BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Talks.cam//talks.cam.ac.uk//
X-WR-CALNAME:Talks.cam
BEGIN:VEVENT
SUMMARY:Trees as keys\, ladders\, maps: a revisionist history of early sys
 tematic trees - Petter Hellström (Uppsala Universitet)
DTSTART:20180212T130000Z
DTEND:20180212T140000Z
UID:TALK98593@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Sebestian Kroupa
DESCRIPTION:In recent years\, there has been a profusion of studies charti
 ng the history of tree diagrams in natural history and biological systemat
 ics. Whereas some of these have focused on one or a few arboreal schemes\,
  the majority have presented long histories\, spanning centuries and occas
 ionally even millennia. Early or 'pre-Darwinian' trees typically feature i
 n these histories as precursors to phylogenetics\; sometimes even as the '
 roots' of later trees. Together with colleagues in France\, I have previou
 sly argued that one of the most frequently cited early tree diagrams\, Aug
 ustin Augier's 'Botanical Tree' (1801)\, cannot in any reasonable way be m
 ade to play the role of forerunner to later\, evolutionary trees – even 
 as the author pitched his tree of natural families in explicitly genealogi
 cal terms. In this talk\, I push the argument further by proposing an alte
 rnative reading of the historical record. Starting from Augier's tree and 
 other early examples\, I argue that 'pre-evolutionary' trees should be und
 erstood less in terms of what came after\, and more in terms of what came 
 before. Attending to the functions they performed as keys\, ladders and ma
 ps\, I argue that early trees were logical\, rhetorical and mnemonic devic
 es drawn to imagine perfect\, static order.
LOCATION:Seminar Room 1\, Department of History and Philosophy of Science
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR