论博物学历史中的“断裂”

On the Issue of “Discontinuity” in the History of Natural History

博物学历史悠久、内容繁杂。学界对博物学在历史发展中是否出现过"断裂"进行了广泛的争论。迈尔、法伯及罗杰等科学史家认为,生物学的基本问题没有变化,因此生物学的历史应该是一部连续的历史。另一方面,福柯、阿什沃斯等人从哲学和认识论的角度出发,认为自文艺复兴以来博物学经历过若干次断裂,形成不同的阶段。博物学的问题旨趣在不同的阶段有很大的差别。本文以连续论者迈尔和断裂论者福柯为主要考察对象,分析和评判其主要观点,力图将断裂问题置于编史学的视角下理解。结论认为,"断裂"不是生物学或生物学史问题,而应该看做一个编史学问题。关于"断裂"的讨论有助于拓展博物学史及科学史研究的多元视角。

Natural history has a very long history and complex content.Scholars have extensively debated whether or not "discontinuity" occurred in the history of natural history.Historians of science such as Mayr,Faber and Roger believe that the basic problems of biology have not changed,and therefore the history of biology should be a continuous and uninterrupted one.On the other hand,Foucault,Ashworth and others,from the perspective of philosophy and epistemology,are of the opinion that since the Renaissance,natural history has experienced several breaks and formed different stages,at which its subject matter varied greatly.This paper selects Foucault,the representative of the continuous position,and Mayr,the representative of the fracture position,and analyzes their main viewpoints,so as to understand the issue of discontinuity from the perspective of historiography.The conclusion is that "discontinuity" is not an issue of biology or biological history,but should be regarded as an issue of historiography.The "discontinuity theory" helps to expand the diverse perspectives of the history of natural history and of the study of the history of science.