George Gaylord Simpson - Publications

Palaeontologist, born in Chicago, Illinois, USA. After earning a PhD at Yale, he began his long association with the American Museum of Natural History (1927–59), where he was eventually curator of fossil mammals and chairman of the department of geology and palaeontology (1942–59). He was later Alexander Agassiz Professor of Vertebrate Paleontology at Harvard (1959–70). A specialist in early fossil mammals, he led expeditions on four continents and discovered (1953) the 50-million-year old fossil skulls of Dawn Horses in Colorado. He helped develop the modern biological theory of evolution, drawing on palaeontology, genetics, ecology, and natural selection to show that evolution occurs as a result of natural selection operating in response to shifting environmental conditions. Among his works in this field is the popular Meaning of Evolution (1944, revised 1967).

George Gaylord Simpson (June 16, 1902 – October 6, 1984) was an American paleontologist. Simpson was the most influential paleontologist of the twentieth century and a major participant in the Modern synthesis, contribting Tempo and Mode in Evolution (1944) and Principles of Classification and a Classification of Mammals (1945).

Publications

Attending Marvels (1931) Tempo and Mode in Evolution (1944) The Meaning of Evolution (1949) Evolution and Geography (1953) The Major Features of Evolution (1953) Life: An Introduction to Biology (1957) Principles of Animal Taxonomy (1961) This View of Life (1964) The Geography of Evolution (1965) Penguins(1976) Splendid Isolation (1980) Concession to the Improbable (1978) The Dechronization of Sam Magruder (posthumously published novella, 1996)