Georges Cuvier
| |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 23 August 1769 |
| Died | 13 May 1832 (aged 62) |
| Nationality | French |
| Known for | Le Règne Animal; establishing the fields of stratigraphy and comparative anatomy, and the principle of faunal succession in the fossil record; making extinction an accepted scientific phenomenon; opposing theories of evolution |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Natural history, paleontology, anatomy |
| Institutions | Muséum national d'histoire naturelle |
| Author abbrev. (botany) | Cuvier |
Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric, Baron Cuvier (French: [kyvje]; 23 August 1769 – 13 May 1832), known as Georges Cuvier, was a French naturalist and zoologist, sometimes referred to as the "founding father of paleontology". Cuvier was a major figure in natural sciences research in the early 19th century and was instrumental in establishing the fields of comparative anatomy and paleontology through his work in comparing living animals with fossils.
Cuvier's work is considered the foundation of vertebrate paleontology, and he expanded Linnaean taxonomy by grouping classes into phyla and incorporating both fossils and living species into the classification. Cuvier is also known for establishing extinction as a fact—at the time, extinction was considered by many of Cuvier's contemporaries to be merely controversial speculation. In his Essay on the Theory of the Earth (1813) Cuvier proposed that now-extinct species had been wiped out by periodic catastrophic flooding events. In this way, Cuvier became the most influential proponent of catastrophism in geology in the early 19th century. His study of the strata of the Paris basin with Alexandre Brongniart established the basic principles of biostratigraphy.
Among his other accomplishments, Cuvier established that elephant-like bones found in the USA belonged to an extinct animal he later would name as a mastodon, and that a large skeleton dug up in Paraguay was of Megatherium, a giant, prehistoric ground sloth. He named the pterosaur Pterodactylus, described (but did not discover or name) the aquatic reptile Mosasaurus, and was one of the first people to suggest the earth had been dominated by reptiles, rather than mammals, in prehistoric times.
Cuvier is also remembered for strongly opposing theories of evolution, which at the time (before Darwin's theory) were mainly proposed by Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck and Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire. Cuvier believed there was no evidence for evolution, but rather evidence for cyclical creations and destructions of life forms by global extinction events such as deluges. In 1830, Cuvier and Geoffroy engaged in a famous debate, which is said to exemplify the two major deviations in biological thinking at the time – whether animal structure was due to function or (evolutionary) morphology. Cuvier supported function and rejected Lamarck's thinking.
His most famous work is Le Règne Animal (1817; English: The Animal Kingdom). In 1819, he was created a peer for life in honor of his scientific contributions. Thereafter, he was known as Baron Cuvier. He died in Paris during an epidemic of cholera. Some of Cuvier's most influential followers were Louis Agassiz on the continent and in the United States, and Richard Owen in Britain. His name is one of the 72 names inscribed on the Eiffel Tower.
Biography
Portrait by François-André Vincent, 1795
Cuvier was born in Montbéliard, France (in department of Doubs), where his Protestant ancestors had lived since the time of the Reformation.
His mother was Anne Clémence Chatel; his father, Jean George Cuvier,
was a lieutenant in the Swiss Guards and a bourgeois of the town of
Montbéliard. At the time, the town, which was annexed to France on 10 October 1793, belonged to the Duchy of Württemberg.
His mother, who was much younger than his father, tutored him
diligently throughout his early years, so he easily surpassed the other
children at school. During his gymnasium
years, he had little trouble acquiring Latin and Greek, and was always
at the head of his class in mathematics, history, and geography. According to Lee,
"The history of mankind was, from the earliest period of his life, a
subject of the most indefatigable application; and long lists of
sovereigns, princes, and the driest chronological facts, once arranged
in his memory, were never forgotten."
Birthplace of Georges Cuvier in Montbéliard
At the age of 10, soon after entering the gymnasium, he encountered a copy of Conrad Gessner's Historiae Animalium, the work that first sparked his interest in natural history. He then began frequent visits to the home of a relative, where he could borrow volumes of the Comte de Buffon's massive Histoire Naturelle.
All of these he read and reread, retaining so much of the information,
that by the age of 12, "he was as familiar with quadrupeds and birds as a
first-rate naturalist." He remained at the gymnasium for four years.
Cuvier spent an additional four years at the Caroline Academy in Stuttgart,
where he excelled in all of his coursework. Although he knew no German
on his arrival, after only nine months of study, he managed to win the
school prize for that language. Cuvier's German education exposed him to
the work of the geologist Abraham Gottlob Werner (1750 - 1817), whose Neptunism
and emphasis on the importance of rigorous, direct observation of
three-dimensional, structural relationships of rock formations to
geological understanding provided models for Cuvier's scientific
theories and methods.
