Showing papers on "Philosophy of biology published in 2006"
01 Jan 2006
149 citations
TL;DR: This paper argues that natural selection indeed takes place at the level of populations, but it is a causal process nonetheless; each of these positions is right in one way, but wrong in another.
Abstract: Recent discussions in the philosophy of biology have brought into question some fundamental assumptions regarding evolutionary processes, natural selection in particular. Some authors argue that natural selection is nothing but a population-level, statistical consequence of lower-level events (Matthen and Ariew [2002]; Walsh, Lewens, and Ariew [2002]). On this view, natural selection itself does not involve forces. Other authors reject this purely statistical, population-level account for an individual-level, causal account of natural selection (Bouchard and Rosenberg [2004]). I argue that each of these positions is right in one way, but wrong in another; natural selection indeed takes place at the level of populations, but it is a causal process nonetheless.
125 citations
TL;DR: These roles are critical components of any adequate explanation of innovation and novelty though not exhaustive of the parts played by morphology in evolutionary investigation, and invite reflection on what counts as an evolutionary cause in contemporary evolutionary biology.
82 citations
TL;DR: A discussion of the importance of recognizing formal and compositional biology as two genuinely different ways of doing biology – the differences arising more from their distinct methodologies than from scientific discipline included or natural domain studied.
Abstract: I analyze the importance of parts in the style of biological theorizing that I call compositional biology. I do this by investigating various aspects, including partitioning frames and explanatory accounts, of the theoretical perspectives that fall under and are guided by compositional biology. I ground this general examination in a comparative analysis of three different disciplines with their associated compositional theoretical perspectives: comparative morphology, functional morphology, and developmental biology. I glean data for this analysis from canonical textbooks and defend the use of such texts for the philosophy of science. I end with a discussion of the importance of recognizing formal and compositional biology as two genuinely different ways of doing biology – the differences arising more from their distinct methodologies than from scientific discipline included or natural domain studied. Ultimately, developing a translation manual between the two styles would be desirable as they currently are, at times, in conflict.
66 citations
01 Dec 2006-Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences
TL;DR: If biology must conceptualize self-organization as actual in the world, Kant's regulative/constitutive distinction is pointless in practice and the (naturalist) philosophy of biology has urgent work to undertake for which Kant turns out not to be very helpful.
62 citations
47 citations
TL;DR: It is believed that a proper understanding of the mechanisms of cultural propagation drawing on the work of cognitive and social scientists contradicts the idea that culture exhibits inheritance in the strict sense needed for the theory of evolution by natural selection to apply straightforwardly to it.
Abstract: The idea that cultural evolution exhibits variation, competition, and inheritance and therefore can be studied by adjusting the Darwinian theory of evolution by natural selection is an attractive one. It has been argued by a number of authors (e.g., Campbell 1960; Monod 1970; Dawkins 1976; Cavalli-Sforza and Feldman 1981; Boyd and Richerson 1985; Durham 1991; Aunger 2002; Mesoudi et al. 2004) and pursued in a variety of ways, some (Dawkins and memeticists) staying close to the Darwinian model, others (e.g., Boyd, Richerson, and their collaborators) being more innovative. We agree that there are relevant analogies between biological and cultural evolution and, in particular, that cultural items do exhibit variation, competition, and cumulative modification. On the other hand, we believe that a proper understanding of the mechanisms of cultural propagation drawing on the work of cognitive and social scientists (see Sperber and Hirschfeld 1999 for a review) contradicts the idea that culture exhibits inheritance in the strict sense needed for the theory of evolution by natural selection to apply straightforwardly to it. If so, it will take more than adjusting the Darwinian model to be faithful to the Darwinian inspiration.
46 citations
01 Feb 2006
TL;DR: In this way, they hoped to establish a new and secure foundation for philosophy, closely associated with science as the model, which even was to be exceeded wherever possible as discussed by the authors. But their concern with certain knowledge was virtually never theoretical; it was generally practical, motivated by hopes of medical and technological advances.
