Evaluating Maclaurin and Sterelny's conception of biodiversity in cases of frequent, promiscuous lateral gene transfer
Biology and Philosophy 25 (4):603-621 (2010)
| Abstract | The recent conception of biodiversity proposed by James Maclaurin and Sterelny was developed mostly with macrobiological life in mind. They suggest that we measure biodiversity by dividing life into natural units (typically species) and quantifying the differences among units using phenetic rather than phylogenetic measures of distance. They identify problems in implementing quantitative phylogenetic notions of difference for non-prokaryotic species. I suggest that if we focus on microbiological life forms that engage in frequent, promiscuous lateral gene transfer (LGT), and their associated reticulated phylogenies, we need to rethink the notion of species as the natural unit, and we discover additional problems with phylogenetic notions of distance. These problems suggest that a phenetic approach based on morphospaces has just as much appeal, if not more, for microbes as they do for multi-cellular life. Facts about LGT, however, offer no new insight into the additional challenge of reconciling units and differences into a single measure of biodiversity. | |||||||||
| Keywords | No keywords specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,653 |
| External links |
 |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesMaureen A. O.’Malley & John Dupré (2007). Size Doesn't Matter: Towards a More Inclusive Philosophy of Biology. Biology and Philosophy 22 (2):155-191.
W. Ford Doolittle (forthcoming). The Attempt on the Life of the Tree of Life: Science, Philosophy and Politics. Biology and Philosophy.
Robert G. Beiko (2010). Gene Sharing and Genome Evolution: Networks in Trees and Trees in Networks. Biology and Philosophy 25 (4):659-673.
Markku Oksanen & Juhani Pietarinen (eds.) (2004). Philosophy and Biodiversity. Cambridge University Press.
Markku Oksanen (2007). Species Extinction and Collective Responsibility. The Proceedings of the Twenty-First World Congress of Philosophy 3:179-183.
Gregory J. Morgan & W. Brad Pitts (2008). Evolution Without Species: The Case of Mosaic Bacteriophages. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 59 (4):745-765.
Robin Attfield (2009). Reviews What is Biodiversity by James Maclaurin and Kim Sterelny University of Chicago Press, 2008. £31/£12.50. Philosophy 84 (4):605-609.
Frédéric Bouchard (2010). Symbiosis, Lateral Function Transfer and the (Many) Saplings of Life. Biology and Philosophy 24 (4):623-641.
Joel D. Velasco & Elliott Sober (2010). Testing for Treeness: Lateral Gene Transfer, Phylogenetic Inference, and Model Selection. Biology and Philosophy 25 (4):675-687.
James Maclaurin & Kim Sterelny (2008). What is Biodiversity? University of Chicago Press.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2010-05-19Total downloads8 ( #122,951 of 548,984 )Recent downloads (6 months)1 ( #63,327 of 548,984 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
