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Deformed Kinds and the Fixity of Species
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Extract
In his biological works Aristotle frequently applies the language of abnormality to those individual members of natural kinds which fail through various defects to live up to the standard of their kind (e.g. GA iv.3 and 4). Aristotle extends this language of abnormality to natural kinds themselves, and will often speak of kinds as‘ deformed’ (TreTTripanevos or avd-rrrfpos) or ‘warped’ (Siearpafifxevos).1 In the vast majority of his references to abnormal kinds,2 Aristotle represents them as defective only because they do not measure up to some standard of excellence, and not because of any genuine distortion of their nature. In one category of cases the defective species belongs to a genus which demands a certain characteristic of its species, but which the defective species does not possess. The lobster, for example, belongs to a genus that possesses claws for prehension and for defence, and thus it too possesses claws. It is, however, ‘deformed’, because it does not use its claws in the natural way, but rather for locomotion (PA iv.8.684a32-bl). Such deformities as these may even conform to Aristotle′s teleology and promote the good of the defective species. The seal, for example, belongs to the genus, the viviparous terrestrial, which requires external ears of its members. The seal does not possess them, and consequently is ‘deformed’ (PA n.12.657a22–4). Yet Aristotle also argues that the seal′s lack of external ears is an advantage, because of its aquatic life, and Nature acts ‘reasonably’ in depriving it of them (GA v.l.781b22–8). In another category of cases the abnormal kind is defective with respect to a broader standard of excellence that lies outside its genus. Testaceans, such as the snail, are ‘deformed’ because they move ‘contrary to nature’. They do not move like a footed animal, but as if they were footed animals whose legs have been cut off (IA 19.714b8–19). This category of abnormality even takes in the whole of the animal kingdom, with the exception of man. For every animal is ‘dwarf-like’ in comparison with man, which is the best of animals, because the upper part of every animal′s body, in contrast with that of man′s, is larger than its lower part (PA iv.lO.686b2–21).
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References
1 I am indebted to the following for their discussions of abnormal kinds: G. E. R. Lloyd, Science, Folklore, and Ideology: Studies in the Life Sciences in Ancient Greece(Cambridge, 1983), pp. 40–2; Anthony Preus, Science and Philosophy in Aristotle′s Biological Works(Hildesheim and New York, 1975), pp. 160–161, 213–218; A. L. Peck, Aristotle′s Historia Animalium(Cambridge, Mass., 1965), Introduction, pp. lxxxvi–lxxxvii.Google Scholar
2 References to abnormal kinds: Deformed: the mole, HA i.9.491b27–36, iv.8.532b34–533a12; the lobster, PA iv.8.684a32–bl; the seal, PA n.12.657a22–4, HA n.l.498a33; the testacean, IA 19.714b8–19; Warped: the terrestrial-aquatic, HA vm.2.589b29–30; the flat-fish, IA 17.714a6–8;Stuntedthe tortoise, PA m.8.671a16; the fish, PA iv.13.695b2–3; Dwarf-like:all animals other than man, PA iv,10.686b2–21.Google Scholar
3 A few of those who attribute fixity of species to Aristotle: John Cooper, ‘Aristotle on Natural Teleology’, Language and Logos: Studies in Ancient Greek Philosophy,eds. M. Schofield and M. Nussbaum (Cambridge, 1982), pp. 197–222; J. L. Ackrill, Aristotle the Philosopher(Oxford, 1981), pp. 133–134; Richard Sorabji, Necessity, Cause, and Blame(Ithaca, 1980), pp. 145–6; C. J. F. Williams, Aristotle′s De Generatione et Corruptione(Oxford, 1982), pp. 193, 208; H. H. Joachim, Aristotle′s on Coming-to-be and Passing-Away(Hildesheim and New York, 1970), p. 276; G. E. R. Lloyd, Aristotle: The Growth and Structure of His Thought(Cambridge, 1968), p. 88; Marjorie Grene, A Portrait of Aristotle(Chicago, 1963), pp. 136–7 (hereafter cited as Portrait).The passages typically referred to in the defence of the doctrine of fixity are GAii. 1.73Ib24–732a 1, De An.n.4.415a26–b7, and GCn. 11.338b 11–19. These passages are generally taken to promote the same conclusion: individual animals and plants partake of eternity through the eternity of their species. Moreover, when, in chapters 7 to 9 of MetaphysicsZ, Aristotle argues that form does not come to be in the making of some object, natural or artificial, he might be taken to suggest thereby that kinds do not come to be and thus that they exist eternallyGoogle Scholar
4 E.g. Marjorie Grene, ‘Aristotle and Modern Biology’, Journal of the History of Ideas 33 (1972), 397.Google Scholar
5 E.g. A. L. Peck, Aristotle′s Generation of Animals (Cambridge, Mass., 1942), Appendix A, 573–5; Williams, pp. 193, 208; Cooper, n. 4; cf. Ackrill, pp. 133–4.Google Scholar
