James Griesemer

The author views concepts of individuality and associated individuation criteria, as used in the sciences, as scientific-theoretical concepts that can have different, even conflicting meanings in different theoretical contexts. Focusing on biological individuality in evolutionary contexts, he argues that despite the variety of usage, evolutionary contexts typically involve two senses of process-relativity depending on (1) empirical processes taken to be operating in the world that humans talk about, try to understand, predict, explain, or control; and (2) tracking processes that humans perform while investigating empirical phenomena. He illustrates the process-relativity of biological individuality concepts by contrasting two different kinds of attempt to articulate concepts of evolutionary individuality, one based in natural selection theory, the other in a theory of biological reproduction. Also characterized is how the tracking activities of scientific practices are entwined with the empirical processes on which both individuation and individuality depend.

Joseph Grinnell (1877–1939) was the founding director of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, Berkeley (MVZ). He conducted extensive and intensive surveys of vertebrate species distribution throughout California, USA. The problem we track throughout this essay is that Grinnell’s carefully laid plans for his museum at the beginning of the twentieth century embodied a notion of locality and associated technology of recording that turned out to be hard to unify with a very different notion that emerged in mid-twentieth century ecology and is embedded in late twentieth century computing practices involving the collection, storage and retrieval of species locality data. Different concepts of space favor different protocols and ways of describing a species’ locality, and thus slowly entrench only certain courses of action in practice, which over time hinders the integration of data.

In this preliminary report, I sketch a model of narrative organization for visual embryological representations and argue that such organization was twice constructed in 19th century embryology. These constructions were stimulated by shifts of theoretical attention that changed research programs and made embryology a locus of biological unification for heredity, development, evolution, and cytology. I describe these constructions of embryological time in terms of double movements connected with a broader shift of attention toward the cellular level of biological organization in the second half of the 19th century. In the first movement, research attention shifted backward in embryological time, toward the cellular origins of germ-layers—endoderm, ectoderm, and mesoderm. Once the backward shift of attention to the earliest developmental stages had been made, cell-lineage work from the 1870s to the 1920s facilitated a second movement, tracing forward in embryological time, from the egg and early cleavage cells to future structures in larvae and adult organisms. These studies identified the fates of cells and the timing of determination of fate in development. Their technical innovations produced two visual abstractions which were important to the emergence, in the 20th century, of distinct narrative forms in transmission genetics and developmental biology: the genealogical time of the geneticist and the deterministic temporal order of the developmental biologist.

In November 1947, at the age of eighty, Miss Annie M. Alexander (1867–1950) of Oakland, California, loaded her Dodge Power Wagon equipped with four-wheel drive, eight forward speeds, a front bumper winch, and a wire body cage and set out with her companions, Louise Kellogg and Annetta Carter, for a three-month collecting trip to Baja California. The trip was one of the last in the long career of an amateur naturalist whose vision, patronage, and collecting work led to the creation, design, and development of research museums for vertebrate zoology and paleontology at the University of California. Annie Alexander contributed personal and purchased collections totaling 20,564 specimens and sponsored every professional and student member of her Museum of Vertebrate Zoology through endowments and direct support from its founding in 1908. The story of her work with Joseph Grinnell (1877–1939), the western naturalist, ecologist, and conservationist who became the first director of the Museum, raises significant questions about the appropriate categories for describing scientific collaboration and challenges some misconceptions of museum science.

David Hull has contributed a number of central and influential views on the topic of conceptual change in science. Our aim in this chapter is to follow up and elaborate on some issues he has delimited, in the context of a case study of the evolution of diagrams of Weismannism. Hull has been a proponent of an evolutionary analysis of change in science, but he also argues that application of this approach demands more than many of its advocates seem to suppose: in order to use evolutionary concepts to analyze scientific change, not only do we need to understand what biologists mean by evolution, but we must use their conceptual tools correctly. This means that a substantial amount of conceptual analysis of biological concepts and methods must go into an evolutionary theory of conceptual change, and that the metaphorical use of evolutionary language must not be considered a substitute for analysis.