Upon graduation, he had no money on which to live as he awaited
appointment to an academic office. So in July 1788, he took a job at
Fiquainville chateau in Normandy as tutor to the only son of the Comte d'Héricy,
a Protestant noble. There, during the early 1790s, he began his
comparisons of fossils with extant forms. Cuvier regularly attended
meetings held at the nearby town of Valmont
for the discussion of agricultural topics. There, he became acquainted
with Henri Alexandre Tessier (1741–1837), who had assumed a false
identity. Previously, he had been a physician and well-known agronomist,
who had fled the Terror
in Paris. After hearing Tessier speak on agricultural matters, Cuvier
recognized him as the author of certain articles on agriculture in the Encyclopédie Méthodique and addressed him as M. Tessier.
Tessier replied in dismay, "I am known, then, and consequently
lost."—"Lost!" replied M. Cuvier, "no; you are henceforth the object of
our most anxious care."
They soon became intimate and Tessier introduced Cuvier to his
colleagues in Paris—"I have just found a pearl in the dunghill of
Normandy", he wrote his friend Antoine-Augustin Parmentier.
As a result, Cuvier entered into correspondence with several leading
naturalists of the day, and was invited to Paris. Arriving in the spring
of 1795, at the age of 26, he soon became the assistant of Jean-Claude Mertrud (1728–1802), who had been appointed to the newly created chair of comparative anatomy at the Jardin des Plantes.
The Institut de France was founded in the same year, and he was elected a member of its Academy of Sciences.
On 4 April 1796 he began to lecture at the École Centrale du Pantheon
and, at the opening of the National Institute in April, he read his
first paleontological paper, which subsequently was published in 1800
under the title Mémoires sur les espèces d'éléphants vivants et fossiles. In this paper, he analyzed skeletal remains of Indian and African elephants, as well as mammoth fossils, and a fossil skeleton known at that time as the 'Ohio animal'.
Cuvier's analysis established, for the first time, the fact that
African and Indian elephants were different species and that mammoths
were not the same species as either African or Indian elephants, so must
be extinct.
He further stated that the 'Ohio animal' represented a distinct and
extinct species that was even more different from living elephants than
mammoths were. Years later, in 1806, he would return to the 'Ohio
animal' in another paper and give it the name, "mastodon".
In his second paper in 1796, he described and analyzed a large skeleton found in Paraguay, which he would name Megatherium.
He concluded this skeleton represented yet another extinct animal and,
by comparing its skull with living species of tree-dwelling sloths, that
it was a kind of ground-dwelling giant sloth.
Together, these two 1796 papers were a seminal or landmark event, becoming a turning point in the history of paleontology, and in the development of comparative anatomy,
as well. They also greatly enhanced Cuvier's personal reputation and
they essentially ended what had been a long-running debate about the
reality of extinction.
In 1799, he succeeded Daubenton as professor of natural history in the Collège de France. In 1802, he became titular professor at the Jardin des Plantes;
and in the same year, he was appointed commissary of the institute to
accompany the inspectors general of public instruction. In this latter
capacity, he visited the south of France, but in the early part of 1803,
he was chosen permanent secretary of the department of physical
sciences of the Academy, and he consequently abandoned the earlier
appointment and returned to Paris. In 1806, he became a foreign member
of the Royal Society, and in 1812, a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. In 1812 he became a correspondent for the Royal Institute of the Netherlands, and became member in 1827. Cuvier was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1822.
Cuvier's tomb in the Père Lachaise Cemetery, Paris
Cuvier then devoted himself more especially to three lines of
inquiry: (i) the structure and classification of the Mollusca; (ii) the
comparative anatomy and systematic arrangement of the fishes; (iii)
fossil mammals and reptiles and, secondarily, the osteology of living forms belonging to the same groups.
In 1812, Cuvier made what the cryptozoologist Bernard Heuvelmans
called his "Rash dictum": he remarked that it was unlikely that any
large animal remained undiscovered. Ten years after his death, the word
"dinosaur" would be coined by Richard Owen in 1842.
During his lifetime, Cuvier served as an imperial councilor under Napoleon, president of the Council of Public Instruction and chancellor of the university under the restored Bourbons,
Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour, a Peer of France, Minister of
the Interior, and president of the Council of State under Louis Philippe.
He was eminent in all these capacities, and yet the dignity given by
such high administrative positions was as nothing compared to his
leadership in natural science.
Cuvier was by birth, education, and conviction a devout Lutheran, and remained Protestant throughout his life while regularly attending church services.
Despite this, he regarded his personal faith as a private matter; he
evidently identified himself with his confessional minority group when
he supervised governmental educational programs for Protestants. He also was very active in founding the Parisian Biblical Society in 1818, where he later served as a vice president. From 1822 until his death in 1832, Cuvier was Grand Master of the Protestant Faculties of Theology of the French University.
