natural history and temporalization. revisión

8/13/2019 Natural history and temporalization. revisin

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Natural history and temporalization: reflections on BuffonsNatural History

Mara Vernica Galfione

Professor in the Facultad de Derecho y Ciencias Sociales and the Facultad de

Lenguas/Universidad Nacional de Crdoba.

5 ! Crdoba ! "rgentina

veronicagalfione#yahoo.co$.ar

%eceived for &ublication in 'arch ()(.

"&&roved for &ublication in 'ay ()(.

*ranslated by Catherine +agoe.

,"LF-N0 'ar1a 2ernica. Natural history and te$&orali3ation4 reflections on uffon6sNatural History. Histria, Cincias, Sade Manguinhos0 %io de +aneiro0 v.(0 n.70 8ul.9set.

()70 &.:::9yyy.

Abstract

Presents a rereading of uffon6s Natural History in the light of the conce&ts of te$&oral

reversibility and irreversibility. *he goal is to deter$ine to ;hat e:tent uffon introduces a

transfor$ationist conce&t of natural for$s in this ;or te$&orality> organis$> ,eorges9Louis Leclerc0 count de uffon

?)@@9)@AAB.

-n Vitalizing nature in the nlighten!ent0 Peter %eill ?(50 &.77 s.B0 &resents a vitalist

reading of uffon6s ;or< that see


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change in natural for$s. *his reconstruction is inscribed ;ithin the broader fra$e;or< of a

&ro8ect ai$ed at deconstructing nineteenth9century inter&retations0 still in force0 ;hich deny or

$ini$i3e the historical nature of enlighten$ent thought. "ccording to this author0 ;e need to

abandon any unifor$ conce&t of this &eriod and recogni3e that it harbored tendencies o&&osed to

the $echanical and $athe$atical &hiloso&hy that ;as do$inant at the ti$e. *hese &ers&ectives0

shared by uffon and ,er$an intellectuals li


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During the seventeenth century0 a $ove$ent it also constituted a duty

for $an


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*he first of these assu$&tions eli$inated the e:istence of e$&ty s&aces in nature and thus $ade

the &ossibility of change less li


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necessary to remember that the analytical procedure used by early modern natural history

was based on the premise that time was not a constitutive element of the physical universe

but rather the result of the limitations of our own cognitive abilities "his understanding of

the concept of temporality, which #l$as %alti ?(0 &.EB refers to as reversibility(0 e:cluded

on &rinci&le any &ossible asy$$etry bet;een &ast and future and therefore eli$inated the

&ossibility of eventual divine intervention in the conte:t of creation.

-ndeed0 seventeenth9 and eighteenth9century naturalists6 analyses ;ere based on

co$&arison and differentiation of the visible features of natural beings and thus de&ended on the

&ossibility of referring these features to an original scene or $o$ent in ;hich the different

organis$s &resented the$selves0 as Foucault says ?)A0 &.)7)B0 Gone beside another0 their

surfaces visible0 JandK grou&ed according to their co$$on features.H7 -n this conte:t0 ti$e

beca$e a =uality that could only refer to nature if the latter ;ere considered an ob8ect of our

faulty &erce&tion or seen in the state of disorder and confusion to ;hich later historical

vicissitudes had brought it. *i$e0 as Foucault indicates0 ;ould have been a catastro&he or a

cataclys$0 al;ays e:ternal in ter$s of the s&ace of original arrange$ents in ;hich it ;as

&ossible to reconstruct a co$&lete0 si$ultaneous i$age of the ;hole of creation.

"s sho;n by the incor&oration of natural history into the field of &hysics0 &ro&osed by

"delung0 organi3ing or classifying the various &arts of the natural ;orld $eant translating into

s&atial ter$s those for$s that see$ed to hu$an eyes to have a te$&oral e:istence.5 *he

naturalist6s tas< ;as reduced0 in this sense0 to e:tracting the different natural beings fro$ their

natural habitat and &lacing the$ on a ho$ogenous s&atial bac


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the &refor$ationist &ers&ective ca$e fro$ researchers li


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-n this sense0 &refor$ationis$ &rovided an e:&lanation that accounted for the ;or


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ut &refor$ationis$6s difficulty e:&laining the bases of the generative &rocess ;as not

the only thing endangering the continuity of early $odern naturalist conce&ts0 since the

ta:ono$ic &ro8ect ;as also &lagued by &rofound contradictions. -ndeed0 the idea of the great

chain of being set in $otion a research &rogra$ to construct a syste$ ;ithin ;hich it ;as

