Factors shaping Ernst Mayr's concepts in the history of biology.
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Biological Evolution↗
Biomedical subjects
T Junker
Publications and source records attributed to T Junker.
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Academies and Institutes↗
[Darwinism, materialism and the revolution of 1848 in Germany. On the interaction of politics and science].
In recent years, the question of national styles in science has received increasing attention. The different forms of Darwinism that emerged in the nineteenth century provide an impressive example of the role of non-scientific factors in the development of scientific ideas. Although the reception of Darwinian theory has been acknowledged to differ according to distinct national traditions even in Darwin's time, there have been few systematic efforts to understand the underlying causal factors. Usually these explanations have conceived of the relationship of science to its social and political context as a distortion of science by ideology. In contrast to this picture, I attempt to demonstrate here how a scientific research program was situated in a concrete historical context. The German tradition of Darwinism in the nineteenth century will be described as a coalition of political liberalism, materialism, and morphology. Whereas the liberals used Darwinism to give their anti-religious and progressive program a naturalistic foundation, the morphologists appreciated that Darwinian theory allowed them to dispense with the idealistic origins of their research program, and the materialist were provided with a naturalistic explanation of the origin of organic form.
Animals↗
A note on the complex metabolism of danthron infused into the rat.
Danthron infused intravenously in rats shows a complex dose-dependent pattern of metabolism and excretion. The metabolites, particularly the more polar ones, are in general excreted predominantly in bile, to a lesser extent in urine. They can be separated as metabolite groups according to polarity and molecular size on a Sephadex LH 20 column. The present paper describes a further study within a bile-derived metabolite group, which proved to be particularly heterogeneous. It contained more than a dozen metabolites, which were conjugates of four different aglycons including the parent danthron. 1H NMR spectral data for danthron monosulfate and monoglucuronide are also presented.
Animals↗
[Heinrich Georg Bronn and Origin of Species].
Heinrich Georg Bronn, one of the leading nineteenth-century palaeontologists was also known as the translator of Charles Darwin's Origin of Species. He undertook his translation soon after the publication of Darwin's work and added a critical post-scriptum. Still in 1857 Bronn had written unambiguously in favour of the constancy of biological species. After the publication of the Origin of Species he thought that in spite of a number of objections which could be brought forward, the future belonged to Darwin's theory and supported with great commitment its spreading. It is puzzling that Bronn did so when he was almost 60 and committed to a religious outlook. The history of the reception of Darwin's doctrine shows that, as a rule, older scientists with such religious worldviews would not support Darwin. The analysis of Bronn's earlier writings and the correspondence between Darwin and Bronn will throw light on the reasons why he represented an exemption. Bronns opinion of Darwin's theory shows the wide gap between the older typologically-inclined natural history and Darwin's evolutionary theory. To conclude, Bronn's translation of the Origin of Species as well as his post-scriptum were of considerable importance for the reception of Darwin's ideas in the german-speaking world.
Animals↗