Of birds and bees: Karl von Frisch, Konrad Lorenz and the science of animals, 1908--1973.

摘要

This dissertation examines the history of animal behavior studies through the works of Karl von Frisch (1886-1982) and Konrad Lorenz (1903-1989). At the heart of the study is the historical reconstruction of how the animal-human boundary was understood, created, and transgressed by von Frisch and Lorenz in the context of twentieth-century German science. In addition to scientific monographs, papers, diaries, letters, and films, the project also considers von Frisch and Lorenz's writings aimed at popular audiences. By considering the history of animal behavior studies across the disciplinary confines of ethology, the study recovers the importance of von Frisch's voice to twentieth-century dialogues on animals and complicates accounts that have simply characterized Lorenzian ethology as the Austro-German answer to American behaviorism. Von Frisch and Lorenz are presented in their cultural contexts to show that similar socio-academic milieus and a shared Prize notwithstanding, they offered two viable but ultimately very different approaches to animals and their behaviors. Whereas Lorenz understood his geese to be largely governed by species-specific complexes of drives and releasers, von Frisch's bee work was consistently underwritten by his understanding of their sensory physiology. And although he avowed himself a steadfast agnostic on the bees' alleged mental abilities, his work would provide powerful ammunition for mid-century opponents of behaviorism.