&ossible to $a


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Syste!a naturae, in -./, included /01 types, whereas thirty years later it had reached

seven thousand 2p/03

4owever, this extraordinary growth of experience was not accompanied by an

immediate crumbling of the classical system, nor did it lead to a rapid temporalization of

experience, as 5epenies suggests 6n the contrary, young naturalists were particularly

reluctant to develop a radical transformationist approach and, despite their lac7 of faith in

preformationism and the scholarly classification system, they continued using categories

based on a reversible temporal matrix As shown by the case of Buffon, to which we will

turn shortly, new naturalist research tended to admit the possibility of unloading on

history a mass of experiences that were impossible to organize on a merely spatial level

4owever, these experiences gave the action of time an exclusively negative character and

they therefore eliminated the possibility of mutations producing novel natural forms As we

shall see, this attitude did not necessarily derive from religious pre8udices, but rather from

the fact that conceptual tools simultaneously allowing a dynamic, ordered perspective of

natural phenomena did not yet exist

Buffon and classical taxonomy 'aten()o diagrama()o: subt1tulo n1vel *+

uffon6s critical attitude to classical natural history ;as obvious fro$ the o&ening &ages

of hisNatural history !n this text, which established the broad outlines of his future wor7,

Buffon 9uestioned the rather orderly, functional representation of nature held in previous

years Buffon ?)@c0 &.B ad$itted the &ossibility that nature $ight at first glance see$ li


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a$ong the$selves0 is less in Nature than in the narro; s&irit of those ;ho have ill understood her0 and ;ho


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-ndeed0 Linnaeus6 syste$ see$ed0 to uffon0 an artificial construction0 based on

&rinci&les that ;ere arbitrarily established by hu$an understanding0 ;hereas a scientific

a&&roach to natural history should use a classification &rinci&le based on observation and

co$&arison of Gan uninterru&ted succession of eventsH.)5uffon found this criterion in the

&rinci&le of re&roduction and thus established a &rocedure ai$ed at &roving0 e:&eri$entally0 that

t;o e:isting e:a$&les belonged to one and the sa$e s&ecies. "ccording to uffon ?)@b0 &.)9

))B0 ;hat deter$ined $e$bershi& of the sa$e s&ecies ;as the ability to &rocreate fertile

offs&ring4 Gone $ust regard as the sa$e s&ecies those that0 by $eans of co&ulation0 &er&etuate

and &reserve the si$ilarity of the s&ecies0 and as different s&ecies those that0 by the sa$e $eans0

cannot &roduce anything togetherH.

Put in these ter$s0 uffon6s conce&t of s&ecies strongly relativi3ed the analysis of visible

features. *his $ade it a good tool for reconstructing natural fa$ilies ;hose $e$bers had been

dis&ersed s&atially for historical reasons0 and had ac=uired for$s that $ade the$ unrecogni3able

side by side. ut if the criterion of fertile re&roduction $ade it &ossible to differentiate the

s&ecies reliably0 it did not deter$ine ;hy nature guaranteed the re&roduction of different s&ecies

or ;hat ty&e of relationshi& there ;as bet;een the ability to generate fertile offs&ring and the

e:tre$e $or&hological si$ilarity that could be detected bet;een $e$bers of the sa$e s&ecies.

n this &oint0 uffon could not resort to &refigured for$s0 not 8ust because of their clear

$eta&hysical connotations but also because this ;ould have $eant renouncing the &ossibility

offered by the fertile offs&ring criterion of reconstructing natural fa$ilies in &laces ;here there

;as no strict for$al rese$blance.

Faced ;ith this situation0 uffon o&ted for the hy&othesis of the interior $old0 ;hich ;e

;ill discuss later. o;ever0 before doing so0 he develo&ed an argu$ent to 8ustify the use of

hy&othesis in the field of natural history0 ;hich ;ould brea< the classic &aradig$6s tendency to

&rivilege the evidence of direct observation. -n the conte:t of the discussion about the hidden

$eans used by nature to &roduce generation0 uffon ?)@b0 &.7(977B clai$ed it ;as

G&er$issible to for$ hy&otheses and to choose that ;hich see$s to be $ost closely analogous

;ith other natural &heno$enaH to establish0 as a re=uire$ent0 the e:clusion of e:&lanations that

assu$ed Gthe thing done0 for e:a$&le0 the hy&othesis that in the first ger$ all ger$s of the sa$e

s&ecies ;ere containedH and of theories based on &rinci&les of a teleological nature.)E