Scientific ideas and their impact
Saartjie Baartman Remains
Saartjie Baartman
died in December 1815 and was relocated to Paris, where she was
dissected by Georges Cuvier. Cuvier examined Baartman's vagina and labia
and concluded that they were not similar to monkeys' genitals. However,
he concluded that her buttock was more similar to a female baboon or
mandrill than to a European woman's. He believed her skull to be
representative of the mix between a Negro and Mongol, but more similar
to a monkey skull than any other human skull.
Her remains were displayed in the Musée de l’Homme in Paris until 1970, then were put into storage. Her remains were returned to South Africa in 2002.
Opposition to evolution
Cuvier
was critical of theories of evolution, in particular those proposed by
his contemporaries Lamarck and Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, which involved
the gradual transmutation of one form into another. He repeatedly
emphasized that his extensive experience with fossil material indicated
one fossil form does not, as a rule, gradually change into a
succeeding, distinct fossil form. A deep-rooted source of his opposition
to the gradual transformation of species was his goal of creating an
accurate taxonomy based on principles of comparative anatomy.
Such a project would become impossible if species were mutable, with no
clear boundaries between them. According to the University of
California Museum of Paleontology, "Cuvier did not believe in organic
evolution, for any change in an organism's anatomy would have rendered
it unable to survive. He studied the mummified cats and ibises that
Geoffroy had brought back from Napoleon's invasion of Egypt, and showed
they were no different from their living counterparts; Cuvier used this
to support his claim that life forms did not evolve over time."
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Cuvier with a fish fossil
He also observed that Napoleon's expedition to Egypt had retrieved
animals mummified thousands of years previously that seemed no different
from their modern counterparts.
"Certainly", Cuvier wrote, "one cannot detect any greater difference
between these creatures and those we see, than between the human mummies
and the skeletons of present-day men."
Lamarck dismissed this conclusion, arguing that evolution
happened much too slowly to be observed over just a few thousand years.
Cuvier, however, in turn criticized how Lamarck and other naturalists
conveniently introduced hundreds of thousands of years "with a stroke of
a pen" to uphold their theory. Instead, he argued that one may judge
what a long time would produce only by multiplying what a lesser time
produces. Since a lesser time produced no organic changes, neither, he
argued, would a much longer time. Moreover, his commitment to the principle of the correlation of parts
caused him to doubt that any mechanism could ever gradually modify any
part of an animal in isolation from all the other parts (in the way
Lamarck proposed), without rendering the animal unable to survive. In his Éloge de M. de Lamarck (Praise for M. de Lamarck), Cuvier wrote that Lamarck's theory of evolution
rested on two arbitrary suppositions; the one, that it is the seminal vapor which organizes the embryo; the other, that efforts and desires may engender organs. A system established on such foundations may amuse the imagination of a poet; a metaphysician may derive from it an entirely new series of systems; but it cannot for a moment bear the examination of anyone who has dissected a hand, a viscus, or even a feather.
Instead, he said, the typical form makes an abrupt appearance in the
fossil record, and persists unchanged to the time of its extinction.
Cuvier attempted to explain this paleontological phenomenon he
envisioned (which would be readdressed more than a century later by "punctuated equilibrium") and to harmonize it with the Bible.
He attributed the different time periods he was aware of as intervals
between major catastrophes, the last of which is found in Genesis.
Cuvier's claim that new fossil forms appear abruptly in the
geological record and then continue without alteration in overlying
strata was used by later critics of evolution to support creationism,
to whom the abruptness seemed consistent with special divine creation
(although Cuvier's finding that different types made their
paleontological debuts in different geological strata clearly did not).
The lack of change was consistent with the supposed sacred immutability
of "species", but, again, the idea of extinction, of which Cuvier was
the great proponent, obviously was not.
Many writers have unjustly accused Cuvier of obstinately maintaining that fossil human beings could never be found. In his Essay on the Theory of the Earth,
he did say, "no human bones have yet been found among fossil remains",
but he made it clear exactly what he meant: "When I assert that human
bones have not been hitherto found among extraneous fossils, I must be
understood to speak of fossils, or petrifactions, properly so called".
Petrified bones, which have had time to mineralize and turn to stone,
are typically far older than bones found to that date. Cuvier's point
was that all human bones found that he knew of, were of relatively
recent age because they had not been petrified and had been found only
in superficial strata.
He was not dogmatic in this claim, however; when new evidence came to
light, he included in a later edition an appendix describing a skeleton
that he freely admitted was an "instance of a fossil human
petrifaction".
The harshness of his criticism and the strength of his
reputation, however, continued to discourage naturalists from
speculating about the gradual transmutation of species, until Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species more than two decades after Cuvier's death.
Extinction
Early in his tenure at the National Museum in Paris, Cuvier published
studies of fossil bones in which he argued that they belonged to large,
extinct quadrupeds. His first two such publications were those
identifying mammoth and mastodon fossils as belonging to extinct species
rather than modern elephants and the study in which he identified the Megatherium as a giant, extinct species of sloth.