Abstract: INTRODUCTION Modern philosophy began as a protest against the traditional philosophy of the schools. The Italians turned to classical antiquity, whereas the English, the French, and the Germans turned to the emerging natural sciences. Bacon, Descartes, Leibniz, Locke, and many others were, of course, students of philosophy, but they all distanced themselves from scholastic philosophy and its theological dominance. They did not teach ‘school-philosophy’ but remained laymen in both senses of the term, non-theologians and non-professionals. Their interest in natural science was an expression of disgust with traditional textual scholarship; they turned from terminological wrangles to the direct study of the world. Obscure and inaccurate discourse was to be replaced by exact and, where possible, quantifiable knowledge. Modern philosophers no longer searched for truth in the past or in ancient texts but expected to find it in the future, through new research into facts, causes, and principles. In this way, they hoped to establish a new and secure foundation for philosophy, closely associated with science as the model, which even was to be exceeded wherever possible. This concern with certain knowledge was virtually never theoretical; it was generally practical, motivated, for example, by hopes of medical and technological advances. Frequently its aim was a general reform of society, a new politics. At the same time, the awkward problem of religion (the reform of which universally had led to conflict) was set aside by emphasising the distinction between reason and revelation. Subsequently it was gradually reintroduced into the discussion, with the declared intention of reconciling philosophy and religion.
46 citations
TL;DR: It is argued that given a plausible account of what distinctively biological means, such laws are distinctively Biological and therefore there cannot be strict laws in biology.
Abstract: This paper consists of four parts. Part 1 is an introduction. Part 2 evaluates arguments for the claim that there are no strict empirical laws in biology. I argue that there are two types of arguments for this claim and they are as follows: (1) Biological properties are multiply realized and they require complex processes. For this reason, it is almost impossible to formulate strict empirical laws in biology. (2) Generalizations in biology hold contingently but laws go beyond describing contingencies, so there cannot be strict laws in biology. I argue that both types of arguments fail. Part 3 considers some examples of biological laws in recent biological research and argues that they exemplify strict laws in biology. Part 4 considers the objection that the examples in part 3 may be strict laws but they are not distinctively biological laws. I argue that given a plausible account of what distinctively biological means, such laws are distinctively biological.
44 citations
TL;DR: The term “progress” has so far served as a metaphor for general patterns generated amongst organisms during evolution and it is proposed that a reformulation is needed to eliminate historically imported implications and that it is necessary to develop a concept for an appropriate empirical description of macroevolutionary patterns.
Abstract: Modern biology is ambivalent about the notion of evolutionary progress. Although most evolutionists imply in their writings that they still understand large-scale macroevolution as a somewhat progressive process, the use of the term “progress” is increasingly criticized and avoided. The paper shows that this ambivalence has a long history and results mainly from three problems: (1) The term “progress” carries historical, theoretical and social implications which are not congruent with modern knowledge of the course of evolution; (2) An incongruence exists between the notion of progress and Darwin’s theory of selection; (3) It is still not possible to give more than a rudimentary definition of the general patterns that were generated during the macroevolution of organisms. The paper consists of two parts: the first is a historical overview of the roots of the term “progress” in evolutionary biology, the second discusses epistemological, ontological and empirical problems. It is stated that the term has so far served as a metaphor for general patterns generated amongst organisms during evolution. It is proposed that a reformulation is needed to eliminate historically imported implications and that it is necessary to develop a concept for an appropriate empirical description of macroevolutionary patterns. This is the third way between, on the one hand, using the term indiscriminately and, on the other hand, ignoring the general patterns that evolution has produced.
38 citations
TL;DR: In this note epistemological problems in general theories about living systems are considered, and the question of hidden connections between different areas of experience, such as folk biology and scientific biology, andhidden connections between central concepts of theoretical biology are considered.
Abstract: In this note some epistemological problems in general theories about living systems are considered; in particular, the question of hidden connections between different areas of experience, such as folk biology and scientific biology, and hidden connections between central concepts of theoretical biology, such as function, semiosis, closure and life.