Accounts of the relation between theories and models in biology concentrate on mathematical models. In this paper I consider the dual role of models as representations of natural systems and as a material basis for theorizing. In order to explicate the dual role, I develop the concept of a remnant model, a material entity made from parts of the natural system(s) under study. I present a case study of an important but neglected naturalist, Joseph Grinnell, to illustrate the extent to which mundane practices in a museum setting constitute theorizing. I speculate that historical and sociological analyses of institutions can play a specific role in the philosophical analysis of model-building strategies.

Exact sciences are described as sciences whose theories are formalized. These are contrasted to inexact sciences, whose theories are not formalized. Formalization is described as a broader category than mathematization, involving any form/content distinction allowing forms, e.g., as represented in theoretical models, to be studied independently of the empirical content of a subject-matter domain. Exactness is a practice depending on the use of theories to control subject-matter domains and to align theoretical with empirical models and not merely a state of a science. Inexact biological sciences tolerate a degree of “mismatch” between theoretical and empirical models and concepts. Three illustrations from biological sciences are discussed in which formalization is achieved by various means: Mendelism, Weismannism, and Darwinism. Frege’s idea of a “conceptual notation” is used to further characterize the notion of a form/content distinction.

Scientific work is heterogeneous, requiring many different actors and viewpoints. It also requires cooperation. The two create tension between divergent viewpoints and the need for generalizable findings. We present a model of how one group of actors managed this tension. It draws on the work of amateurs, professionals, administrators and others connected to the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at the University of California, Berkeley, during its early years. Extending the Latour–Callon model of interessement, two major activities are central for translating between viewpoints: standardization of methods, and the development of ‘boundary objects.’ Boundary objects are both adaptable to different viewpoints and robust enough to maintain identity across them. We distinguish four types of boundary objects: repositories, ideal types, coincident boundaries and standardized forms.

This introduction follows a different format than others in this collection in that it is an edited transcription of a lengthy facilitated interview jointly with Jim Griesemer and Bill Wimsatt performed on 27 September 2024. It includes discussion of the article that appears below and other topics likely to be of interest to readers, such as Griesemer’s intellectual and career trajectory, and Griesemer and Wimsatt’s long-standing collaboration. It has been edited due to space considerations, with references added where thought to be useful. If this introduction were to have its own title, it would be “Riffing on Thickety Problems in Philosophy of Biology, or Useful Lessons about Serendipity and Interdisciplinarity.”

Propositions are no more constitutive of science than they are of any activity: a body of knowledge is not all there is to the life of science. Thus I take the premise underlying the topic of this symposium to be uncontroversial, there is a “non-propositional” side of science and of biology in particular. From time to time, however, philosophers ask whether the “non-propositional” side of science is theoretically superfluous, or as Duhem put it, logically dispensable. What they mean to ask is whether science can be fully analyzed in propositional terms; must philosophy of science, in other words, consider the non-propositional side in order to adequately account for science? In this paper I explore the boundary between the propositional and non-propositional sides of biological science, drawing on three cases with which I am familiar. It is important to stress that I focus only on the boundary between two perspectives on scientific theory, as exemplified by biological theories. I do not aim to address the larger questions of the non-propositional character of scientific practice tout court. I propose a picture of material model-building in biology in which manipulated systems of material objects function as theoretical models. Sometimes material models serve as direct theoretical models, as in non-mathematized fields of biology where structure may be abstracted directly from the material system without detour through a formal sentential apparatus. Sometimes material models serve as vicarious, or indirect, theoretical models. That is, work with material systems can serve as an important basis for manipulation in thought of abstract, formal objects for the purpose of articulating a theory.

We track and analyze the re-situation of scientific knowledge in the field of human population genomics ancestry studies. We understand re-situation as a process of accommodating the direct or indirect transfer of objects of knowledge from one site/situation to (one or many) other sites/situations. Our take on the concept borrows from Mary S. Morgan’s work on facts traveling while expanding it to include other objects of knowledge such as models, data, software, findings, and visualizations. We structure a specific case study by tracking the re-situation of these objects between three research projects studying human population diversity reported in three articles in Science, Genome Research and PLoS Genetics between 2002 and 2005. We characterize these three engagements as a unit of analysis, a “skirmish,” in order to compare: (a) the divergence of interests in how life-scientists answer similar research questions and (b) to track the challenging transformation of workflows in research laboratories as these scientific objects are re-situated individually or in bundles. Our analysis of the case study shows that an accurate understanding of re-situation requires tracking the whole bundle of objects in a project because they interact in particular key ways. The absence or dismissal of these interactions opens the door to unforeseen trade-offs, misunderstandings and misrepresentations about research design(s) and workflow(s) and what these say about the questions asked and the findings produced.

