142 Harrison
ogy.”^120 Abandoned by the newly defi ned “scientists,” and evacuated of its
theological meanings, by the beginning of the twentieth century natural
history had been alienated from the two enterprises that could lend it
legitimation.CONCLUSION
Natural history no longer plays an integral role in the study of nature.
Indeed, it no longer exists as a serious academic discipline. The Adamic
dream of a complete catalog of living creatures is further away than ever
before, with a huge proportion of species still awaiting description and
classifi cation. Neither is it seriously claimed that the description and nam-
ing of these innumerable undescribed creatures will add much of scientifi c
substance to the sum of human knowledge. The religious and moral justi-
fi cations for the pursuit of natural history have held little appeal for some
time. The logical contention of David Hume (1711–1776) that values can-
not be derived from facts, along with the development of modern ethical
theory by such fi gures as Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) and John Stuart
Mill (1806–1873), have made claims about the moral authority of natural
history doubtful. The contention that God’s wisdom and goodness is evi-
dent in the specifi c adaptations of creatures, or in the general benevolence
of the system of nature, has also become diffi cult to sustain in the wake
of the general acceptance of Darwin’ theory of natural selection—witness
J. B. S. Haldane’s (1892–1964) celebrated observation that the one thing
that could be discerned about the Deity from the study of nature was his
“inordinate fondness for beetles.”^121
Yet the legacy of natural history lives on. “Scientifi c creationism”
bears more than a passing resemblance to the natural histories of Earth
produced in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. On the
other side are the recent attempts of evolutionary psychologists to derive
moral principles from the putative facts of evolutionary history in a man-
ner akin to early- modern moralizers of insect behaviors—as if Hume had
labored in vain to distinguish facts and values. The closest descendent
of nineteenth- century natural history amongst the academic disciplines
is perhaps ecology, although more mathematically inclined ecologists
might not be happy with this genealogy. “Ecology,” according to one of
its early practitioners, “simply means a scientifi c natural history.”^122 At a
popular level—and natural history has always enjoyed popular appeal—
sales fi gures for the essays of Stephen Jay Gould, ratings for the television
productions of David Attenborough, the burgeoning membership of so-