Ornithology, Evolution, and Philosophy 123

Birds of Oceania 141
From the start, this taxonomic and regional work, however, was not an end in
itself for Mayr but a means to go beyond it. Regarding his scientific perspectives
he wrote to E. Stresemann on 24 March 1934 (transl.):
“Systematics: I also strive beyond it and often pose the question: Cui bono?
or in American: ‘What of it?’ On the other hand, I consider systematic studies an
excellent training and I am paid to do such research. I do not know how I could
justifytooccupymyselfwithothersubjectmatteraslongas40–60undescribed
new forms collected by the Whitney South Sea Expedition lie in the drawers.
I do not want to give careless descriptions; every careless work I did so far,
I regretted bitterly afterwards. Either-or!
The list of references I sent you recently will have demonstrated that I remain
in very close touch with the progress of biology. There are many good and capable
biologists and physiologists, but only very few really great systematists.
Germany has been leading in this field, at least lately (Hartert–(Kleinschmidt)–
Hellmayr–Stresemann), should this tradition be discontinued completely? […]
Therefore my proposal to train a truly significant systematist! I shall also see to
it that I can train here a ‘successor.’ For as soon as I shall have completed three
additional tasks, I’ll also withdraw from the field of ‘taxonomy.’ 1 These three
tasks are: Monographic treatment of all interesting Polynesian genera, the New
Guinea list, and a book on the birds of the Solomon Islands. Afterwards I shall
restrict myself to more general problems of ‘taxonomy’ like ‘geographical variation
of morphological characteristics’ etc. [emphasis added]. Not much news
is to be expected in the field of species description anyway (please keep this
as a secret!!). I just unpacked the Archbold collection [from New Guinea] that
contains nice things such as Daphoenositta, but practically nothing new. I hope
to find more in Coultas’ collection from the Admiralty Islands.”
Since the mid-1930s Mayr increasingly took into consideration general systematic,
evolutionary, and genetic aspects, particularly through his contact with
Th. Dobzhansky (see p. 133ff.). Certain museum tasks such as the organization
and integration of the Rothschild Collection, his increasing involvement in evolutionary
studies and activities as a lecturer at various universities interfered only
to some extent with his taxonomic work. However, the publication of the book
on the birds of the Solomon Islands was long delayed until it eventually appeared
in coauthorship with Jared Diamond (2001g). The work on the above research
programs will be presented in some detail in the following sections. The results
formed the intellectual database for Mayr’s later work in the field of evolutionary
biology.
1 Stresemann had written to him on 25 February 1934: “I begin to think that my occupation
with collection-based taxonomy has been for me only a transitonal stage
which, inside, I have overcome completely, but outside not quite yet. It is physiology
with its wide perspectives which now attracts me mightily (although perhaps too
late).” Similarly already five years earlier: “Actually my real interests have shifted to
very different fields [than systematics, zoogeography, and speciation], in particular
functional anatomy and physiology” (letter to Mayr dated 14 October 1929).