This short reminiscence was written by James Griesemer and e-published for the Paul K. Feyerabend Centennial 1924–2024 (the 100th anniversary of his birth) in a grouping of personal memoirs provided by those who worked with or were influenced by Feyerabend. It recounts Griesemer's encounters with Feyerabend as a freshman at UC Berkeley in his philosophy class on ‘theory of knowledge’ around the time that Against Method was being written. Griesemer concludes by noting that he learned from this experience that taking a contrarian position to received views or common knowledge about science is both philosophically important and highly entertaining, and that he has since made a career of multi-perspectival contrarianism as a philosopher of biology.

The 30th anniversary of the 1981 Dahlem conference on Evolution and Development (Bonner 1982) presents an opportunity to assess the role of various kinds of approaches to problems, practices, and principles of interdisciplinary research as they contributed to patterns of conceptual change in different biological specialties over the second half of the twentieth century. Specifically, the integration (Hall 2000), extended synthesis (Pigliucci and Müller 2010), or “juncture” (Gerson 2007, 2015) of evolutionary and developmental biology—“Evo–devo,” “Devo–evo,” or “evolutionary developmental biology”—had roots in several specialties, including: molecular approaches to developmental biology, genetics, and systematics; functional, developmental and evolutionary morphology; paleontology; and, population and quantitative genetics approaches to the evolutionary synthesis.

We develop an account of laboratory models, which have been central to the group selection controversy. We compare arguments for group selection in nature with Darwin’s arguments for natural selection to argue that laboratory models provide important grounds for causal claims about selection. Biologists get information about causes and cause–effect relationships in the laboratory because of the special role their own causal agency plays there. They can also get information about patterns of effects and antecedent conditions in nature. But to argue that some cause is actually responsible in nature, they require an inference from knowledge of causes in the laboratory context and of effects in the natural context. This process, cause detection, forms the core of an analogical argument for group selection. We discuss the differing roles of mathematical and laboratory models in constructing selective explanations at the group level and apply our discussion to the units of selection controversy to distinguish between the related problems of cause determination and evaluation of evidence. Because laboratory models are at the intersection of the two problems, their study is crucial for framing a coherent theory of explanation for evolutionary biology.

Current workflows in academic ecology rarely allow an engagement of ecologists with philosophers, or with contemporary philosophical work. We argue that this is a missed opportunity for enriching ecological reasoning and practice, because many questions in ecology overlap with philosophical questions and with current topics in contemporary philosophy of science. One obstacle to a closer connection and collaboration between the fields is the limited awareness of scientists, including ecologists, of current philosophical questions, developments and ideas. In this article, we aim to overcome this obstacle and trigger more collaborations between ecologists and philosophers. First, we provide an overview of philosophical research relevant to ecologists. Second, we use examples to demonstrate that many ecological questions have a philosophical dimension and point to related philosophical work. We elaborate on one example – the debate around the appropriate level of complexity of ecological models – to show in more detail how philosophy can enrich ecology. Finally, we provide suggestions for how to initiate collaborative projects involving both ecologists and philosophers.

Propositions are no more constitutive of science than they are of any activity: a body of knowledge is not all there is to the life of science. Thus I take the premise underlying the topic of this symposium to be uncontroversial, thereisa “non-propositional” side of science and of biology in particular. From time to time, however, philosophers ask whether the “non-propositional” side of science is theoretically superfluous, or as Duhem put it, logically dispensable. What they mean to ask is whether science can be fullyanalyzedin propositional terms; must philosophy of science, in other words, consider the non-propositional side in order to adequately account for science?Negative answers to the question often rest on the tacit view that the most (or only)importantthing about science is scientific theories.