TL;DR: The authors argued that a consistent general naturalism must be understood in terms of methodological maxims rather than metaphysical doctrines and argued that epistemological norms of science itself, particularly those governing the empirical testing of specific models, should be regarded as conditional rather than categorical and that, as such, can be given a naturalistic justification.
Abstract: I begin by arguing that a consistent general naturalism must be understood in terms of methodological maxims rather than metaphysical doctrines. Some specific maxims are proposed. I then defend a generalized naturalism from the common objection that it is incapable of accounting for the normative aspects of human life, including those of scientific practice itself. Evolutionary naturalism, however, is criticized as being incapable of providing a sufficient explanation of categorical moral norms. Turning to the epistemological norms of science itself, particularly those governing the empirical testing of specific models, I argue that these should be regarded as conditional rather than categorical and that, as such, can be given a naturalistic justification. The justification, however, is more cognitive than evolutionary. The historical development of science is found to be a better place for applying evolutionary ideas. After briefly considering the possibility of a naturalistic understanding of mathematics and logic, I turn to the problem of reconciling scientific realism with an evolutionary picture of scientific development. The solution, I suggest, is to understand scientific knowledge as being “per-spectival” rather than absolutely objective. I first argue that scientific observation, whether by humans or instruments, is perspectival. This argument is extended to scientific theorizing, which is regarded not as the formulation of universal laws of nature but as the construction of principles to be used in the construction of models to be applied to specific natural systems. The application of models, however, is argued to be not merely opportunistic but constrained by the methodological presumption that we live in a world with a definite causal structure even though we can understand it only from various perspectives.
TL;DR: Measurements of metabolic rates and mRNA complexity in developing embryos, as well as functional analyses of gene regulatory systems, indicate that ontogeny fits the paradigm of developmental ascendency, an overarching explanation for phylogenetic change that contextualizes Darwinian evolution.
Abstract: Development is a process whereby a relatively unspecified system comprised of loosely connected lower level parts becomes organized into a coherent, higher-level agency. Its temporal corollaries are growth, increasingly deterministic behavior, and a progressive reduction of developmental potential. During immature stages with relatively low specification and high potential, development is largely controlled by local interactions from the “bottom-up,” whereas during more highly specified stages with reduced potential, emergent autocatalytic processes exert “top-down” control. Robert Ulanowicz has shown that this phenomenology of ascendency follows thermodynamic principles and can be described quantitatively using information theory, providing a general theory of development. However, the theory has not found a wide audience among developmental biologists, as genetic determinism encourages the popular reductionistic perception that ontogeny is controlled entirely by molecular mechanisms that exert efficient causality from the bottom-up. Nonetheless, measurements of metabolic rates and mRNA complexity in developing embryos, as well as functional analyses of gene regulatory systems, indicate that ontogeny fits the paradigm of developmental ascendency. Beyond informing biomedical research and the interpretation of large datasets obtained by systems-biological approaches, developmental ascendency helps explain the origin of life, and, being independent of scale, provides an overarching explanation for phylogenetic change that contextualizes Darwinian evolution.
TL;DR: The theoretical problem of integrating evolution, heredity, development, and cognition has a long pedigree with a complicated history and thinking about integration from the point of view of these specialties has traditionally depended on a notion of unification by explanatory theory reduction.
