Georges Cuvier Quotes
August 23, 1769 – May 13, 1832
More Georges Cuvier Quotes
Why has not anyone seen that fossils alone gave birth to a theory about the formation of the earth, that without them, no one would have ever dreamed that there were successive epochs in the formation of the globe.
Georges Cuvier— as quoted from "Discourse on the Revolutionary Upheavals on the Surface of the Earth".
It is evident that one cannot say anything demonstrable about the problem before having resolved these preliminary questions, and yet we hardly possess the necessary information to solve some of them.
Georges Cuvier— as stated in 1796 before the National Institute of Sciences and Arts in Paris, concerning fossil elephants.
The works which this man leaves behind him occupy a few pages only; their importance is not greatly superior to their extent.
Georges Cuvier— About the writings of Joseph Banks, as stated in Cavendish: The Experimental Life, by Christa Jungnickel and Russell McCormmach (1999, pg. 461).
The synthesis of paleontology, taxonomy, and comparative anatomy that Cuvier achieved was based on a teleological approach to nature, one that gave primacy to functional purpose over structural affinity.
Georges Cuvier— Toby A. Appel, The Cuvier-Geoffrey Debate: French Biology in the Decades before Darwin (1987)
Cuvier advanced his doctrine on methodological as well as scientific grounds. Although his work was far from empirical, Cuvier adopted and promulgated an empiricist ideology in order to combat opposing points of view.
Georges Cuvier— Toby A. Appel, The Cuvier-Geoffrey Debate: French Biology in the Decades before Darwin (1987)