His primary evidence for his identifications of mammoths and mastodons
as separate, extinct species was the structure of their jaws and teeth. His primary evidence that the Megatherium fossil had belonged to a massive sloth came from his comparison of its skull with those of extant sloth species.
Cuvier wrote of his paleontological method that "the form of the
tooth leads to the form of the condyle, that of the scapula to that of
the nails, just as an equation of a curve implies all of its properties;
and, just as in taking each property separately as the basis of a
special equation we are able to return to the original equation and
other associated properties, similarly, the nails, the scapula, the
condyle, the femur, each separately revel the tooth or each other; and
by beginning from each of them the thoughtful professor of the laws of
organic economy can reconstruct the entire animal."
However, Cuvier's actual method was heavily dependent on the comparison
of fossil specimens with the anatomy of extant species in the necessary
context of his vast knowledge of animal anatomy and access to
unparallelled natural history collections in Paris.
This reality, however, did not prevent the rise of a popular legend
that Cuvier could reconstruct the entire bodily structures of extinct
animals given only a few fragments of bone.
At the time Cuvier presented his 1796 paper on living and fossil
elephants, it was still widely believed that no species of animal had
ever become extinct. Authorities such as Buffon had claimed that fossils
found in Europe of animals such as the woolly rhinoceros and the mammoth were remains of animals still living in the tropics (i.e. rhinoceros and elephants), which had shifted out of Europe and Asia as the earth became cooler.
Thereafter, Cuvier performed a pioneering research study on some
elephant fossils excavated around Paris. The bones he studied, however,
were remarkably different from the bones of elephants currently
thriving in India and Africa. This discovery led Cuvier to denounce the
idea that fossils came from those that are currently living. The idea
that these bones belonged to elephants living - but hiding - somewhere
on Earth seemed ridiculous to Cuvier because it would be nearly
impossible to miss them due to their enormous size. The Megatherium
provided another compelling datapoint for this argument. Ultimately,
his repeated identification of fossils as belonging to species unknown
to man, combined with mineralogical evidence from his stratigraphical
studies in Paris, drove Cuvier to the proposition that the abrupt
changes the Earth underwent over a long period of time caused some
species to go extinct.
Cuvier's theory on extinction has met opposition from other
notable natural scientists like Darwin and Charles Lyell. Unlike
Cuvier, they didn't believe that extinction was a sudden process; they
believed that like the Earth, animals collectively undergo gradual
change as a species. This differed widely from Cuvier's theory, which
seemed to propose that animal extinction was catastrophic.
However, Cuvier's theory of extinction is still justified in the
case of mass extinctions that occurred in the last 600 million years,
when approximately half of all living species went completely extinct
within a short geological span of two million years, due in part by
volcanic eruptions, asteroids, and rapid fluctuations in sea level. At
this time, new species rose and others fell, precipitating the arrival
of human beings.
Cuvier's early work demonstrated conclusively that extinction was indeed a credible natural global process.
Cuvier's thinking on extinctions was influenced by his extensive
readings in Greek and Latin literature; he gathered every ancient report
known in his day relating to discoveries of petrified bones of
remarkable size in the Mediterranean region.
Influence on Cuvier's theory of extinction was his collection of
specimens from the New World, many of them obtained from Native
Americans. He also maintained an archive of Native American
observations, legends, and interpretations of immense fossilized
skeletal remains, sent to him by informants and friends in the Americas.
He was impressed that most of the Native American accounts identified
the enormous bones, teeth, and tusks as animals of the deep past that
had been destroyed by catastrophe.
Catastrophism
These Indian elephant and mammoth jaws were included in 1799 when Cuvier's 1796 paper on living and fossil elephants was printed.
Cuvier came to believe that most, if not all, the animal fossils he
examined were remains of species that had become extinct. Near the end
of his 1796 paper on living and fossil elephants, he said:
- All of these facts, consistent among themselves, and not opposed by any report, seem to me to prove the existence of a world previous to ours, destroyed by some kind of catastrophe.
Contrary to many natural scientists' beliefs at the time, Cuvier believed that animal extinction was not a product of anthropogenic
causes. Instead, he proposed that humans were around long enough to
indirectly maintain the fossilized records of ancient Earth. He also
attempted to verify the water catastrophe by analyzing records of
various cultural backgrounds. Though he found many accounts of the
water catastrophe unclear, he did believe that such an event occurred at
the brink of human history nonetheless.
This led Cuvier to become an active proponent of the geological school of thought called catastrophism,
which maintained that many of the geological features of the earth and
the history of life could be explained by catastrophic events that had
caused the extinction of many species of animals. Over the course of his
career, Cuvier came to believe there had not been a single catastrophe,
but several, resulting in a succession of different faunas. He wrote
about these ideas many times, in particular he discussed them in great
detail in the preliminary discourse (an introduction) to a collection of
his papers, Recherches sur les ossements fossiles de quadrupèdes (Researches on quadruped fossil bones), on quadruped fossils published in 1812.