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"he generative theory 'aten()o diagrama()o: subt1tulo n$vel *+

uffon develo&ed a ne; conce&t of generation


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occurred0 according to uffon0 both in the area of nutrition and gro;th of e:isting beings and

also during the course of &rocreation. -n the for$er0 the hy&othesis of the interior $old e:&lained

;hy living beings incor&orated organic $atter0 increasing in $ass and volu$e0 ;ithout

$odifying the arrange$ent of their organs or the =uality of the $atter of ;hich they ;ere $ade.

" si$ilar although slightly $ore co$&le: and &roble$atic &rocess occurred ;hen ne;

individuals of the sa$e s&ecies ;ere generated. *he si$ilarity bet;een &rogenitor and offs&ring

;as due to the fact that ne; organis$s ;ere $ade fro$ the e:cess organic $aterial that adult

$e$bers of a &articular s&ecies ;ere able to accu$ulate. Ihile the ne; individual develo&ed

fro$ the re$nants of already $odeled organic $atter0 ;hich the living adult being re8ected

because it ;as unnecessary to its o;n nutrition and develo&$ent0 the offs&ring had to re&roduce

the $old of the organis$ that had sha&ed the e:cess $olecules ?uffon0)@5E0 &.@B.

efore &roceeding0 it should be &ointed out that although to a certain e:tent the interior

$old restricted uffon6s no$inalis$0 $entioned earlier0 this did not strictly $ean that he fell

bac< on &refor$ationist &re$ises.)AUnli these forces0 as ;e have

&roved0 could never reach our senses0 because their action occurs on the interior of bodies0 and our sensescan only re&resent ;hat occurs on the e:terior0 they are not the


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organic conditions and avoid the danger of see$ing to be the result of the ha&ha3ard con8unction

of organic $olecules. -ndeed0 this &rinci&le0 ;hich ;e are unable to observe0 i$&osed a legality

that $ade the fortuitous asse$bling of ele$ental $olecules a regulated &rocess and thus ensured

the integrity of the organis$ throughout its various a&&earances. *hus0 in the si:th volu$e of his

Natural history0 uffon ?)@5E0 &.AEB atte$&ted to de$onstrate the fi:ed nature of biological

s&ecies0 arguing that G;hat is $ost constant0 $ost unalterable in Nature0 is the $old of each

s&ecies0 both in ani$als and in vegetablesH.

ut if uffon $anaged in this ;ay to guarantee the stability of s&ecies and thereby

restore the syste$atic character of natural history ;ithout needing to a&&eal to &refor$ed ger$s0

he did so at the e:&ense of blurring the transfor$ationist &ossibilities that ;ere originally

inscribed in the e&igenetic6 &ers&ective. %eaffir$ing $atter6s inability to &revail over for$0

uffon ?)@5E0 &.A@B &ointed out that organic $olecules Gsee$ to be indifferent to receiving this

or that for$0 and ca&able of bearing all &ossible i$&rints4 the organic $olecules0 in other ;ords0

the living &arts of this $atter0 &ass fro$ vegetables to ani$als0 ;ithout destruction and ;ithout

alteration0 and for$ e=ually the living substance of grass0 ;ood0 flesh and boneH.

*he &roble$atic nature of this state$ent ;as &articularly evident in the case of s&ecies0

li


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fro$ a single ani$al0 ;hich0 over ti$e0 has &roduced0 by &erfecting itself and degenerating0 all

the races of other ani$alsH ?cf. %oger0 )A70 &.)9)@(B.

o;ever0 the cli$ate hy&othesis could only be saved fro$ the sus&icion of reintroducing

contingency and fate if the action of environ$ental factors ;as understood in strictly negative

ter$s ?Ca&oni0 (0 &.E)9E7B. *his assu$ed that these0 rather than &roducing ne; for$s0

should be li$ited to o&&osing &articular resistance to the lines i$&osed by the interior $old0 so

that it could only carry out its tas< &artially0 thus giving rise to a degraded version of the original

for$. "t this &oint0 uffon0 argued that organic $atter assi$ilated by living creatures during the

nutrition &rocess could only be co$&letely $olded if the cli$ate held stable. Under such

conditions0 uffon believed0 the action of the interior $old tended to re&roduce si$ilar

individuals and &revail over the assi$ilated $atter. ut if there ;ere large fluctuations in the

environ$ent0 the organic $atter6s for$ changed0 hindering the &rocess of absor&tion carried

about by the interior $old. *hus variations ;ere &roduced that0 ;hile i$&erce&tible at first0