6 Cooper, pp. 212–15.
7 Aristotle′s De Partibus Animalium I and De Generatione Animalium I (Oxford, 1972), pp. 97–8, and Aristotle′s Use of Teleological Explanation (Inaugural Lecture at Queen Mary College, University of London, 1965), p. 13.Google Scholar
8 Balme offers three observations as evidence against fixity. First, new species seem to arise from fertile hybrids at GA n.7.746a29ff. But in GA n.4.738b27–34 Aristotle maintains that hybrids after a few generations revert to the species of the female that brought forth the original hybrid. Reversion of hybrids to the original female kind does not suggest that they form a genuine natural kind independent of the kinds their parents belong to, but rather, as William Jacobs has suggested, that they are only deformities of their parents′ kinds (cf. Met. Z.8.1033b29–33):′ Preus on Aristotle′s Eide\ Nature and System 3 (1981), 116. For his second observation Balme notes that Aristotle often points out that there are kinds that overlap generic classifications, such as the testacean, which cannot with certainty be assigned exclusively to the class of animals or to that of plants (e.g. PA iv.5.681a10ff.). It is not clear just what Balme intends with this observation. Perhaps he is suggesting that kinds cannot be fixed because some of them are not rigidly demarcated from others. This point, however, actually tells against the very notion of Aristotle′s natural kind, as traditionally interpreted, rather than the issue of fixity. For his natural kinds, on the traditional interpretation, must be discrete and incompatible with one another (e.g. Grene, Portrait, pp. 87,231–2), and even if there are kinds that participate in distinct natural kinds, there would be nothing to prevent the eternity of their fixed participation in those kinds. (There are, however, no such kinds. Where Aristotle seems to sanction such kinds, which he describes as ‘equivocals’, he does not commit himself to the view that they participate in distinct natural kinds. Elsewhere I have defended at length this interpretation of‘equivocals’: ‘The scala naturae and the Continuity of Kinds’, Phronesis 30 (1985), 181–200.) Balme′s third observation concerns the focus of Aristotle′s theory of heredity in GA iv.3. Although failure occurs in various ways because of the intractability of matter, the goal of reproduction is to produce an offspring exactly like the sire, and not just another instance of the same natural kind. This is perhaps Balme′s best point. If Aristotle were concerned with the perpetuation of the features of fixed species, he would focus on this project in an important way in his account of heredity, or at least would bring it more forcefully forward for consideration.
9 At De An. m. 1.425a9–11 Aristotle alludes to the mole′s lack of sight, but tries to avoid labelling it as deformed by maintaining that even it possesses eyes under the skin.Google Scholar
10 This is true of the Talpa caeca of Southern Europe, according to D‘Arcy Thompson, Aristotle′s Historia Animalium (Oxford, 1910), n. on 1.9.
11 In addition to HA vin.2, HA i.l.487a14–27 provides many examples of the terrestrial-aquatic.Google Scholar
12 The‘ equivocals’ do not participate in incompatible categories. For a full discussion of them, see my paper, ‘The scala naturae and the Continuity of Kinds’, Phronesis 30 (1985), 181–200.Google Scholar
13 With Thompson and Dittmeyer, I treat as a gloss the succeeding words
They seem to repeat what has just been said, and it is difficult to see how to integrate them into the text grammatically
14 At HA n.l.498a33 Aristotle says that the seal is
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15 I presented a version of this paper to the 1986 Central Division Meetings of the American Philosophical Association. I should like to thank Jane Maienschein and an anonymous referee for CQ for many helpful comments on a draft version.