Abstract: The theoretical problem of integrating evolution, heredity, development, and cognition has a long pedigree with a complicated history. Many of these fields were considered the subjects of one science in the 19th century (Maienschein 1987). Leading theoretical biologists of the age wrote large, expansive treatises that biologists now can read only with equal measures of wonder and incredulity: wonder at their wide and deep learning and incredulity at their peculiar visions of biological integration. Think of Herbert Spencer (1900, pt 2: 367): “Evolution is an integration of matter and concomitant dissipation of motion; during which the matter passes from a relatively indefinite, incoherent homogeneity to a relatively definite, coherent heterogeneity and during which the retained motion undergoes a parallel transformation.” Or consider Ernst Haeckel (Gastraea theory), Hans Driesch (entelechies), August Weismann (biophors, ids, idants), and even Charles Darwin (use inheritance, pangenesis). None of these ideas were especially crazy in their time, but they drove integration projects that are quite different from ours. Historically, each of these special subjects has been a contender for the role of primary theory from which an understanding of all biological phenomena would flow. To take but a few examples, Dobzhansky (1973: 125) gave us “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution” on behalf of Darwin’s theory. De Vries gave us his Mutationstheorie and Johannsen his pure line theory as alternative explanations of the root cause of hereditary change. Both were intended originally to replace natural selection as theoretically primary. Driesch gave us entelechies of individual development as a fundamental philosophical principle for the biological sciences. James Mark Baldwin, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Francisco Varela, Rupert Riedl, and Donald Campbell, in very different ways, put cognition in the center of theoretical concern for general biological science, evolution in particular. Thinking about integration from the point of view of any of these specialties has traditionally depended on a notion of unification by explanatory theory reduction: explanations flow from a fundamental primary theory to phenomena that are organized at the surfaces, so to speak, of those phenomena considered central for the primary theory—for example, trait heredity and organism development in the light of evolution in Darwin’s day, or population change and the development of hybrids in the light of Mendelian heredity circa 1905, recapitulation and phylogeny in the light of ontogeny in Haeckel’s, de Beer’s, and Gould’s days (Haeckel 1866; de Beer 1930; Gould 1977), learning as coequal to inheritance and selection as a force in evolution. In the 20th century, phenomena have tended to be organized hierarchically, in terms of the composition of matter from the smallest to the largest units, so that there is a general expectation and drift of reductionism toward lower levels of compositional organization—to the behavior of smaller and smaller bits of matter—as the primary concern of fundamental theory. In biology, this reductionist drift led theorists from organisms to organs and tissues, to cells, and on to molecules as the foci of theoretical interest. Genes, the “molecules of life,” have been the focus of biological reductionism for nearly all of that century. A different model of integration centers on cooperation and communication among theoretical and phenomenal equals, rather than on imperialism and competition for primacy and fundamentality, which reduces or replaces one theory by another or trivializes one explanandum as epiphenomenal to another. An explanatory domain can become integrated when its bumps, twists, and turns are smoothly traversable, but we need not achieve integration by leveling the domain and making it conceptually homogeneous, just as nation-states can be unified by the smooth flow of goods, services, people, and ideas across their borders rather than by the obliteration of local and regional differences making flow irrelevant.
TL;DR: The descendence theory was the part of Darwinism that was accepted by almost all biologists, whereas natural selection remained a controversial idea well into the 20th century.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that the belief that no definition will succeed since no definitions have succeeded is an inductive objection, open to realist responses, and they use disease as an example and show that this argument implies that if a common understanding of disease can be analysed into a definition, then this is a non-trivial definition.
Abstract: Within philosophy of medicine it has been a widespread view that there are important theoretical and practical reasons for clarifying the nature of basic health concepts like disease, illness and sickness. Many theorists have attempted to give definitions that can function as general standards, but as more and more definitions have been rejected as inadequate, pessimism about the possibility of formulating plausible definitions has become increasingly widespread. However, the belief that no definitions will succeed since no definitions have succeeded is an inductive objection, open to realist responses. The article argues that an influential argument from philosophy of language constitutes a more fundamental objection. I use disease as an example and show that this argument implies that if a common understanding of disease can be analysed into a definition, then this is a non-trivial definition. But any non-trivial analysis must be viciously circular: the analysis must presuppose that disease can be defined, but this is what the analysis is supposed to yield as a result. This means, the article concludes, that disease and other controversial health concepts do not have analyses grounded in a common language. Stipulative and contextual definitions can have local significance, but the normative roles of such definitions are at the same time limited.
