Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-wq2xx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-19T20:28:01.816Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Species, Historicity, and Path Dependency

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Marc Ereshefsky
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper clarifies the historical nature of species by showing that species are path-dependent entities. A species’ identity is not determined by its intrinsic properties or its origin, but by its unique evolutionary path. Seeing that species are path-dependent entities has three implications: it shows that origin essentialism is mistaken, it rebuts two challenges to the species-are-historical-entities thesis, and it demonstrates that the identity of a species during speciation depends on future events.

Type
Biological Sciences
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 81 , Issue 5 , December 2014 , pp. 714 - 726
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

†

Thanks to John Beatty, Eric Desjardins, Travis Dumsday, Laura Franklin-Hall, Matt Haber, Makmiller Pedroso, Thomas Reydon, Elliott Sober, Derek Turner, and Joel Velasco for their help on this project. The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada provided financial support.

References

Beatty, John. 2006. “Replaying Life’s Tape.” Journal of Philosophy 103:336–62.10.5840/jphil2006103716CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blount, Zachary, Borland, Christina, and Lenski, Richard. 2008. “Historical Contingency and the Evolution of a Key Innovation in an Experimental Population of Escherichia coli.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 105:7899–7906.10.1073/pnas.0803151105CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyd, Richard. 1999. “Kinds, Complexity and Multiple Realization: Comments on Millikan’s ‘Historical Kinds and the Special Sciences.’” Philosophical Studies 95:67–98.10.1023/A:1004511407133CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyd, Richard 2010. “Homeostasis, Higher Taxa and Monophyly.” Philosophy of Science 77:686–701.10.1086/656551CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Briggs, David, and Walters, Stuart. 1997. Plant Variation and Evolution. 3rd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Coyne, Jerry, and Orr, H. Allen. 2004. Speciation. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer.Google Scholar
De Queiroz, Kevin. 2007. “Species Concepts and Species Delimitation.” Systematic Biology 56:879–86.10.1080/10635150701701083CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Desjardins, Eric. 2011. “Historicity and Experimental Evolution.” Biology and Philosophy 26:339–64.10.1007/s10539-011-9256-4CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Devitt, Michael. 2008. “Resurrecting Biological Essentialism.” Philosophy of Science 75:344–82.10.1086/593566CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elder, Crawford. 2008. “Biological Species Are Natural Kinds.” Southern Journal of Philosophy 46:339–62.10.1111/j.2041-6962.2008.tb00123.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ereshefsky, Marc. 1991. “Species, Higher Taxa, and the Units of Evolution.” Philosophy of Science 58:84–101.10.1086/289600CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Griffiths, Paul. 1999. “Squaring the Circle: Natural Kinds with Historical Essences.” In Species: New Interdisciplinary Essays, ed. Wilson, Robert, 209–28. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Hull, David. 1978. “A Matter of Individuality.” Philosophy of Science 45:335–60.10.1086/288811CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, Phillip. 1984. “Species.” Philosophy of Science 51:308–33.10.1086/289182CrossRefGoogle Scholar
LaPorte, Joseph. 2004. Natural Kinds and Conceptual Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Matthen, Mohan. 1998. “Biological Universals and the Nature of Fear.” Journal of Philosophy 95:105–32.10.2307/2564712CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mayr, Ernst. 1963. Animal Species and Evolution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.10.4159/harvard.9780674865327CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mayr, Ernst 1970. Populations, Species, and Evolution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
O’Hara, Robert. 1993. “Systematic Generalization, Historical Fate, and the Species Problem.” Systematic Biology 42 (3): 231–46.Google Scholar
Okasha, Samir. 2002. “Darwinian Metaphysics: Species and the Question of Essentialism.” Synthese 131:191–213.10.1023/A:1015731831011CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Podos, Jeffery. 2001. “Correlated Evolution of Morphology and Vocal Signal Structure in Darwin’s Finches.” Nature 400:185–87.Google Scholar
Ruse, Michael. 1987. “Biological Species: Natural Kinds, Individuals, or What?” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 38:225–42.10.1093/bjps/38.2.225CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schluter, Dolph. 2009. “Evidence for Ecological Speciation and Its Alternative.” Science 323:737–41.10.1126/science.1160006CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sober, Elliott. 1980. “Evolution, Population Thinking and Essentialism.” Philosophy of Science 47:350–83.10.1086/288942CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sober, Elliott 1984. “Sets, Species, and Natural Kinds.” Philosophy of Science 51:334–41.Google Scholar
Sober, Elliott 1994. Philosophy of Biology. 2nd ed. Boulder, CO: Westview.Google Scholar
Soltis, Douglas, Albert, Victor, Leebens-Mack, Jim, Bell, Charles D., Paterson, Andrew H., Zheng, Chunfang, Sankoff, David, dePamphilis, Claude W., Wall, P. Kerr, and Soltis, Pamela S.. 2009. “Polyploidy and Angiosperm Diversification.” American Journal of Botany 96:336–48.10.3732/ajb.0800079CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sterelny, Kim, and Griffiths, Paul. 1999. Sex and Death: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Biology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.10.7208/chicago/9780226178653.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wiley, Edward. 1981. Phylogenetics: The Theory and Practice of Phylogenetic Systematics. New York: Wiley-Interscience.Google Scholar