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996Experimentation versus Theory Choice: A Social-Epistemological ApproachIn Hans Bernhard Schmid, Daniel Sirtes & Marcel Weber (eds.), Collective Epistemology, Ontos. pp. 20--203. 2011.
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15Ron Amundson, The Changing Role of the Embryo in Evolutionary Thought: Structure and Synthesis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press , 280 pp., $75.00 (review)Philosophy of Science 73 (4): 469-471. 2006.
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699Which Kind of Causal Specificity Matters Biologically?Philosophy of Science 84 (3): 574-585. 2017.Griffiths et al. (2015) have proposed a quantitative measure of causal specificity and used it to assess various attempts to single out genetic causes as being causally more specific than other cellular mechanisms, for example, alternative splicing. Focusing in particular on developmental processes, they have identified a number of important challenges for this project. In this discussion note, I would like to show how these challenges can be met.
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984Causal Selection versus Causal Parity in Biology: Relevant Counterfactuals and Biologically Normal InterventionsIn Brian J. Hanley & C. Kenneth Waters (eds.), Philosophical Perspectives on Causal Reasoning in Biology. Minnesota Studies in Philosophy of Science. Vol. XXI., University of Minnesota Press. forthcoming.Causal selection is the task of picking out, from a field of known causally relevant factors, some factors as elements of an explanation. The Causal Parity Thesis in the philosophy of biology challenges the usual ways of making such selections among different causes operating in a developing organism. The main target of this thesis is usually gene centrism, the doctrine that genes play some special role in ontogeny, which is often described in terms of information-bearing or programming. This pa…Read more
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13Ron Amundson: The Changing Role of the Embryo in Evolutionary Thought: Structure and Synthesis (review)Philosophy of Science 73 (4): 469-471. 2006.
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109Determinism, realism, and probability in evolutionary theoryProceedings of the Philosophy of Science Association 2001 (3). 2001.Recent discussion of the statistical character of evolutionary theory has centered around two positions: (1) Determinism combined with the claim that the statistical character is eliminable, a subjective interpretation of probability, and instrumentalism; (2) Indeterminism combined with the claim that the statistical character is ineliminable, a propensity interpretation of probability, and realism. I point out some internal problems in these positions and show that the relationship between dete…Read more
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52Theory testing in experimental biology: the chemiosmotic mechanism of ATP synthesisStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 33 (1): 29-52. 2002.Historians of biology have argued that much of the dynamics of experimental disciplines such as genetics or molecular biology can be understood from studying experimental systems and model organisms alone . Such accounts contrast sharply with more traditional philosophies of science which viewed scientific research essentially as a process of inventing and testing theories. I present a case from the history of biochemistry which can be viewed from both the experimental systems perspective and fr…Read more
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45I defend the view that single experiments can provide a sufficient reason for preferring one among a group of hypotheses against the widely held belief that “crucial experiments” are impossible. My argument is based on the examination of a historical case from molecular biology, namely the Meselson-Stahl experiment. “The most beautiful experiment in biology”, as it is known, provided the first experimental evidence for the operation of a semi-conservative mechanism of DNA replication, as predict…Read more
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33Jane Maienschein and Michael Ruse, biology and the foundation of ethicsEthical Theory and Moral Practice 4 (1): 79-82. 2001.
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22This paper examines how experimental scientists choose theoretical frameworks as well as their experimental systems for doing research. I start out with Kuhn's claim that there are no algorithms that could determine the coices made by individual scientists. Samir Okasha has recently provided an argument for this claim in terms of social choice theory, which I briefly discuss. Then, I show why this problem is not relevant in an experimental science. There are social mechanisms in place that make …Read more
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283Behavioral traits, the intentional stance, and biological functionsIn Kathryn Plaisance & Thomas A. C. Reydon (eds.), Philosophy of Behavioral Biology, Springer. pp. 317-328. 2011.It has been claimed that the intentional stance is necessary to individuate behavioral traits. This thesis, while clearly false, points to two interesting sets of problems concerning biological explanations of behavior: The first is a general in the philosophy of science: the theory-ladenness of observation. The second problem concerns the principles of trait individuation, which is a general problem in philosophy of biology. After discussing some alternatives, I show that one way of individuati…Read more
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420Philosophie der LebenswissenschaftenInformation Philosophie 4 14-27. 2013.This paper summarizes (in German) recent tendencies in the philosophy of the life sciences.
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63Representing genes: Classical mapping techniques and the growth of genetical knowledgeStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 29 (2): 295-315. 1998.
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138Incommensurability and theory comparison in experimental biologyBiology and Philosophy 17 (2): 155-169. 2002.Incommensurability of scientific theories, as conceived by Thomas Kuhnand Paul Feyerabend, is thought to be a major or even insurmountable obstacletothe empirical comparison of these theories. I examine this problem in light ofaconcrete case from the history of experimental biology, namely the oxidativephosphorylation controversy in biochemistry (ca. 1961-1977). After a briefhistorical exposition, I show that the two main competing theories which werethe subject of the ox-phos controversy instan…Read more
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5Epistemologie des Konkreten: Studien zur Geschichte der modernen Biologie (review)Isis 98 (2): 665-666. 2007.
