Year: 2011
Type: article
Abstract: From a Darwinian point of view, taxonomic groups are understood as historical entities that arise at an evolutionary moment and that can always disappear. But these groups were also understood by many naturalists as natural kinds; in other words, as permanent, ahistorical types. I will explore some of the forms that this typological thought took, showing that this typological perspective neither depends on theological beliefs, nor obeys the adoption of an ontology that might contradict natural science. Thus I shall analyze Buffon's understanding of species and the ways in which Cuvier and Lamarck understood the higher taxonomic orders.
Author: Gustavo Caponi
Institution: Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina
Language: Spanish
Subfield: History and Philosophy of Science
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W2008169559