Synonyms
Scale of nature; Phylogenetic scale; Evolutionary scale
Definition
A hierarchical ranking of animals based on Aristotelian notions of perfection, with humans at the top. It has often been used incorrectly as a model for vertebrate evolution.
Characteristics
In seeking to find order and relationship in the biological world, the Greek scientist and philosopher, Aristotle (384–322 B.C.) devised a classification scheme for animals that came to be known as the scala naturae in its Latin translation from Greek. In Latin, scala means “ladder” or “flight of steps” and naturae means “of nature” or “of the universe”. Aristotle’s idea was that living things could be assigned a hierarchical position on this metaphorical ladder that would represent their degree of perfection [1,2,3]. He placed humans on the top rung and other creatures of the known world on progressively lower rungs. He based his classification system on various biological characteristics that he could observe, such as...
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References
Aristotle (1910) Historia Animalium. Clarendon Press, Oxford, UK (Translated by W Ogle)
Aristotle (1912) De Partibus Animalium. Clarendon Press, Oxford, UK (Translated by W Ogle)
Aristotle (1912) De Generatione Animalium. Clarendon Press, Oxford, UK (Translated by A Platt)
Hodos W, Campbell CBG (1969) Scala naturae: why there is no theory in comparative psychology. Psych Rev 76:337–350
Lovejoy AO (1936) The great chain of being. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA
Hodos W, Campbell CBG (1990) Evolutionary scales and comparative studies of cognition. In: Kesner R, Olton D (eds) Animal cognition. Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ, pp 1–21
Butler AB, Hodos W (2005) Comparative vertebrate neuroanatomy: evolution and adaptation, 2nd edn. Wiley-Liss, Hoboken, NJ
Hofman MA (2001) Evolution and complexity of the human brain: some organizing principles. In: RothG, Wullimann ME (eds) Brain evolution and cognition. Wiley, New York, pp 501–521
Jerison HJ (2001) The evolution of neural complexity. In: Roth G, Wullimann ME (eds) Brain evolution and cognition. Wiley, New York, pp 521–553
Carroll RL (1988) Vertebrate paleontology and evolution. Freeman, New York
Ayala EJ (1988) Can “progress” be defined as a biological concept? In: Nitecki MH (ed) Evolutionary progress. University of Chicago Press, Chicago Press, IL, pp 75–96
Gould SJ (1988) On replacing the idea of progress with an operational notion of directionality. In: Nitecki MH (ed) Evolutionary progress. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL, pp 319–338
Campbell CBG, Hodos W (1991) The scala naturae revisited: anagenesis and evolutionary scales in comparative psychology. J Comp Psych 105:211–221
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Hodos, W. (2009). Evolution and the Scala Naturae. In: Binder, M.D., Hirokawa, N., Windhorst, U. (eds) Encyclopedia of Neuroscience. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-29678-2_3118
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-29678-2_3118
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