The structure and significance of evolutionary explanations in philosophy
In H. Carel & D. Gamez (eds.), What Philosophy is. Ccontinuum (2004)
| Abstract | The so-called evolutionary approach is getting more and more popular in various branches of philosophy. Evolutionary explanations are often used in virtually every classical philosophical discipline. The structure of evolutionary explanations is examined and it is pointed out that only one sub-category of evolutionary explanations, namely, nonreductive, non-stipulated adaptation-explanation can be of any philosophical significance. I finish by examining which of the proposed philosophical arguments use this kind of evolutionary explanation. The answer will be disappointing for those who would like to think of philosophy as a branch of evolutionary biology. | |||||||||
| Keywords | Evolutionary explanation Adaptationalism Evolutionary psychology Evolutionary epistemology | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,875 |
| External links |
  Try with proxy. |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesWim J. van der Steen (1999). Methodological Problems in Evolutionary Biology. XII. Against Evolutionary Ethics. Acta Biotheoretica 47 (1).
Susan K. Mills & John H. Beatty (1979). The Propensity Interpretation of Fitness. Philosophy of Science 46 (2):263-286.
Anya Plutynski (2004). Explanation in Classical Population Genetics. Philosophy of Science 71 (5):1201-1214.
Dominic Murphy (2005). Can Evolution Explain Insanity? Biology and Philosophy 20 (4):745-766.
Russil Durrant & Brian D. Haig (2001). How to Pursue the Adaptationist Program in Psychology. Philosophical Psychology 14 (4):357 – 380.
André Ariew (1998). Are Probabilities Necessary for Evolutionary Explanations? Biology and Philosophy 13 (2).
Roger Sansom (2003). Constraining the Adaptationism Debate. Biology and Philosophy 18 (4).
Marko Barendregt & René Van Hezewijk (2005). Adaptive and Genomic Explanations of Human Behaviour: Might Evolutionary Psychology Contribute to Behavioural Genomics? Biology and Philosophy 20 (1):57-78.
Mary B. Williams (1986). The Logical Skeleton of Darwin's Historical Methodology. PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association 1986:514 - 521.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2009-01-28Total downloads23 ( #54,691 of 556,837 )Recent downloads (6 months)7 ( #11,112 of 556,837 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
