The microscope in the Dutch republic: by E.G. Ruestow Cambridge University Press, 1997. (348 pages)...
1
Feminists, it seems to me, should not be preoccupied with the underpinnings and methods of bad science in the guise of sociobiology, burdened by careless adapta- tionist arguments (in lieu of definitive data) and the misinterpretation of data (see Chapter 4, The mask of theory and the face of nature, by Lawton et aZ.). This will do lit- tle to bring about the ‘critical mass’ required to transform institutions toward greater equity. Rather than asking questions about why men are so reluctant to share power, feminists might more profitably apply their efforts seek out egregious instances of gen- der discrimination (see Schuster and Wade on ‘Hiring selection’, Chapter 7) scrutiniz- ing them and highlighting them for all to see. Certainly, excellent scientists can hold feminist concerns, and if they happen to be trained in behavioral disciplines such as anthropology and behavioral ecology they can, and have, offered important new insights. But these scientific insights are not, nor should they be, governed by feminist ideologies. In summary, Gowaty has, to her credit, brought together in this volume a wide array of viewpoints, some of them at odds, to stimulate discussion. As a result, I found the book at times frustrating, at others provoca- tive and enlightening. The book discloses a strong dose of self-criticism among practi- tioners of behavioral ecology, which can only be healthy for the field. However, the absence of a central message aimed at a particular audience leaves one lost among the trees, wishing for a view of the forest. Sydney Cameron The Microscope in the Dutch Republic by E.G. Ruestow Cambridge University Press, 1997. (348 pages) ISBN 0 521 47078 1 Although both the telescope and the micro- scope were invented by Dutchmen in the first decade of the 17th century, their respective impacts upon scientific under- standing were very different. The tele- scope’s impact after 1610 was immediate and led to a whole new body of authentic knowledge, whereas the images produced by the early microscopes were often debated as to their very objective status. Unlike the craters on the moon, they had no clearly defined context into which they could be placed, and it was not until 50 years after the invention of the microscope that it seemed to have any scientific useful- ness, following the discovery of the capili- ary circulation. A question which one inevitably asks one- self when reading Edward Ruestow’s book is: Why did Europe contain more techno- logically adventurous astronomers than it did biologists some 350 years ago? This is a question that strikes to the heart of the his- torical understanding of the role played by instruments in the growth of science, though in his concentration on the advancement of microscopy by two Dutchmen between 1660 and 1720, Ruestow has produced an excellent analysis of the part played by a new scientific technique within the prosper- ous and international culture of late 17th Century Holland. Jan Swammerdam, the philosophically and religiously minded anatomist who first developed the techniques and concepts of insect anatomy is contrasted with the com- mercially educated Delft draper, Antoni ‘van’ Leeuwenhoek, who also found a whole new world through his simple droplet lenses. And unlike any other of the early microscopists, he used the instrument unceasingly to discover myriads of new life forms - blood corpuscles, spermatozoa, and fermentation - for over 50 years. For while Malpighi and Hooke in his own time, and Haller and Wolff in the next century, undertook detailed microscopical investi- gations, no one used the microscope so imaginatively or so thoroughly as did Leeuwenhoek. Ruestow draws particular attention to the protocols of scientific discourse in 1670, and how a merchant like Leeuwenhoek, without Latin and with only a shaky knowl- edge of anatomy, as an intellectual outsider whose discoveries none the less won him celebrity and an FRS. I like the way in which Leeuwenhoek’s sense of personal uncertainty in a world of ‘gentleman philosophers’ is dealt with, especially in the Dutch context, for in the past it was rela- tively easier for a gifted, yet socially unso- phisticated individual to make fundamental innovations in science than it is today. On the other hand, Leeuwenhoek (unlike the academic Swammerdam) was strongly influenced by the ideas of the mechanical philosophers, such as Descartes, and was instinctively drawn to the search for mecha- nistic explanations of what he saw. For example, he was led into believing that bodies like blood corpuscles acquired their shape from a packing of six-fold lesser corpuscles, and so on down the visible chain. As is essential in such a study, the author looks at the practical problems inherent in single-lens microscopy, and I was especially impressed with the remarkable clear photo- graph of diatoms taken through the Leeuwenhoek lens preserved in the University of Utrecht Museum. Edward Ruestow’s book is clearly and lucidly writ- ten, and provides a fascinating example of how one can approach the study of a scien- tific instrument within a specific historical context, and only points to the extension of that technique for the study of different types of instruments in the hands of differ- ent scientists. Alan Chapman Copyright 0 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd. All right reserved. 