Cuvier's own explanation for such a catastrophic event is derived from two different sources, including those from Jean-André Deluc and Déodat de Dolomieu.
The former proposed that the continents existing ten millennia ago
collapsed, allowing the ocean floors to rise higher than the continental
plates and become the continents that now exist today. The latter
proposed that a massive tsunami
hit the globe, leading to mass extinction. Whatever the case was, he
believed that the deluge happened quite recently in human history. In
fact, he believed that Earth's existence was limited and not as extended
as many natural scientists, like Lamarck, believed it to be.
Much of the evidence he used to support his catastrophist
theories have been taken from his fossil records. He strongly suggested
that the fossils he found were evidence of the world's first reptiles,
followed chronologically
by mammals and humans. Cuvier didn't wish to delve much into the
causation of all the extinction and introduction of new animal species
but rather focused on the sequential aspects of animal history on Earth.
In a way, his chronological dating of Earth history somewhat reflected Lamarck's transformationist theories.
Cuvier also worked alongside Alexandre Brongniart in analyzing the Parisian rock cycle. Using stratigraphical
methods, they were both able to extrapolate key information regarding
Earth history from studying these rocks. These rocks contained remnants
of molluscs, bones of mammals, and shells. From these findings, Cuvier
and Brongniart concluded that many environmental changes occurred in
quick catastrophes, though Earth itself was often placid for extended
periods of time in between sudden disturbances.
The 'Preliminary Discourse' became very well known and,
unauthorized translations were made into English, German, and Italian
(and in the case of those in English, not entirely accurately). In 1826,
Cuvier would publish a revised version under the name, Discours sur les révolutions de la surface du globe (Discourse on the upheavals of the surface of the globe).
After Cuvier's death, the catastrophic school of geological thought lost ground to uniformitarianism, as championed by Charles Lyell
and others, which claimed that the geological features of the earth
were best explained by currently observable forces, such as erosion and
volcanism, acting gradually over an extended period of time. The
increasing interest in the topic of mass extinction
starting in the late twentieth century, however, has led to a
resurgence of interest among historians of science and other scholars in
this aspect of Cuvier's work.
Stratigraphy
Cuvier collaborated for several years with Alexandre Brongniart,
an instructor at the Paris mining school, to produce a monograph on the
geology of the region around Paris. They published a preliminary
version in 1808 and the final version was published in 1811.
In this monograph they identified characteristic fossils of
different rock layers that they used to analyze the geological column,
the ordered layers of sedimentary rock, of the Paris basin. They
concluded that the layers had been laid down over an extended period
during which there clearly had been faunal succession and that the area had been submerged under sea water at times and at other times under fresh water. Along with William Smith's
work during the same period on a geological map of England, which also
used characteristic fossils and the principle of faunal succession to
correlate layers of sedimentary rock, the monograph helped establish the
scientific discipline of stratigraphy. It was a major development in the history of paleontology and the history of geology.
Age of reptiles
In
1800 and working only from a drawing, Cuvier was the first to correctly
identify in print, a fossil found in Bavaria as a small flying reptile, which he named the Ptero-Dactyle in 1809, (later Latinized as Pterodactylus antiquus)—the first known member of the diverse order of pterosaurs. In 1808 Cuvier identified a fossil found in Maastricht as a giant marine lizard, the first known mosasaur.
Cuvier speculated correctly that there had been a time when reptiles rather than mammals had been the dominant fauna.
This speculation was confirmed over the two decades following his death
by a series of spectacular finds, mostly by English geologists and
fossil collectors such as Mary Anning, William Conybeare, William Buckland, and Gideon Mantell, who found and described the first ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, and dinosaurs.
Principle of the correlation of parts
In
a 1798 paper on the fossil remains of an animal found in some plaster
quarries near Paris, Cuvier states what is known as the principle of the
correlation of parts. He writes:
- ...if an animal's teeth are such as they must be, in order for it to nourish itself with flesh, we can be sure without further examination that the whole system of its digestive organs is appropriate for that kind of food, and that its whole skeleton and locomotive organs, and even its sense organs, are arranged in such a way as to make it skillful at pursuing and catching its prey. For these relations are the necessary conditions of existence of the animal; if things were not so, it would not be able to subsist.
This idea is referred to as Cuvier's principle of correlation of
parts, which states that all organs in an animal's body are deeply
interdependent. Species' existence relies on the way in which these
organs interact. For example, a species whose digestive tract is best
suited to digesting flesh but whose body is best suited to foraging for
plants cannot survive. Thus in all species, the functional significance
of each body part must be correlated to the others, else the species
cannot sustain itself.
