Dr. Magnus is examining the role of natural history in the American development of ecology, especially as this tradition developed in California. He argues that the importance of natural history has been misunderstood by both historians and philosophers of science. The role that a number of natural historians such as D. S. Jordan, G. H. Gilbert, and J. Grinnell played in the development of evolutionary ecology has been largely ignored in the literature on the American development of ecology. Similarly, natural history's significance for philosophical issues relating to theory structure and evidential support, has not been fully appreciated. Working with Prof. James Griesemer at the University of California at Davis, Dr. Magnus is examining a biogeographically oriented tradition in evolutionary animal ecology. This tradition ran from Jordan's work (along with his contemporaries) on geographical barriers and the role of isolation in speciation, through the work of Joseph Grinnell at the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology in Berkeley on the influence of environmental factors on distribution. This primarily West Coast tradition advanced many concepts and insights which were influential in the development of ecology. In addition to producing a fuller historical understanding of the development of biology, particularly ecology, a treatment of this research tradition will correct many philosophical views about the status of natural history. Natural history does have a theoretical component, and its practitioners often had good evidence for their theoretical views. In general, natural history was significantly more sophisticated that historians and philosophers have claimed.