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75Collective Epistemology (edited book)Ontos. 2011.The aim of this volume is to examine this claim, and to place it in the wider context of recent epistemological debates about the role of sociality in knowledge acquisition.
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738Reference, Truth, and Biological KindsIn: J. Dutant, D. Fassio and A. Meylan (Eds.) Liber Amicorum Pascal Engel. 2014.This paper examines causal theories of reference with respect to how plausible an account they give of non-physical natural kind terms such as ‘gene’ as well as of the truth of the associated theoretical claims. I first show that reference fixism for ‘gene’ fails. By this, I mean the claim that the reference of ‘gene’ was stable over longer historical periods, for example, since the classical period of transmission genetics. Second, I show that the theory of partial reference does not do justice…Read more
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8Under the LamppostIn Peter McLaughlin, Peter Machamer & Rick Grush (eds.), Theory and Method in the Neurosciences, Pittsburgh University Press. pp. 231. 2001.
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244Life in a Physical World: The Place of the Life SciencesIn F. Stadler, D. Dieks, W. Gonzales, S. Hartmann, T. Uebel & M. Weber (eds.), The Present Situation in the Philosophy of Science, Springer. pp. 155--168. 2010.
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77Fitness made physical: The supervenience of biological concepts revisitedPhilosophy of Science 63 (3): 411-431. 1996.The supervenience and multiple realizability of biological properties have been invoked to support a disunified picture of the biological sciences. I argue that supervenience does not capture the relation between fitness and an organism's physical properties. The actual relation is one of causal dependence and is, therefore, amenable to causal explanation. A case from optimality theory is presented and interpreted as a microreductive explanation of fitness difference. Such microreductions can ha…Read more
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65Critical Notice: D arwinian ReductionismBiology and Philosophy 23 (1): 143-152. 2008.This notice provides a critical discussion of some of the issues from Alex Rosenberg’s Darwinian Reductionism, in particular proper functions and the relationship of proximate and ultimate biology, developmental programs and genocentrism, biological laws, the principle of natural selection as a fundamental law, genetic determinism, and the definition of “reductionism.”
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71Explanation, Prediction, and Confirmation (edited book)Springer. 2011.This volume, the second in the Springer series Philosophy of Science in a European Perspective, contains selected papers from the workshops organised by the ESF ...
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874Experimental Modeling in Biology: In Vivo Representation and Stand-ins As Modeling StrategiesPhilosophy of Science 81 (5): 756-769. 2014.Experimental modeling in biology involves the use of living organisms (not necessarily so-called "model organisms") in order to model or simulate biological processes. I argue here that experimental modeling is a bona fide form of scientific modeling that plays an epistemic role that is distinct from that of ordinary biological experiments. What distinguishes them from ordinary experiments is that they use what I call "in vivo representations" where one kind of causal process is used to stand in…Read more
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19Review of Robert A. Wilson, Genes and the Agents of Life: The Individual in the Fragile Sciences: Biology (review)Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2005 (12). 2005.
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339Indeterminism in neurobiologyPhilosophy of Science 72 (5): 663-674. 2005.I examine different arguments that could be used to establish indeterminism of neurological processes. Even though scenarios where single events at the molecular level make the difference in the outcome of such processes are realistic, this falls short of establishing indeterminism, because it is not clear that these molecular events are subject to quantum mechanical uncertainty. Furthermore, attempts to argue for indeterminism autonomously (i.e., independently of quantum mechanics) fail, becaus…Read more
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44Evolutionary plasticity in prokaryotes: A panglossian viewBiology and Philosophy 11 (1): 67-88. 1996.Enzyme directed genetic mechanisms causing random DNA sequence alterations are ubiquitous in both eukaryotes and prokaryotes. A number of molecular geneticist have invoked adaptation through natural selection to account for this fact, however, alternative explanations have also flourished. The population geneticist G.C. Williams has dismissed the possibility of selection for mutator activity on a priori grounds. In this paper, I attempt a refutation of Williams' argument. In addition, I discuss …Read more
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31Über die Vergleichbarkeit metaphysischer Systeme: Der Fall Leibniz kontra LockeZeitschrift für Philosophische Forschung 59 (2). 2005.Dieser Aufsatz untersucht die Vergleichbarkeit metaphysischer Systeme an einem historischen Fallbeispiel, Leibniz' Kritik an Locke. Die zentrale Frage ist, wie weit es Leibniz gelingt, Lockes Thesen zu widerlegen ohne dabei einfach Behauptungen aus seinem eigenen System vorauszusetzen. Es wird gezeigt, dass Leibniz dies nur bei der Frage nach der Existenz eingeborener Ideen gelingt, nicht aber bei der Denkfähigkeit der Materie oder der Existenz unbewusster mentaler Vorgänge. Die Quellen dieser U…Read more
Areas of Specialization
Philosophy of Biology |
General Philosophy of Science |
Metaphysics and Epistemology |
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Mind |