Applications
Cuvier
believed that the power of his principle came in part from its ability
to aid in the reconstruction of fossils. In most cases, fossils of
quadrupeds were not found as complete, assembled skeletons, but rather
as scattered pieces that needed to be put together by anatomists. To
make matters worse, deposits often contained the fossilized remains of
several species of animals mixed together. Anatomists reassembling these
skeletons ran the risk of combining remains of different species,
producing imaginary composite species. However, by examining the
functional purpose of each bone and applying the principle of
correlation of parts, Cuvier believed that this problem could be
avoided.
This principle's ability to aid in reconstruction of fossils was
also helpful to Cuvier's work in providing evidence in favor extinction.
The strongest evidence Cuvier could provide in favor of extinction
would be to prove that the fossilized remains of an animal belonged to a
species that no longer existed. By applying Cuvier's principle of
correlation of parts, it would be easier to verify that a fossilized
skeleton had been authentically reconstructed, thus validating any
observations drawn from comparing it to skeletons of existing species.
In addition to helping anatomists reconstruct fossilized remains,
Cuvier believed that his principle held enormous predictive power as
well. For example, when he discovered a fossil that resembled a
marsupial in the gypsum quarries of Montmartre, he correctly predicted
that the fossil would contain bones commonly found in marsupials in its
pelvis as well.
Impact
Cuvier
hoped that his principles of anatomy would provide the law-based
framework that would elevate natural history to the truly scientific
level occupied by physics and chemistry thanks to the laws established
by Isaac Newton (1643 - 1727) and Antoine Lavoisier (1743 - 1794),
respectively. He expressed confidence in the introduction to Le Règne Animal
that some day anatomy would be expressed as laws as simple,
mathematical, and predictive as Newton's laws of physics, and he viewed
his principle as an important step in that direction.
To him, the predictive capabilities of his principles demonstrated in
his prediction of the existence of marsupial pelvic bones in the gypsum
quarries of Montmartre demonstrated that these goals were not only in
reach, but imminent.
The principle of correlation of parts was also Cuvier's way of
understanding function in a non-evolutionary context, without invoking a
divine creator.
In the same 1798 paper on the fossil remains of an animal found in
plaster quarries near Paris, Cuvier emphasizes the predictive power of
his principle, writing:
Today comparative anatomy has reached such a point of perfection that, after inspecting a single bone, one can often determine the class, and sometimes even the genus of the animal to which it belonged, above all if that bone belonged to the head or the limbs ... This is because the number, direction, and shape of the bones that compose each part of an animal's body are always in a necessary relation to all the other parts, in such a way that—up to a point—one can infer the whole from any one of them and vice versa.
Though Cuvier believed that his principle's major contribution was
that it was a rational, mathematical way to reconstruct fossils and make
predictions, in reality it was difficult for Cuvier to use his
principle. The functional significance of many body parts were still
unknown at the time, and so relating those body parts to other body
parts using Cuvier's principle was impossible. Though Cuvier was able to
make accurate predictions about fossil finds, in practice the accuracy
of his predictions came not from application of his principle, but
rather from his vast knowledge of comparative anatomy. However, despite
Cuvier's exaggerations of the power of his principle, the basic concept
is central to comparative anatomy and paleontology.
Scientific work
Comparative anatomy and classification
At
the Paris Museum, Cuvier furthered his studies on the anatomical
classification of animals. He believed that classification should be
based on how organs collectively function, a concept he called functional integration.
Cuvier also reinforced the idea of subordinating less vital body parts
to more critical organ systems as part of anatomical classification.
He published these ideas in his book called Animal
distribué d'après son organisation, pour servir de base à l'histoire
naturelle des animaux et d'introduction à l'anatomie comparée, or The
Animal Kingdom Arranged after its Organization; Forming a Natural
History of Animals, and an Introduction to Comparative Anatomy) in 1817.
In his anatomical studies, Cuvier believed function played a
bigger role than form in the field of taxonomy. His scientific beliefs
rested in the idea of the principles of the correlation of parts and of
the conditions of existence. The former principle accounts for the
connection between organ function and its practical use for an organism
to survive. The latter principle emphasizes the animal's physiological
function in relation to its surrounding environment. These findings
were published in his scientific readings, including Leçons d'anatomie
comparée (Lessons on Comparative Anatomy) and in Le Règne Animal (The Animal Kingdom) in the early 19th century and 1817 respectively.
Ultimately, Cuvier developed four embranchements, or branches,
through which he classified animals based on his taxonomical and
anatomical studies. He later performed groundbreaking work in
classifying animals in vertebrate and invertebrate groups by subdividing
each category. For instance, he proposed that the invertebrates could
be segmented into three individual categories, including Mollusca,
Radiata, and Articulata. He also articulated that species cannot move
across these categories, a theory called transmutation.
