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Philosophy of Biology Brian Garvey
A comprehensive and accessible presentation of key philosophical issues in biology.
Biology raises distinct questions not only for philosophy of science but for metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics. This comprehensive new textbook for a rapidly growing field provides students with an up-to-date presentation of the key philosophical issues. The text is organized in four parts. The first part covers the philosophical challenges posed by evolution and evolutionary biology, beginning with Darwin's central argument in the Origin of Species. Individual chapters cover natural selection, creationism, the selfish gene, alternative units of selection, developmental systems theory, adaptionism, and issues in macroevolution. The second part examines philosophical questions arising in connection with biological traits, function, nature and nurture, and biological kinds, followed by an examination of metaphysical questions, biology's relation with the traditional concerns of philosophy of science, and how evolution has been introduced into the epistemological debates.
The final section considers the relevance of biology to questions about ethics, religion, and human nature. Technicalities are made accessible to the non-biologist, while still maintaining philosophical subtleties. The text is thus relevant to individuals at various levels of study.
Review quotes
"An excellent introduction to the topic and deserves to be widely read. Students will come away informed and excited about the subject." Michael Ruse, Lucyle T. Werkmeister Professor of Philosophy, Director of the Program in the History and Philosophy of Science, Florida State University
Brian Garvey is lecturer in philosophy, University of Lancaster.
Philosophy of Biology
Brian Garvey
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements ix
Introduction xi
I. THE ARGUMENT IN DARWIN'S ORIGIN 1
1.1 Earlier attempts 2
1.2 Variation and inheritance 5
1.3 The struggle for existence 8
1.4 Natural selection 10
2. THE POWER OF GENES 16
2.1 Introducing the gene 17
2.2 Genes and how organisms are made 21
2.3 Genes as agents 23
3. UNITS OF SELECTION 29
3.1 Genes versus individual organisms 30
3.2 Individual organisms as units of selection 33
3.3 Groups of organisms, and the question of altruism 35
3.4 Memes 39
4. PANGLOSSIANISM AND ITS DISCONTENTS 46
4.1 The uniqueness of natural selection 47
4.2 The accusation of "panglossianism" 51
4.3 So what is wrong with panglossianism ? 53
4.4 A storm in a teacup? 59
5. THE ROLE OF DEVELOPMENT 64
5.1 A nineteenth-century idea: recapitulation 64
5.2 New developments in developmental biology 67
5.3 Evo-devo 72
5.4 Developmental systems theory 78
6. NATURE AND NURTURE 89
6.1 Why does innateness seem to matter so much? 89
6.2 But what is innateness? 94
6.3 The ordinary-language concept 96
6.4 Canalization 99
6.5 Generative entrenchment 101
6.6 A deflationary approach 103
6.7 Conclusion 105
7. FUNCTION: "WHAT IT IS FOR" VERSUS "WHAT IT DOES" 108
7.1 What it is for 112
7.2 What it has been selected for 117
7.3 What it does 121
7.4 Conclusion 125
8. BIOLOGICAL CATEGORIES 127
8.1 Introduction: natural kinds in general 127
8.2 Taxonomy 128
8.3 What are the natural kinds of biology? 131
9. SPECIES AND THEIR SPECIAL PROBLEMS 143
9.1 The interbreeding criterion 144
9.2 Species as individuals 148
9.3 A pluralistic approach 152
10. BIOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE 157
10.1 Lawlessness in biology 157
10.2 Does biology have real laws? 163
10.3 Comprehensiveness, unity and simplicity 167
10.4 Conclusion 173
II. EVOLUTION AND EPISTEMOLOGY 176
11.1 Conjectures and refutations 177
11.2 The reliability of our sources 180
11.3 The limitations of our minds 185
12. EVOLUTION AND RELIGION 189
12.1 Does the theory of evolution support atheism? 190
12.2 "God of the gaps" arguments 196
12.3 Evolution and explaining religion 200
13. EVOLUTION AND HUMAN NATURE 207
13.1 Sociobiology and its controversies 208
13.2 Evolutionary psychology's grand synthesis 211
13.3 Conclusion. 222
14. BIOLOGY AND ETHICS 224
14.1 Fitness as a normative concept 224
14.2 The naturalistic fallacy 230
14.3 Ought implies can 236
14.4 Altruism 239
14.5 Intuitions again 247
Notes 251
Further reading 257
Bibliography 263
Index 271
