Systematics and the Origin of Species from Edgar Anderson’s Viewpoint:

“Odd Noises” from the Evolutionary Synthesis

Kim Kleinman

Webster University

Missouri Botanical Garden

Washington University University College

Introduction

• Canonical Story

• Gould: Synthesis “hardened”

• Provine: “constricted”

• Anderson: “Odd Noises”

http://www.mobot.org/mobot/archives/image.asp?filename=PORT2007-0001.tif&returnto=/mobot/archives/results.asp

Anderson“In personal conversation Professor Dobzhansky has sometimes chided scholars, who like this reviewer,

cherish a Batesonian interest in those few significant fact which do not fit easily with today’s facile

exposition of basic principles.At such times he cites an old Russian proverb,

warning against ‘making odd noises for the benefit of future generations.’

There are few such ‘odd noises’ in this book. They are probably pretty much out of place in modern

textbooks.”

Anderson, Review of Dobzhansky, Evolution Genetics, and Man (1956)

1941 Jesup Lectures:Edgar Anderson and Ernst Mayr

“Systematics and the Origin of Species from the Viewpoints of a Botanist and a Zoologist”

Correspondence on:

• Differences in evolution of plants & animals

• Relationship of macroevolution to microevolution

• Nature of genus and species

Plan

• Anderson (and Mayr) to 1941

• Their correspondence

• Aftermath of the Lectures– introgressive hybridization

Anderson (and Mayr) to 1941

• Mayr at AMNH

• Anderson at Missouri Botanical Garden and Washington University– Work on Iris and Tradescantia

Anderson: Impact of the MBG

“The main interest of my colleagues and students were in taxonomy, morphology, and physiology. I was keenly interested in natural history and the then little known Ozarks were at our back door. I taught genetics, but I explored the Ozarks with my students. They learned genetics from me, and they convinced me that I should take a serious interest in taxonomy. With them and with other colleagues I have studied it ever since. We really explored together much more than the Ozarks; we explored the wide field between genetics and taxonomy, then a terra incognita. I began to study the species problem. I began to think of back-crossing in wildflowers and ornamental shrubs. I took a keen interest in the effects of heterosis outside of the breeding plots. With my students, I helped originate what is now called ‘biosystematics.’” Anderson (1968)

Anderson, “What We Do Not Know About Zea Mays,” Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science

http://www.mobot.org/mobot/archives/image.asp?filename=PHO2005-0803.tif&returnto=/mobot/archives/results.asp

Anderson: Iris

• “differences between species are of an entirely different order from the differences between individuals….There is no evidence that these differences between individuals might…eventually be compounded into differences comparable to those between…two species….”

• Against “the general theory…held by many of the Drosophila workers who see in the gene mutation the unit of process, which compounded a thousand-fold, results in specific differences.”

Iris photo from http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=IRVI

Anderson 1928, 311.

Anderson: Iris

• Hybridization as a possible explanation

• Fisher and Linear Discriminant Function

Iris photo from http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=IRVI

Anderson: Tradescantia

• Use of Cytology

• Report of Progress– Fragmentation– Polyploidy– Hybridization

• Synthetic approach/modest claims

Photo by Tim Smith from http://www.missourinativeplantsociety.org/node/41

The Anderson/Mayr Correspondence

• Forging a Working Relationship

• Evolution in Plants and Animals

• The Genus Problem

• Relationship of Macroevolution and Microevolution

• Working Styles

The Anderson/Mayr Correspondence: Forging a

Working Relationship

• Systematics or Taxonomy?

• “Be as heterodox as you want”

• Population Thinking

• Personalities

The Anderson/Mayr Correspondence: Evolution in

Plants and Animals

• Mayr, Animal Species and Evolution (1963)

• Huxley (editor), The New Systematics (1940)

• Biological Species Concept

Ernst Mayr Papers, Harvard University Library Archives

The Anderson/Mayr Correspondence: The Genus

Problem

• Anderson, “A Survey of Modern Opinion” (1940)

• “Higher categories are a nuisance.” --Mayr

The Anderson/Mayr Correspondence: Macroevolution

and Microevolution

• Richard Goldschmidt

Mayr: “thoroughly furious at his book.”

Anderson: “a stimulating book.”

The Anderson/Mayr Correspondence: Macroevolution

and Microevolution

• Anderson at AAAS 1936 on “Supra-Specific Variation in Nature and Classification”

The Anderson/Mayr Correspondence: Working Styles

• Mayr: “…have nearly completed the first draft of the entire book.”

• Anderson: “I ordinarily lecture with almost no notes.”

Aftermath of the 1941 Jesup Lectures

• Why Anderson Didn’t Publish: Two Views

• What Anderson Might Have Published

Introgressive Hybridization (1949)

Introgressive Hybridization (1949)

• “…take this problem outside the area of argument and opinion and into the zone of measurement and analysis.”

• “It may be of greatest fundamental importance when…we can do no more than demonstrate its existence

Introgressive Hybridization and locoweeds

Introgressive Hybridization and locoweeds

Oxytropsis lamberti Pursh from Encyclopedia of Life. http://www.eol.org/pages/415921

Two views on Hybridization and Gene Flow

• Anderson on H.G. Baker: He asks “from the standpoint of modern genetics, what is the importance and what are the evolutionary effects of hybridization.”

• Anderson on himself: I ask “from an examination fo the variation patterns of plant and animal populations, what is the relative importance of hybridization and mutation.”

Conclusions

• Synthesis: Scientific Project or Historical Process?

• Mayr: Biological Species Concept, speciation, contra-Goldschmidt; draft manuscript

• Anderson: exciting possibilities and tools but focus on “stubborn facts;” “few if any notes.”

http://www.wku.edu/~smithch/chronob/ANDE1897.htm

Acknowldgements

• Andrea Goldstein, Harvard Univ. Archives• The Ewan Memorial Occasional Lunch

Group• Gar Allen• Betty Smocovitis• Peter Mickulas• Tiffany Smith, Webster University Faculty

Development Center