G.G.+Simpson

FOUNDER OF THE MODERN SYNTHESIS OF EVOLUTION __GEORGE GAYLORD SIMPSON__ 1902-1984 G. Ledyard Stebbins home Geoffrey St. Hilaire

George Gaylord Simpson was born June 16, 1902 to Julia Kinney and Joseph Alexander Simpson in Chicago, Illinois. Simpson and his family moved to Denver, Colorado where he went to high school and graduated in 1918. George Simpson continued his education and "the following autumn he entered the university of Colorado where he acquired a particular interest in historical geology an interest that was sparked and fanned by Arthur Jerrold Tieje". Later, in 1922 Tieje encouraged Simpson to transfer to Yale University, where it was strong in zoology and geology; Simpson spent senior year at Yale University and graduated in 1923. Then, Simpson entered graduate school to study paleontology. The summer of 1924 Simpson accompanied, both paleontologist, on a collecting expedition in Texas and New Mexico. Then returned to Yale, Simpson continued his study on Masonic mammals, the oldest fossilized mammals. This subject became part of Simpsons’ dissertation, the following year it led to his graduation to study at the British museum on European Masonic mammals. While in Britain, Simpson received job offers from Yale and the American museum of natural history in New York City but decided to work as a curator of the museum of comparative zoology at Harvard University up to 1970. Simpson was able to carry out fossil collecting expeditions, which allowed him to travel to Florida, Montana, New Mexico, Argentina and Venezuela. First, he studied the country’s fossil collections in museums at Buenos Aires and La Plata; and continued to studying fossils he tracked down in Patagonia. By the 1930s Simpson's life changed in two major ways, his marriage failed and by 1938 Simpson remarried to Anne Roe, an academic psychologist. The second change related Simpson's expertise in statistics and prepared him to take on theoretical problems in biology.



Through paleontology Simpson studied the history of evolution and as a professional paleontologist, SImpson "argued that the fossil record supports Darwin's theory that natural selection acting on random variation in a population is the driving force behind evolution". Simpson was the first to use math in paleontology and discovered new genetic evidence in evolution through his study of paleontology. By 1944 Simpson published the book //Tempo and Mode in Evolution// where he divided evolutionary change into tempo, the rate of change, and mode, the pattern or change with tempo being the basic factor of mode. Tempo and Mode focuses on the speed of evolution and how it occurs. During the 20th century many scientists werent certain that "natural populations contained enough genetic variation for natural selection to create new species" while scientists argued over Darwin's emphasis on natural selection, Simpson believed "that fossil patterns needed no mystical or goal-oriented processes to explain them". Simpson argued that the evolution of mammals fit perfectly together with the new mechanism of population genetics. He used the new mathematical process to clarify how evoultion occurs in "gene pool".



Simpson's professionalism in paleontology, and fossils led to one of his specialties, the evolution of the horse, which he published a book on in 1951 titled //Horses//. In his book Horses he shows the "complexity and diversity and branching of the horses' ancient relatives, not only through time, but over geographical area, as early populations pushed into various habitats, adapting first to forests, then to open grasslands". After his contributions to his field in paleontology, Simpson was awarded several honorary degrees and medals. In 1941 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Natural Arts and Sciences in 1948. George Gaylord Simpson died October 6, 1984 in Tucson, Arizona.

George Gaylord Simpson Biography | BookRags.com. (n.d.). BookRags.com | Study Guides, Lesson Plans, Book Summaries and more. Retrieved March 3, 2011, from []

Unofficial SJG Archive - People - George G. Simpson (1902-1984). (n.d.). The Unofficial Stephen Jay Gould Archive. Retrieved March 3, 2011, from [|http://www.stephenjaygould.org]  ﻿Evolution: Library: George Gaylord Simpson: Natural Selection and the Fossil Record. (n.d.). PBS: Public Broadcasting Service. Retrieved March 3, 2011, from []