George Gaylord Simpson facts for kids

George Gaylord Simpson (born June 16, 1902 – died October 6, 1984) was an American paleontologist. He was one of the most important paleontologists of the 1900s. He helped shape the "modern evolutionary synthesis," which is how scientists understand evolution today.

Simpson was an expert on extinct mammals and how they moved around the Earth. He studied how animals migrated, especially between North and South America. He also showed that the evolution of the horse was not a simple straight line, but a more complex process. He created the word hypodigm in 1940. He wrote many books about how to classify both fossil and living mammals.

Early Life and Career

George Gaylord Simpson was born in Chicago, Illinois. He grew up mostly in Denver, Colorado. He earned his degrees from Yale University in 1923 and 1926. His first big work, American Mesozoic Mammalia (1929), started his lifelong interest in how mammals evolved. After studying for a year at the British Natural History Museum, Simpson joined the American Museum of Natural History in 1927.

In 1942, Simpson joined the U.S. Army. He served as a Captain and then a Major in Army intelligence. He worked with American forces in North Africa and Europe until 1944. He then left the army due to illness. He returned home with two Bronze Star medals for his service. He became the head of the Geology and Paleontology Department at the American Museum of Natural History. He also taught Zoology at Columbia University from 1945 to 1959. He continued his work on early mammals, studying ancient animals from New Mexico.

From 1959 to 1970, he was a Curator at the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University. He also taught Geoscience at the University of Arizona until he retired in 1982.

Important Books and Awards

In the 1940s, Simpson wrote three very important books. These were Tempo and mode in evolution (1944), Principles of classification and a classification of mammals (1945), and The meaning of evolution (1949). In these books, Simpson explained modern evolutionary theory. He focused on evidence found in fossils.

Simpson received many awards for his work. He was given the Darwin-Wallace Medal in 1958. This award is for major advances in evolutionary biology. In 1962, he received the Royal Society's Darwin Medal. This was for his important work on evolution, especially his studies of fossil vertebrates. He also won the U.S. National Medal of Science in 1965.

Famous Sayings

These quotes from Simpson show his way of thinking:

• "Man is the result of a purposeless and natural process that did not have him in mind."
• "I don't think that evolution is supremely important because it is my specialty; it is my specialty because I think it is supremely important."

Books by George Gaylord Simpson

• Attending marvels (1931)
• Tempo and mode in evolution (1944)
• The meaning of evolution (1949)
• Horses (1951)
• 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)
• Concession to the improbable (1978) (his autobiography)
• Splendid isolation (1980)
• The Dechronization of Sam Magruder (published after his death, 1996)