He reasoned that organisms cannot acquire or change their physical
traits over time and still retain optimal survival. As a result, he
often conflicted with Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire and Jean-Baptiste Lamarck's
theories of transmutation.
In 1798 Cuvier published his first independent work, the Tableau élémentaire de l'histoire naturelle des animaux,
which was an abridgment of his course of lectures at the École du
Pantheon and may be regarded as the foundation and first statement of
his natural classification of the animal kingdom.
In 1800 he published the Leçons d'anatomie comparée, assisted by A. M. C. Duméril for the first two volumes and Georges Louis Duvernoy for the three later ones.
Molluscs
Cuvier
categorized snails, cockles, and cuttlefish into one category he called
molluscs, or mollusca, an embranchment. Though he noted how all three
of these animals were outwardly different in terms of shell shape and
diet, he saw a noticeable pattern pertaining to their overall physical
appearance.
Cuvier began his intensive studies of molluscs during his time in
Normandy—the first time he had ever seen the sea—and his papers on the
so-called Mollusca began appearing as early as 1792. However, most of his memoirs on this branch were published in the Annales du museum between 1802 and 1815; they were subsequently collected as Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire et à l'anatomie des mollusques, published in one volume at Paris in 1817.
"When the French Academy was preparing its first dictionary, it defined "crab"
as, "A small red fish which walks backwards." This definition was sent
with a number of others to the naturalist Cuvier for his approval. The
scientist wrote back, "Your definition, gentlemen, would be perfect,
only for three exceptions. The crab is not a fish, it is not red and it
does not walk backwards."
Source unknown, but probably Times Literary Supplement (UK).
Fish
Cuvier's researches on fish, begun in 1801, finally culminated in the publication of the Histoire naturelle des poissons, which contained descriptions of 5,000 species of fishes, and was a joint production with Achille Valenciennes. Cuvier's work on this project extended over the years 1828–1831.
Palaeontology and osteology
Plate from Le Règne Animal, 1828 edition
In palaeontology, Cuvier published a long list of memoirs, partly
relating to the bones of extinct animals, and partly detailing the
results of observations on the skeletons of living animals, specially
examined with a view toward throwing light upon the structure and
affinities of the fossil forms.
Among living forms he published papers relating to the osteology of the Rhinoceros Indicus, the tapir, Hyrax capensis, the hippopotamus, the sloths, the manatee, etc.
He produced an even larger body of work on fossils, dealing with the extinct mammals of the Eocene beds of Montmartre, the fossil species of hippopotamus, a marsupial (which he called Didelphys gypsorum), the Megalonyx, the Megatherium, the cave-hyena, the pterodactyl, the extinct species of rhinoceros, the cave bear, the mastodon, the extinct species of elephant, fossil species of manatee and seals, fossil forms of crocodilians, chelonians,
fish, birds, etc. If his identification of fossil animals was dependent
upon comparison with the osteology of extant animals whose anatomy was
poorly known, Cuvier would often publish a thorough documentation of the
relevant extant species' anatomy before publishing his analyses of the
fossil specimens. The department of palaeontology dealing with the Mammalia may be said to have been essentially created and established by Cuvier.
The results of Cuvier's principal palaeontological and geological
investigations ultimately were given to the world in the form of two
separate works: Recherches sur les ossemens fossiles de quadrupèdes (Paris, 1812; later editions in 1821 and 1825); and Discours sur les revolutions de la surface du globe (Paris, 1825). In this latter work he expounded a scientific theory of Catastrophism.
The Animal Kingdom (Le Règne Animal)
Plate from Le Règne Animal, 1828 edition
Cuvier's most admired work was his Le Règne Animal.
It appeared in four octavo volumes in 1817; a second edition in five
volumes was brought out in 1829–1830. In this classic work, Cuvier
presented the results of his life's research into the structure of
living and fossil animals. With the exception of the section on insects, in which he was assisted by his friend Latreille,
the whole of the work was his own. It was translated into English many
times, often with substantial notes and supplementary material updating
the book in accordance with the expansion of knowledge.
Racial studies
Cuvier was a Protestant and a believer in monogenism, who held that all men descended from the biblical Adam, although his position usually was confused as polygenist.
Some writers who have studied his racial work have dubbed his position
as "quasi-polygenist", and most of his racial studies have influenced scientific racism. Cuvier believed there were three distinct races: the Caucasian (white), Mongolian (yellow), and the Ethiopian (black). Cuvier claimed that Adam and Eve
were Caucasian, the original race of mankind. The other two races
originated by survivors escaping in different directions after a major catastrophe hit the earth 5,000 years ago, with those survivors then living in complete isolation from each other.
Cuvier categorized these divisions he identified into races according to
his perception of the beauty or ugliness of their skulls and the
quality of their civilizations. Cuvier's racial studies held
the supposed features of polygenism,
namely fixity of species; limits on environmental influence; unchanging
underlying type; anatomical and cranial measurement differences in
races; physical and mental differences between distinct races.
