a) What is Gould mainly trying to say through Blumenbach's example?
Though people in that age accepted Blumenbach's taxonomy, in these days people know that it was not accurate. It means that our common sense, which we think is general, can be denied in the future.
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| Johann Friedrich Blumenbach |
Through Blumenbach's example, Gould mainly trying to say that science is influenced by scientists' perception or mental condition, which is also influenced by social situation of the age.
Blumenbach, who was a German anatomist and naturalist, tried to categorize people into five groups: Caucasian (white), Mongolian (yellow), Malay (brown), Ethiopian (black), and American Indian (red). He brought a hierarchical way which is decided by the beauty of the skull. Although he did not mean to, it was extremely racist way of grouping people. Not only his way was new, but was so influential.
Blumenbach, who was a German anatomist and naturalist, tried to categorize people into five groups: Caucasian (white), Mongolian (yellow), Malay (brown), Ethiopian (black), and American Indian (red). He brought a hierarchical way which is decided by the beauty of the skull. Although he did not mean to, it was extremely racist way of grouping people. Not only his way was new, but was so influential.
Though people in that age accepted Blumenbach's taxonomy, in these days people know that it was not accurate. It means that our common sense, which we think is general, can be denied in the future.
b) What do you think about his argument? What parts are useful or meaningful?
What parts are weak or need development?
What parts are weak or need development?
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| Stephen Jay Gould |
I think his argument is reasonable because there are histories that shows science influenced by social condition such as the Ptolemaic theory. There are many things found by the development of equipment for examinations, but in the future, it has a chance to be rejected as one past idea.
I thought Gould's way of writing is new for me and also interesting. Most parts of the article are about the study of Linnaeus and Blumenbach, but between the paragraphs, there are Italicized parts which are sentences mentioned before. From the Italicized parts, we are easily able to know the ideas Gould wanted to emphasize.
Even though there are Italicized sentences repeated twice, but for me, it is quite difficult to catch the ideas what Gould wanted to say to us, readers. Maybe it is because this article is not for students (nor even for foreigners), however, I felt that it might be better to make it clear to say the essential part.
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