;ould eventually give rise to a true degeneration of the s&ecies ?uffon0 )@570 &.(97)B.)*hat

is0 after a considerable ti$e la&se0 the ty&e of &articles incor&orated ;ould start to &revail over

the internal for$ and sho; u& in the si3e0 color and other &eculiar features ado&ted by the

&rocreated beings.

inal considerations

"s ;e can infer fro$ all this0 the inter&retational sche$e ado&ted by uffon did not

&resu$e the e$ergence of ne; s&ecies0 but only the corru&tion of the original for$s due to

environ$ental factors. -n this sense0 his theory cannot be seen as transfor$ationist0 since he did

not see ti$e as ca&able of &roducing $or&hological innovations4 never0 according to Ca&oni

?(0 &.EAB0 Gcan ;e conceive of those &rocesses affecting the funda$ental structure of an

organis$0 even in its inci&ient for$. *hese changes affect &ree:isting structures> but they do not

create even the rudi$ents of ne; structuresH. n this &oint0 uffon6s theory of degeneration

re&roduced the sa$e fi:ist tendency seen in his conce&t of generation. For0 according to that

theory0 an organis$6s gro;th did not involve the e$ergence of ne; for$s either0 but ;as

derived fro$ $erely incor&orating &ree:isting organic $olecules.

o;ever0 re8ecting a transfor$ationist inter&retation of uffon6s ;or< does not $ean

denying its critical effect on classical natural history. *his ;as achieved0 firstly0 by the fact that

15


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uffon6s e&igenetics abandoned the &refor$ationist &re$ise of original ger$s0 created directly

by god0 and re&laced it ;ith the $echanical action of the interior $old. *his re&resented a

significant de&arture fro$ classical natural history6s vie;&oint0 seen in the for$ula of the scala

naturae0 ;hich co$bined order0 beauty and utility. -n this sense0 ;idening the field of the

$echanical9causal e:&lanation used by uffon &resented an unavoidable obstacle to vie;&oints

that sought to lin< the arrange$ent of natural for$s ;ith the infinite goodness of the creator. For

this &redis&osition ;as no; inter&reted as a reflection of $echanical forces that0 even ;hen they

$anaged to $aintain the natural order0 ;ere not ca&able of granting it esthetic =ualities or

intrinsic usefulness.

ut the order established bet;een natural beings by e&igenetics ;as not co$&lete either.

n the contrary0 uffon6s goal of designing a syste$atic i$age of nature based on $ere causal

$echanics ;as only &ossible by introducing a radical distinction bet;een GnaturalH ti$e and G

historicH ti$e. "s the theory of degeneration sho;s0 uffon only $anaged to establish that the

$eans and ob8ectives of his enter&rise coincided in the first of these $o$ents0 that is0 ;hen the

interior $old0 &ro$&ted by a favorable cli$ate0 could re&roduce si$ilar individuals and &revail

u&on the $atter ingested as food. eyond those li$its0 there ;as a degenerative &rocess

characteri3ed by the fact that0 ;hile it ;as &erfectly e:&licable in causal ter$s0 it could no longer

be inter&reted syste$atically. *his $eant that0 even ;hen current organic for$s could be traced

bac< to a &resu$ed original stoc


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&.7AB0 ;ithout any tools for deter$ining ;hether G$any constituents of the for$ at &resent

found in a s&ecies $ay not be of e=ually contingent and &ur&oseless originH.(

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)N6"#&

-n this and other literal =uotations of te:ts fro$ non9nglish languages0 a free translation has been &rovided.2

"n irreversible conce&t of te$&orality ;ould be one that ad$itted the e:istence of transfor$ations that constituted natural

for$s.

3 For an e:a$ination of the bases of Foucault6s $ethod in his analysis of classical natural history0 cf. Foucault ((. "

criti=ue of this $ethod0 ;hich e$&hasi3es its inability to sho; historical continuity0 is found in 'et3ger0 ((0 &.)9(.

4 Natural history is &resented as the sub8ect of various te:tboo


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15 uffon ?)@c0 &.5955B re&roaches Linnaeus here for having confused $athe$atical truths0 based on definitions and

lac

natural history and temporalization. revisión

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