nineteenth century each had some special question in mind. The volume by Fothergill Philip G. , Historical aspects of organic evolution (New York, 1953), although mentioning much of the later evolutionary work, contains a strong neo-Lamarckian flavour. Barnett A. (ed.), A century of Darwin (Cambridge and London, 1958), contains a series of essays by working biologists, dealing each with their own special discipline, where historical analysis is not the guiding criterion. Carter C. S. , A hundred years of evolution (London, 1957), combines history with an explanation of the biology suited to the interested layman.

See the papers in Bell P. R. (ed.), Darwin's biological work, some aspects reconsidered (Cambridge, 1959). Le Gros Clark W. E. Lerner I. Michael Stern Curt Müntzing Arne Mayr Ernst Stebbins G. Ledyard , Theodosius Dobzhansky are among the contributors to the “Commemoration of the centennial of the publication of ‘The Origin of species’ by Charles Darwin”, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, ciii, 2 (1959).

One important study of this period is by Wilkie J. S. , “Galton's contribution to the theory of evolution with special reference to his use of models and metaphors”, Annals of science, xi (1956) 194–205.

Wilkie J. S. , “Some reasons for the rediscovery and appreciation of Mendel's work in the first years of the present century”, British journal of the history of science, 1 (1962) 5–17; Glass Bentley , “The long neglect of a scientific discovery: Mendel's laws of inheritance”, in Boas George , Studies in intellectual history (Baltimore, 1953). and see also “The establishment of modern genetical theory as an example of the interaction of different models, techniques, and inferences”, Scientific change. Historial studies in the intellectual, social and technical conditions for scientific discovery and technical invention from antiquity to the present, ed. Crombie A. C. (London and New York, 1963). For another attempt at explaining the neglect, see Gasking Elizabeth B. , “Why was Mendel's work ignored?”, Journal of the history of ideas, xx (1959) 60–84.

An excellent collection of papers has been brought together under the auspices of the Johns Hopkins History of Ideas Club: Glass Bentley Temkin Owsei Straus William L. Jnr. (eds.), Forerunners of Darwin: 1745–1849 (Baltimore, 1959). Conway Zirkle's early study still must not be overlooked: “Natural selection before the ‘Origin of species’”, Proc. Amer. Phil. Soc., Ixxxiv (1941) 71–123. Eiseley Loren C. has argued strenuously for greater recognition of Blyth Edward , “Charles Darwin, Edward Blyth, and the theory of natural selection”, Proc. Amer. Phil. Soc., ciii (1959) 94–158. Georges Canguilhem and his colleagues have explored the embryological background to organic evolution in their monograph: “Du développement à l'évolution au xix^e siècle”, Thales, xi (1960 [1962]) 1–68.

Two excellent examples of general histories are: Eiseley Loren C. , Darwin's century, evolution and the men who discovered it (New York, 1958); Greene John C. , The death of Adam, evolution and its impact on Western thought (Ames, Iowa, 1959). Many fragments of importance for the history of evolution have been collected by Zimmermann Walter , Evolution, die Geschichte Ihrer Probleme und Erhenntnisse (Freiburg and Munich, 1953).

Millhauser Milton , Just before Darwin, Robert Chambers and “Vestiges” (Middletown, Conn., 1959); Wilkie J. S. , “The idea of evolution in the writings of Buffon”, Annals of science, xii (1956) 48–62, 212–227, 255–226.

Two brief studies indicate roads for future research: Gillispie Charles C. , “Lamarck and Darwin in the history of science”, in Forerunners of Darwin, pp. 265–291; Wilkie J. S. , “Buffon, Lamarck and Darwin: The originality of Darwin's theory of evolution”, in Darwin's biological work, ed. Bell 262–307.

Curiously it is only in the United States in the late nineteenth century that there is a clearly recognisable school of neo-Lamarckians.

Cannon Walter F. , “The uniformitarian catastrophist debate”, Isis, li (1960) 38–55; Coleman William , “Lyell and the ‘reality’ of species: 1830–1833”, Isis, liii (1962) 325–338. Lyell's ideas received important commentary in Gillispie Charles C. , Genesis and geology, a study in the relations of scientific thought, natural theology, and social opinion in Great Britain, 1790–1850 (Cambridge, Mass., 1951). Another recent student of Lyell has promised a full-scale study: Wilson Leonard , “The development of uniformitarianism in the mind of Sir Charles Lyell (1797–1875)”, Acts of the Xth international congress of the history of science (in press).

Eiseley Loren C. , “Alfred Russel Wallace”, Scientific American, cc (February, 1959) 70–84. After going to press I have seen the new study by George Wilma , Biologist philosopher, a study of the life and writings of Alfred Russel Wallace (London and New York, 1964).

Hertwig , op. cit., reference 45.

Rotschuh K. E. Schäfer A. , “Quantitative Untersuchungen über die Entwicklung des Physiologischen Fachschriftt hums (Periodica) in den Letzten 150 Jahren”, Centaurus, iv (1955) 63–66.

Rothschuh K. E. , “Dynamische Momente in der Entfaltung der Wissenschaft, gezeigt an der Geschichte der Physiologic”, Naturwissenschaften Rundschau, x (1961) 379–384.

Goldschmidt Richard B. , Portraits from memory, recollections of a zoologist (Seattle Wash., 1956).