01 Jan 2006
TL;DR: In this paper, a tensioning field between normal and abnormal development of man is analyzed by comparing preformation and epigenesis theory, and it is clear that a theory of reproduction can never be seen in isolation, but as a part of a certain world view, it also touches upon the constitution of nature and thus questions about a suitable epistemic approach to investigate the assumed laws of nature.
Abstract: The mechanization of the world in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries leads to the conviction of the regularity of nature and its processes and also calls for a theory of reproduction based on mechanical laws without the necessity of an intervention of the Creator. Although this mechanism, which has become worldly, offers an analytical approach to certain phenomena of nature, it also excludes others – the assumed regularity of nature leads to the elimination of the irregular. This tensioning field between normal and abnormal development of man is to be analyzed by comparing preformation and epigenesis theory. It is clear that a theory of reproduction can never be seen in isolation, but – as a part of a certain world view – it also touches upon the constitution of nature and thus questions about a suitable epistemic approach to investigate the assumed laws of
TL;DR: The most general relation between information and physical laws is the well-known statistical condition that any controlled reduction of entropy of a system by measured information must at some point be compensated by enough increase of entropy by energy dissipation to satisfy the second law of thermodynamics.
Abstract: The general concept of information does not belong in the category of universal and inexorable physical laws but in the category of initial conditions and boundary conditions. Boundary conditions formed by local structures are often called constraints. Informational structures such as symbol vehicles are a special type of constraint. It should be clear that the concepts of initial conditions and constraints in physics make no sense outside the context of the law-based physical dynamics to which they apply. This is also the case for the concept of information. There are many different origins, functions, and hierarchical levels of informational constraints. Physicists require the type of information that begins by an observer choosing to perform a measurement. This passive information is necessary to establish the initial conditions of a chosen dynamical system at a particular time. The behavior of the system can then be derived by integration over time. Initial conditions include the positions of all the microscopic units (configuration), their masses, and rates of change of position (momenta). Constraints are macroscopic structures that require additional information for their description. Biological information begins not by observer’s choice but by chance. Chance produces variation in the structures of potential informational constraints. Only by self-replication and natural selection do these constraints become functional information that controls the dynamics of chemical syntheses of the organism. This distinction between physical and biological information is essential because it is the undirected origin of biological information that is one of several necessary conditions for open-ended evolution. Other conditions were presented by von Neumann (1966), who was the first to give a plausible logical argument that information in the form of nondynamic symbolic constraints (“quiescent” descriptions) must be distinguished from the dynamics they control in order to allow open-ended evolution. But he did not address the physical conditions necessary for symbolic control of physical systems. As a matter of practice, symbolic expressions do not appear to take place by physical necessity, nor do physical laws appear to restrict symbol sequences (e.g., Hoffmeyer and Emmeche 1991). Because of this, some mathematicians and physicists believe in the reality of true Platonic symbol systems independent of physical laws. Nevertheless, it is the case that no symbol vehicle or symbolic operation can evade physical laws. This means that in spite of the apparent autonomy of biological information, physical laws impose several conditions on the material embodiment of the different forms of information. The most general relation between information and physical laws is the well-known statistical condition that any controlled reduction of entropy of a system by measured information must at some point be compensated by enough increase of entropy by energy dissipation to satisfy the second law of thermodynamics. Specific forms of information have additional conditions. For efficient heritable storage of information, there must exist distinguishable but nearly equiprobable stable structures or states. Since the probability of physical states depends on energy, differing informational constraints should have stable but equivalent energetic configurations. In order to achieve high information capacity this energy degeneracy is often realized by one-dimensional discrete sequences as in copolymers and other types of symbol strings. Higher dimensional memories are also possible but require more complicated reading and writing processes than do linear sequences. In addition to energy degeneracy, permanent, long-term, and random access informational structures must be relatively time and rate independent, by definition. More precisely, the temporal events of such memory have no coherent relation to the dynamical time of the systems they control. Furthermore, the interpretation or meanings of symbolic memory structures, like genes, texts, logical and mathematical