0160-9327/97/$17.00. Evolution and Ecology: The Pace of Life by K.D. Bennett Cambridge University Press, 1997. f16.95 pbk; f50.00 hbk (xviii t 241 pages) ISBN 0 52139921 1; 0 521 39028 1 While ecology and evolutionary biology tend to be distinct fields of organismal biol- ogy, these fields and palaeoclimatology, which traditionally allies itself with the physical sciences, are even stranger bed- fellows. In his new book, Bennett couples emerging knowledge about Earth’s climate history - mainly due to variations in Earth’s orbital precession, tilt and eccentricity (‘Milankovitch’ theory) - to biotic response measured by changes in geographic distri- bution, evolution and extinction. There are, of course, other multi-authored volumes on evolution and climate, some good palaeo- ecology texts, and many volumes on climate- organism reciprocity, biogeochemistry, ‘geophysiology’, and the influence of meta- bolic activities on global climate. But Bennett’s is the only book I’ve seen that has as its main goal the marriage of past climate changes with both evolutionary and ecologi- cal theory. As such, the book is a useful and thought-provoking entre into how recent advances in palaeoclimatology pertain to evolutionary biology and ecology. The scope of palaeoclimatology is enor- mous and omissions are unavoidable. Bennett places more emphasis on the terres- trial biotic record, especially from the Quatemary, than on the marine record. The sections on vegetation response to Quaternary climate change are useful, although several recent long-term pollen records from Asia, Africa, Europe and South America (by Heusser, DuPont, Guiot and Hooghiemstra) are missing. Discussion of the marine palaeoclimate record is spotty, although most seminal papers are cited appropriately. Bennett’s suggestion that high-latitude Quaternary climate changes were ‘exagger- ated locally’ by the effects of ice sheets compared to ‘smaller degrees of change’ experienced by other regions should not be taken to mean that low latitudes were not perturbed by orbital climate cycles. Late Neogene glacial-interglacial climatic cycles also altered tropical and subtropical marine (pelagic, deep-sea benthic, coral reef) and terrestrial ecosystems. Many studies of low- latitude oceanic (by Tiedemann, Pisias, Shackleton, McIntyre, Clemens) and coral reef (by Chappell, Pandolfi, Guilderson, Mastaggioni, Bard, Fairbanks) palaeoclima- tology are for the most part missing. The concern that Bennett describes about whether the biotic disturbances that occurred during the Quaternary climatic cycles are somehow different from those of pre-Quaternary periods seems artificial given current understanding of Cenozoic climate variability. One might also get the impression that orbital factors are the domi- nant cause of most climate change, whereas many researchers focus on ‘suborbital’ Endeavour Vol. 21(4) 1997 175
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Transcript of The microscope in the Dutch republic: by E.G. Ruestow Cambridge University Press, 1997. (348 pages)...
Feminists, it seems to me, should not be preoccupied with the underpinnings and methods of bad science in the guise of sociobiology, burdened by careless adapta- tionist arguments (in lieu of definitive data) and the misinterpretation of data (see Chapter 4, The mask of theory and the face of nature, by Lawton et aZ.). This will do lit- tle to bring about the ‘critical mass’ required to transform institutions toward greater equity. Rather than asking questions about why men are so reluctant to share power, feminists might more profitably apply their efforts seek out egregious instances of gen- der discrimination (see Schuster and Wade on ‘Hiring selection’, Chapter 7) scrutiniz- ing them and highlighting them for all to see. Certainly, excellent scientists can hold feminist concerns, and if they happen to be trained in behavioral disciplines such as anthropology and behavioral ecology they can, and have, offered important new insights. But these scientific insights are not, nor should they be, governed by feminist ideologies.
In summary, Gowaty has, to her credit, brought together in this volume a wide array of viewpoints, some of them at odds, to stimulate discussion. As a result, I found the book at times frustrating, at others provoca- tive and enlightening. The book discloses a strong dose of self-criticism among practi- tioners of behavioral ecology, which can only be healthy for the field. However, the absence of a central message aimed at a particular audience leaves one lost among the trees, wishing for a view of the forest.
Sydney Cameron
The Microscope in the Dutch Republic by E.G. Ruestow Cambridge University Press, 1997. (348 pages) ISBN 0 521 47078 1
Although both the telescope and the micro- scope were invented by Dutchmen in the first decade of the 17th century, their respective impacts upon scientific under- standing were very different. The tele- scope’s impact after 1610 was immediate and led to a whole new body of authentic knowledge, whereas the images produced by the early microscopes were often debated as to their very objective status. Unlike the craters on the moon, they had no clearly defined context into which they could be placed, and it was not until 50 years after the invention of the microscope that it seemed to have any scientific useful- ness, following the discovery of the capili- ary circulation.
A question which one inevitably asks one- self when reading Edward Ruestow’s book is: Why did Europe contain more techno- logically adventurous astronomers than it did biologists some 350 years ago? This is a
question that strikes to the heart of the his- torical understanding of the role played by instruments in the growth of science, though in his concentration on the advancement of microscopy by two Dutchmen between 1660 and 1720, Ruestow has produced an excellent analysis of the part played by a new scientific technique within the prosper- ous and international culture of late 17th Century Holland.
