Oskar Kuhn

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Oskar Kuhn (7 March 1908,

palaeontologist.[2][3]

Life and career

Kuhn was educated in

D. Phil. in 1932.[1]

He worked in the University of Munich Geological Institute, among other things on the Fossilium Catalogus (Catalogue of Fossils), and then in 1938 on a stipend from the

Geiseltal fossils.[1] In 1939 he achieved his Habilitation with a thesis on the Halberstadt Keuper fauna, and in 1940 was named Privatdozent in geology and paleontology.[1]

Informed by his Catholic religion, Kuhn was an exponent of idealistic morphology: he viewed evolution as operating only within predetermined morphological classes.[4][5] In 1943 he declared, "The theory of descent has collapsed."[6] After a political conflict with his mentor, Johannes Weigelt, over evolution, Kuhn's teaching certification was withdrawn (in an act known as "remotion") in November 1941.[1][7][8] He had to leave Halle and was immediately called up for wartime service in the Wehrmacht. In February 1942 he was released because of lung disease. (He had been a member of the SA from 1933 to 1936 but left for health reasons.)[1]

In 1947 he became professor extraordinarius at the University of Bamberg, but left after a short time.[1]

Selected works

  • Paläozoologie in Tabellen. (1940)
  • Lehrbuch der Paläozoologie. (Textbook of Paleontology) (1949)
  • Die Deszendenztheorie: Grundlegung der Ganzheitsbiologie. (1951)
  • Lebensbilder und Evolution fossiler Saurier, Amphibien und Reptilien. (1961) (with Hartmut Haubold)
  • Die Vorzeitlichen Wirbellosen. System und Evolution. (1966)
  • Handbuch der Paläoherpetologie - Encyclopedia of Paleoherpetology. Stuttgart, New York: G. Fischer, 1978- .
    ISBN 3-89937-007-4. OCLC
    .

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g "Oskar Kuhn" (in German). Retrieved 2010-07-13.
  2. ^ "Entry on Oskar Kuhn". Catalogue of the German National Library (in German). Retrieved 2010-07-11.[permanent dead link]
  3. ^ "Oskar Kuhn - Library of Congress". id.loc.gov. Retrieved 20 January 2023.
  4. ISBN 978-1-86239-269-4, p. 213
    .
  5. ^ Georgy S. Levit and Kay Meister, The history of essentialism vs. Ernst Mayr's “Essentialism Story”: A case study of German idealistic morphology. Theory in Biosciences (2006), vol. 124, no. 3-4, pp. 281-307
  6. ISBN 0-226-73834-5, p. 445
    .
  7. ISBN 3-89812-150-X, pp. 101, 102
    : Weigelt regarded Catholic-inspired thought at the university that undercut evolution as a fundamental threat.
  8. ISBN 3-89812-144-5, pp. 478-80
    : the section on "Der ,Fall' Kuhn" states that Weigelt had brought Kuhn to Halle after he had been refused Habilitation at Munich.
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