John has a post where he offers:
This reminds me of one of the paradoxes about Gould. Among historians (and the public) he was believed to represent mainstream science, a belief not shared by many scientists. Among scientists (and the public) he was believed to represent mainstream history of science, a belief not shared by practicing historians.
As I said elsewhere, most of the substance in Gould's work I have found in Peter J. Bowler's work. There are some issues and topics which get more limelight in The Structure of Evolutionary Theory because of the larger point of Stephen Jay Gould's extended argument, as it is a reinterpretation of the structure of contemporary evolutionary theory. I haven't found Gould to be that original of a historical researcher at this point, though I wouldn't say that he's incompetent or prone to misrepresentation if Bowler is a good judge of the central tendency of the field (there are lots of obscure facts sprinkled through the texts which you can't find in Bowler as Gould has apparently purchased lots of 19th century books and notes details such as the lack or writing on the margins from personal copies and what not, because are usually facts of interest, not datum which is added to the trend line). Brian has nearly caught up with me. He says:
Spending so much time on historical context might seem excessive or unnecessary to some readers, but I think it allows the reader to more fully understand the connections between so many researchers involved in a debate that (to perhaps to a lesser extent) is still going on today. I've still got a long way to go, but if the number of hastily scribbled notes I've affixed to the pages is any indication, Gould's massive tome has definitely provided me with ample food for thought.
I'm wondering what debate Brian is talking about. For example, Mike Lynch's argument in The Origin of Genome Architecture is rather "anti-adaptationist" for those who are label-lovers, but I don't know if the Cuvier vs. Geoffrey conflict is necessarily a value-add in understanding the debates around "junk DNA."^1 There may be a disciplinary difference here; Brian is more interested in paleontology and morphology than I am, as I tend to learn toward evolutionary and population genetics. Gould does admit that his training as a paleontologist means that his exemplars will lean toward that field, but he also makes the claim for a broad pan-disciplinary relevance for his theory. I'm not ignorant of the various debates extant in evolutionary biology today; and so far I don't know if I know something that I didn't already know. I guess we'll see. 1 - T. Ryan Gregory has read Structure, and that counts for something in my book....