In this paper I contrast two causal explanations of the outcome of a set of laboratory experiments in population ecology conducted by Thomas Park in the 1940s and 1950s. These experiments shed light on the problem of adducing evidence for the operation of competition (see Lloyd 1987 for a recent philosophical discussion) and are central to the group selection controversy because they form the empirical base for experimental studies of group selection conducted over the last 12 years (see Griesemer and Wade 1988 for an analysis).The experiments investigated competition in laboratory populations of two flour beetle species, Tribolium confusum and Tribolium castaneum, but the results were more complex and interesting than expected; in addition to demonstrating competition in a laboratory system, they exhibited what Park called “competitive indeterminacy.” This phenomenon was of great interest to statisticians, who devised stochastic models to describe its demographic basis (e.g., M.S. Bartlett, P.H. Leslie, and J. Neyman; see Mertz 1972 for references).

We track and analyze the re-situation of scientific knowledge in the field of human population genomics ancestry studies. We understand re-situation as a process of accommodating the direct or indirect transfer of objects of knowledge from one site/situation to other sites/situations. Our take on the concept borrows from Mary S. Morgan’s work on facts traveling while expanding it to include other objects of knowledge such as models, data, software, findings, and visualizations. We structure a specific case study by tracking the re-situation of these objects between three research projects studying human population diversity reported in three articles in Science, Genome Research and PLoS Genetics between 2002 and 2005. We characterize these three engagements as a unit of analysis, a “skirmish,” in order to compare: the divergence of interests in how life-scientists answer similar research questions and to track the challenging transformation of workflows in research laboratories as these scientific objects are re-situated individually or in bundles. Our analysis of the case study shows that an accurate understanding of re-situation requires tracking the whole bundle of objects in a project because they interact in particular key ways. The absence or dismissal of these interactions opens the door to unforeseen trade-offs, misunderstandings and misrepresentations about research design and workflow and what these say about the questions asked and the findings produced.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, the biologist Joseph Grinnell made a distinction between science and sentiment for producing fact-based generalizations on how to conserve biodiversity. We are inspired by Grinnellian science, which successfully produced a century-long impact on studying and conserving biodiversity that runs orthogonal to some familiar philosophical distinctions such as fact versus value, emotion versus reason and basic versus applied science. According to Grinnell, unlike sentiment-based generalizations, a fact-based generalization traces its diverse commitments and thus becomes tractable for its audience. We argue that foregrounding tractability better explains Grinnell’s practice in the context of his time as well as in the context of current discourse among scientists over the political “biases” of biodiversity research and its problem of “reproducibility.”

Biological reproduction is a material process of intertwined, recursive propagule generation and development, assuming that development produces simple life cycles. Most organisms, however, have more or less complex life cycles. Here, I attempt to reconcile recent articulations of a reproducer account with traditional approaches to complex life cycles by generalizing genetic demarcation criteria for life cycle generations in terms of the “scaffolded” development of hybrid reproducers. I argue that scaffolding provides a general method for identifying developmental bottlenecks and suggests in turn a new way of understanding developmental reaction norms.

This paper characterizes the role of the experimenter in causal explanations of laboratory phenomena. Causal explanation rests on appeals to the experimenter's efficacy as a causal agent. I contrast "demographic" and "genetic" explanations of stochastic outcomes in a set of competition experiments in ecology. The demographic view ascribes causes to the experimenter's agency in setting up the experiment and to events within the experimental set-up. The genetic view ascribes causes to an unrecognized effect of the experimenter's sampling process prior to the experimental set-up.

Propositions alone are not constitutive of science. But is the "non-propositional" side of science theoretically superfluous: must philosophy of science consider it in order to adequately account for science? I explore the boundary between the propositional and non-propositional sides of biological theory, drawing on three cases: Grinnell's remnant models of faunas, Wright's path analysis, and Weismannism's role in the generalization of evolutionary theory. I propose a picture of material model-building in biology in which manipulated systems of material objects function as theoretical models. In each of the cases, material systems such as diagrams play important generative as well as presentational roles.