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The case for multiple realization in biology

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Abstract

Polger and Shapiro argue that their official recipe, a criterion for judging when the phenomenon of multiple realization (MR) exists, renders MR less widespread than its proponents have assumed. I argue that, although Polger and Shapiro’s criterion is a useful contribution, they arrive at their conclusion too hastily. Contrary to Polger and Shapiro, I claim that the phenomenon of multiple realization in the biological world, judged by their criterion, is not as scarce as they suggest. To show this, an updated official recipe, namely a multiple mechanistic realization thesis, integrating Polger and Shapiro’s criterion with a compositional conception of realization, is developed. Then, three examples of varied kinds are examined, showing that cases of MR are not so hard to find in the biological world.

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Notes

  1. Some philosophers may be skeptical of the talk of “levels”, e.g., Potochnik and McGill (2012). However, since the talk of levels has a well-defined meaning through the essay (i.e., compositional organization), and this essay’s argument does not hinge on the talk of levels, I will not address this dispute in the essay. I thank Jay Odenbaugh for letting me notice this dispute.

  2. Shapiro is not the first to have proposed a “causally relevant differences” criterion. Shoemaker makes a similar point in his causal theory of properties, stating that two properties are different when they contribute different powers to the individuals in which they are instantiated when under the same conditions (Shoemaker 1980; Cf. Gillett 2010, 169). Kim’s principle of causal individuation of kinds also asserts that “kinds in science are individuated on the basis of causal powers; that is, objects and events fall under a kind, or share a property, insofar as they have similar causal powers” (Kim 1992, 17).

  3. With respect to the conception of function, they say that “for some entities—properties, states, kinds, objects—being that entity is a matter of having a certain function” (Polger and Shapiro 2016, 23; original emphasis).

  4. Note that this is by no means denying that there might be other kind of realization in the biological world, e.g., functional realization. Functional realization may have different forms depending on what one means by function. For example, it might refer to the evolutionary history of the function through which that function was selected, or the causal process in which one thing is caused or causing other things, etc. For a discussion of functional realization see Polger (2004). However, given that concentrating on compositional realization is sufficient to show that the biological world is abundant in the phenomenon of multiple realization, this essay will not consider other potential kinds of realization.

  5. According to this theory, a property is individuated by the causal powers it contributes to the individual in which it is instantiated (Shoemaker 1980, 109–135).

  6. This definition draws heavily on Aizawa and Gillett’s account (2009a, b), though this account differs in two substantial ways: (1) it makes clear that realization in the biological world is mechanistic realization (i.e., a type of compositional realization); and (2) it attempts to integrate Polger and Shapiro’s criterion for MR.

  7. Note that properties and kinds are two different concepts. However, I sometimes use kinds to mean that something has a property \(P\) such that, due to having this property, it is classified into the kind \(X\). I thank Patrick McGivern for alerting me to the difference between them. Also notice that we here do not use the shorthand way of talking about realization (i.e., property \(P\) realizes property \(Q\)), but rather use the full-fledged way introduced in “The full-fledged form of realization” section (i.e., individual \(S_{i}\) as a realizer realizes property \(Q\)).

  8. “Have the similar property” should be understood as having the same property with different property-values, e.g., being crimson and being scarlet are different property-values of being red. I thank Jay Odenbaugh for helping me clarify this point.

  9. Piccinini and Maley also make this distinction (2014, 137–141).

  10. There is another reason for re-examining Polger and Shapiro’s example: it is meant to show that the examination of various examples in this essay does not proceed in a cherry-picking way, only selecting cases in favor of my position while ignoring cases speaking against my position.

  11. I thank an anonymous referee for suggesting me comparing the similarities and dissimilarities between the various normal ferrets and the similarities and dissimilarities between the rewired and normal ferrets.

  12. Note that the inter-level realization scenario described here differs from the intra-level causation scenario, because in the latter case a difference in effect can in principle be tracked back to a difference in cause and thus there does exist such a similarity-dissimilarity mapping. Exploring how the similarity-dissimilarity mapping does not arise in the non-causal, inter-level realization case, however, must wait for another occasion.

  13. Note that here convergent evolution constitutes an important source for MR to emerge. However, there might be other ways for MR to arise, e.g., parallel evolution, evolution by chance, divergent evolution, etc. For a discussion of how divergent evolution could modify the active sites of certain enzymes but the enzymes modified can still perform the same or similar function, see Gerlt and Babbitt (2001), Todd et al. (2001) and Bartlett et al. (2002). I thank an anonymous referee for letting me notice this point.

  14. For a discussion of the EC number, see Webb (1992).

  15. This is not denying that there might exist the extreme case of MR where things sharing no essential property at all could realize the same function. However, though this might be the case, this paper only needs to meet the more moderate goal that there exist middle ground cases where things that both share some essential properties and do not share some essential properties can realize the same function.

  16. Note that the concern here is not with the amount of transformational analogues but with the frequent occurrences of their associated functions. I think one anonymous referee for helping me clarify this.

  17. I thank an anonymous referee for alerting me to this possible line of objection.

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Acknowledgements

I am grateful to a number of friends and colleagues for feedback on early drafts of this work, including Pierrick Bourrat, Mischa Davenport, Stefan Gawronski, Paul Griffiths, Kate Lynch, Qiaoying Lu, John Matthewson, Patrick McGivern, Jay Odenbaugh, Wendy Parker, Arnaud Pocheville, Elena Walsh and two anonymous referees. Special thanks is due to Paul Griffiths and Arnaud Pocheville, who gave me extremely useful help and encouragement over the course of developing this work. Also thanks to the National Social Science Fund of China (Grant no.: 14ZDB018).

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    Wei Fang

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Fang, W. The case for multiple realization in biology. Biol Philos 33, 3 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-018-9613-7

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