Official and public work
Engraving by James Thomson
Apart from his own original investigations in zoology and paleontology
Cuvier carried out a vast amount of work as perpetual secretary of the
National Institute, and as an official connected with public education
generally; and much of this work appeared ultimately in a published
form. Thus, in 1808 he was placed by Napoleon upon the council of the Imperial University,
and in this capacity he presided (in the years 1809, 1811, and 1813)
over commissions charged to examine the state of the higher educational
establishments in the districts beyond the Alps and the Rhine
that had been annexed to France, and to report upon the means by which
these could be affiliated with the central university. He published
three separate reports on this subject.
In his capacity, again, of perpetual secretary of the Institute, he not only prepared a number of éloges historiques
on deceased members of the Academy of Sciences, but was also the author
of a number of reports on the history of the physical and natural
sciences, the most important of these being the Rapport historique sur le progrès des sciences physiques depuis 1789, published in 1810.
Prior to the fall of Napoleon (1814) he had been admitted to the
council of state, and his position remained unaffected by the
restoration of the Bourbons. He was elected chancellor of the university, in which capacity he acted as interim president of the council of public instruction, whilst he also, as a Lutheran,
superintended the faculty of Protestant theology. In 1819 he was
appointed president of the committee of the interior, an office he
retained until his death.
In 1826 he was made grand officer of the Legion of Honour; he subsequently was appointed president of the council of state. He served as a member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres from 1830 to his death. A member of the Doctrinaires, he was nominated to the ministry of the interior in the beginning of 1832.
Commemorations
Statue of Cuvier by David d'Angers, 1838
Cuvier is commemorated in the naming of several animals; they include Cuvier's beaked whale (which he first thought to be extinct), Cuvier's gazelle, Cuvier's toucan, Cuvier's bichir, Cuvier's dwarf caiman, and Galeocerdo cuvier (tiger shark). Cuvier is commemorated in the scientific name of the following reptiles: Anolis cuvieri (a lizard from Puerto Rico), Bachia cuvieri, and Oplurus cuvieri. There also are some extinct animals named after Cuvier, such as the South American giant sloth Catonyx cuvieri.
Cuvier Island in New Zealand was named after Cuvier by D'Urville.
The professor of English Wayne Glausser argues at length that the Aubrey-Maturin series of 21 novels (1970–2004) by Patrick O'Brian make the character Stephen Maturin "an advocate of the neo-classical paradigm articulated .. by Georges Cuvier."
Cuvier is referenced in Edgar Allan Poe's short story The Murders in the Rue Morgue as having written a description of the orangutan.
Works
- Tableau élémentaire de l'histoire naturelle des animaux (1797–1798)
- Leçons d'anatomie comparée (5 volumes, 1800–1805)
- Essais sur la géographie minéralogique des environs de Paris, avec une carte géognostique et des coupes de terrain, with Alexandre Brongniart (1811)
- Le Règne animal distribué d'après son organisation, pour servir de base à l'histoire naturelle des animaux et d'introduction à l'anatomie comparée (4 volumes, 1817)
- Recherches sur les ossemens fossiles de quadrupèdes, où l'on rétablit les caractères de plusieurs espèces d'animaux que les révolutions du globe paroissent avoir détruites (4 volumes, 1812) (text in French) 2 3 4
- Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire et à l'anatomie des mollusques (1817)
- Éloges historiques des membres de l'Académie royale des sciences, lus dans les séances de l'Institut royal de France par M. Cuvier (3 volumes, 1819–1827) Vol. 1, Vol. 2, and Vol. 3
- Théorie de la terre (1821)
- Recherches sur les ossemens fossiles, 1821–1823 (5 vols).
- Discours sur les révolutions de la surface du globe et sur les changements qu'elles ont produits dans le règne animal (1822). New edition: Christian Bourgeois, Paris, 1985. (text in French)
- Histoire des progrès des sciences naturelles depuis 1789 jusqu'à ce jour (5 volumes, 1826–1836)
- Histoire naturelle des poissons (11 volumes, 1828–1848), continued by Achille Valenciennes
- Histoire des sciences naturelles depuis leur origine jusqu'à nos jours, chez tous les peuples connus, professée au Collège de France (5 volumes, 1841–1845), edited, annotated, and published by Magdeleine de Saint-Agit
- Cuvier's History of the Natural Sciences: twenty-four lessons from Antiquity to the Renaissance [edited and annotated by Theodore W. Pietsch, translated by Abby S. Simpson, foreword by Philippe Taquet], Paris: Publications scientifiques du Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle, 2012, 734 p. (coll. Archives; 16) ISBN 978-2-85653-684-1
Cuvier also collaborated on the Dictionnaire des sciences naturelles (61 volumes, 1816–1845) and on the Biographie universelle (45 volumes, 1843-18??)
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