Jan Swammerdam, the philosophically and religiously minded anatomist who first developed the techniques and concepts of insect anatomy is contrasted with the com- mercially educated Delft draper, Antoni ‘van’ Leeuwenhoek, who also found a whole new world through his simple droplet lenses. And unlike any other of the early microscopists, he used the instrument unceasingly to discover myriads of new life forms - blood corpuscles, spermatozoa, and fermentation - for over 50 years. For while Malpighi and Hooke in his own time, and Haller and Wolff in the next century, undertook detailed microscopical investi- gations, no one used the microscope so imaginatively or so thoroughly as did Leeuwenhoek.
Ruestow draws particular attention to the protocols of scientific discourse in 1670, and how a merchant like Leeuwenhoek, without Latin and with only a shaky knowl- edge of anatomy, as an intellectual outsider whose discoveries none the less won him celebrity and an FRS. I like the way in which Leeuwenhoek’s sense of personal uncertainty in a world of ‘gentleman philosophers’ is dealt with, especially in the Dutch context, for in the past it was rela- tively easier for a gifted, yet socially unso- phisticated individual to make fundamental innovations in science than it is today. On the other hand, Leeuwenhoek (unlike the academic Swammerdam) was strongly influenced by the ideas of the mechanical philosophers, such as Descartes, and was instinctively drawn to the search for mecha- nistic explanations of what he saw. For example, he was led into believing that bodies like blood corpuscles acquired their shape from a packing of six-fold lesser corpuscles, and so on down the visible chain.
As is essential in such a study, the author looks at the practical problems inherent in single-lens microscopy, and I was especially impressed with the remarkable clear photo- graph of diatoms taken through the Leeuwenhoek lens preserved in the University of Utrecht Museum. Edward Ruestow’s book is clearly and lucidly writ- ten, and provides a fascinating example of how one can approach the study of a scien- tific instrument within a specific historical context, and only points to the extension of that technique for the study of different types of instruments in the hands of differ- ent scientists.
Alan Chapman
Copyright 0 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd. All right reserved. 0160-9327/97/$17.00.
Evolution and Ecology: The Pace of Life by K.D. Bennett Cambridge University Press, 1997. f16.95 pbk; f50.00 hbk (xviii t 241 pages) ISBN 0 52139921 1; 0 521 39028 1
While ecology and evolutionary biology tend to be distinct fields of organismal biol- ogy, these fields and palaeoclimatology, which traditionally allies itself with the physical sciences, are even stranger bed- fellows. In his new book, Bennett couples emerging knowledge about Earth’s climate history - mainly due to variations in Earth’s orbital precession, tilt and eccentricity (‘Milankovitch’ theory) - to biotic response measured by changes in geographic distri- bution, evolution and extinction. There are, of course, other multi-authored volumes on evolution and climate, some good palaeo- ecology texts, and many volumes on climate- organism reciprocity, biogeochemistry, ‘geophysiology’, and the influence of meta- bolic activities on global climate. But Bennett’s is the only book I’ve seen that has as its main goal the marriage of past climate changes with both evolutionary and ecologi- cal theory. As such, the book is a useful and thought-provoking entre into how recent advances in palaeoclimatology pertain to evolutionary biology and ecology.
The scope of palaeoclimatology is enor- mous and omissions are unavoidable. Bennett places more emphasis on the terres- trial biotic record, especially from the Quatemary, than on the marine record. The sections on vegetation response to Quaternary climate change are useful, although several recent long-term pollen records from Asia, Africa, Europe and South America (by Heusser, DuPont, Guiot and Hooghiemstra) are missing. Discussion of the marine palaeoclimate record is spotty, although most seminal papers are cited appropriately.
Bennett’s suggestion that high-latitude Quaternary climate changes were ‘exagger- ated locally’ by the effects of ice sheets compared to ‘smaller degrees of change’ experienced by other regions should not be taken to mean that low latitudes were not perturbed by orbital climate cycles. Late Neogene glacial-interglacial climatic cycles also altered tropical and subtropical marine (pelagic, deep-sea benthic, coral reef) and terrestrial ecosystems. Many studies of low- latitude oceanic (by Tiedemann, Pisias, Shackleton, McIntyre, Clemens) and coral reef (by Chappell, Pandolfi, Guilderson, Mastaggioni, Bard, Fairbanks) palaeoclima- tology are for the most part missing. The concern that Bennett describes about whether the biotic disturbances that occurred during the Quaternary climatic cycles are somehow different from those of pre-Quaternary periods seems artificial given current understanding of Cenozoic climate variability. One might also get the impression that orbital factors are the domi- nant cause of most climate change, whereas many researchers focus on ‘suborbital’
Endeavour Vol. 21(4) 1997 175
