At a glance
- Age
- 73
- Born
- May 1, 1881
- From
- château of Sarcenat
- Lives in
- France
- Nationality
- France
Biography
The lines that circulate from him tend to sit at the meeting point of science and religion, and that is exactly where he worked. A Jesuit priest who was also a working paleontologist, he treated evolution as a subject for both laboratory and contemplation, and wrote on it in scientific and religious registers alike. His thinking drew on Henri Bergson on one side and Christian mysticism on the other — an unusual pairing, and the reason his writing still gets quoted by people who have never opened a fossil report.
The scientific credentials were not incidental. He carried out paleontological research in China and was among those involved in the discovery of the Peking Man fossils at the Zhoukoudian cave complex near Beijing, one of the more consequential finds in the study of human origins. So the philosophical material came from someone who had spent time in the field, handling the evidence rather than commenting on it from a distance.
He was born on 1 May 1881 at the château of Sarcenat in France and died on 10 April 1955. Priest, scientist, philosopher, mystic, teacher: the list of roles is long because he did not accept that they were separate jobs.
The scientific credentials were not incidental. He carried out paleontological research in China and was among those involved in the discovery of the Peking Man fossils at the Zhoukoudian cave complex near Beijing, one of the more consequential finds in the study of human origins. So the philosophical material came from someone who had spent time in the field, handling the evidence rather than commenting on it from a distance.
He was born on 1 May 1881 at the château of Sarcenat in France and died on 10 April 1955. Priest, scientist, philosopher, mystic, teacher: the list of roles is long because he did not accept that they were separate jobs.
