How to Write the History of the New WorldIn the mid eighteenth century, the French naturalist Buffon contended that the New World was in fact geologically newthat it had recently emerged from the watersand that dangerous miasmas had caused all organic life on the continents to degenerate. In the dispute of the New World many historians, naturalists, and moral philosophers from Europe and the Americas (including Thomas Jefferson) sought either to confirm or refute Buffons views. This book