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Connecting Information with Scientific Method: Darwin’s Significance for Epistemology

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Abstract

Theories of epistemology make reference—via the perspective of an observer—to the structure of information transfer, which generates reality, of which the observer himself forms a part. It can be shown that any epistemological approach which implies the participation of tautological structural elements in the information transfer necessarily leads to an antinomy. Nevertheless, since the time of Aristotle the paradigm of mathematics—and thus tautological structure—has always been a hidden ingredient in the various concepts of knowledge acquisition or general theories of information transfer. We hold that Darwin’s Evolutionary Theory is the first scientific theory which consistently presupposes a non-tautological structure for the information transfer and, at the same time, keeps it strictly distinct from the tautological metric of scientific observation. The consequences of this technique—namely the dissociation of information from intentionality—have not yet been fully drawn.

Zusammenfassung

Erkenntnistheorien beziehen sich über die Perspektive eines Beobachters auf die Struktur des Informationstransfers, der die Realität erzeugt, von der der Beobachter selbst ein Element ist. Man kann zeigen, dass jeder erkenntnistheoretische Ansatz, der an diesem Transfer von Information tautologische Strukturelemente teilnehmen lässt, zu einer Antinomie führt. Dennoch bilden das Paradigma der Mathematik—und damit tautologische Strukturen—seit Aristoteles einen festen Bestandteil von Erkenntnistheorien und generell von Theorien des Informationstransfers. Unserer These zufolge ist Darwins Evolutionstheorie die erste wissenschaftliche Theorie, die den Informationstransfer ausschließlich als nicht-tautologische Struktur auffasst und diese zugleich strikt von der tautologischen Struktur der Beobachtungsmetrik getrennt hält. Die Konsequenzen für die Erkenntnistheorie—namentlich die Trennung von Information und Intentionalität- sind bisher nicht gezogen worden.

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Notes

  1. For clarification we can put this thesis into more abstract terms: Validity claims and proofs are based on identity claims of the kind A = A. Any such claims must be made on the basis of a set referential system. According to the Darwinian theory, by contrast, the identity of the feature A in an organism depends on the interpretation of A as A through a surrounding milieu. However, the milieu and the organism are not linked to one another by a shared referential system—i.e. the interaction between them is without determinable metric. This claim can be verified by the fact that the feature A of individuals belonging to the same species does not remain constant and invariable over time, but keeps evolving through contingent historical change. The true dilemma results from the fact that the validity claim of the Darwinian theory relies on scientific proof, i.e. on the verification of identity relations through the hand of an observer, which according to the theory should not be possible, since the observer himself is an element of this theory and thus should not be able to determine the proof conditions of his own indeterminateness. In the following, we will continue discussing this problem from different viewpoints.

  2. By using this term, we draw on the original Greek meaning of tautology—‘saying the same thing’. As shown by Netz (1999), the shaping of deduction in Greek mathematics relies on the principle of iterative operation, verbally as well as in practice—“the generality of proofs in Greek mathematics derives from repeatability” (ibid., 269). The “distinctive mark of Greek mathematics” (ibid., 58)—the “lettered diagram” (ibid., 12–67)—combines both: ‘saying the same thing’ and ‘doing the same thing’. The connection to the information transfer lies in the fact that the transfer of a specific structure (=the information content) between sender and receiver constitutes the establishment of an equivalence relation, which must—before the background of Greek mathematics—be thought of as a chain of iterative operations if meant to be unambiguous, i.e. structure-preserving. Tautology is therefore not only the basis for deductive proof but also the basis for structure-preserving information transfer. This connection can be exemplified as well as verified by the Aristotelian (Sect. 2) and Kantian (Sect. 3) epistemologies, and it can be shown to persist into modern information theories (see below).

  3. The basic tautological structure of the information transfer (cf. ftn. 2) requires—just as in the case of the mathematical proof—that a clear distinction be made between the iterative operations and the boundary conditions (information content). This separation of iterative operations and boundary conditions (information content) is necessary since it prevents any repercussions that the boundary conditions (information content) might otherwise have on the rules of the construction (code structure). That is, the two components are entirely distinct from one another. This means that it is not only possible to send different information contents by the same code structure but also conversely that the same information contents are transferable and realizable by different code structures (=principle of multiple realizability).

  4. Intentionality thus adds a new structural dimension to the information transfer: goal-oriented information processing. In this context, it is possible to develop the concept of an artificial distinction between transfer structure and information content. However, this does not mean that the ontological structure of the information transfer can be subsumed under the concept of mathematical information theory, since this would make it impossible to understand how the intentional information transfer acquires its independent information content. The neurobiologists Gerald M. Edelman and Giulio Tononi (2000) have characterized this problem as follows: “[A] number of applications of information theory in biology have been fraught with problems […] because at the heart of information theory as originally formulated lies the sensible notion of an external, intelligent observer who encodes messages using an alphabet of symbols. So-called information-processing views of the brain, however, have been severely criticized because they typically assume the existence in the world of previously defined information (begging the question of what information is) and often assume the existence of precise neural codes for which there is no evidence” (126f).

  5. The linkage problem arises when the position of a supervisor remains unoccupied in the case of a tautological information transfer. The structure of the tautological information transfer mandates the autonomy of code structure (iterative operations) and information content (cf. ftn. 2 and ftn. 3). At the same time, this requires the presence of a supervisor, who can mediate the transfer of information content onto some code structure. While in mathematics this supervisor position is filled by the imperative settings of the mathematician, and, likewise, in interpersonal information transfer by the intentional agreement between sender and receiver, it remains unoccupied in the case of natural information transfer (this holds true even if one side of the transfer is said to be intentional). However, with the supervisor role unoccupied, the relational gap between tautological transfer structures and information content cannot be bridged, and we are faced with a linkage problem. If adhering to the proposition that information exists—which any epistemological theory must do –, then consequently the linkage problem can only be solved by abandoning the separation of tautological structure and information content. In that case, the transfer of information runs on a non-tautological basis, and hereby the principle of clarity and multiple realizability must be abandoned as well. The relationship between information and transfer structure is then implicitly determined by historical-contingent constellations, where repeatability in the strict sense does not exist (=non-tautological).

  6. A similar conclusion has already been drawn by G.E.R. Lloyd (1996, 63f): “[T]he difference between the artefact model and the vitalist one is not one simply of grades of complexity, […] but one of the nature of the analysis of matter to be given: is it, or is it not, dependent on the sunolon or the form? […] [T]he unity of this theory of matter […] is under extreme strain in Aristotle himself.” Consequently, and in opposition to Gotthelf, Kullmann and Lennox, Lloyd concludes that Aristotle could ultimately not have thought of the deductive method of his Analytica as strict method for the biological natural sciences (cf. Lloyd 1996, 1–6, as well as the discussion in Lennox 2001, 4–6). However, according to our analysis, the findings of Lloyd, on the one hand, and Gotthelf, Kullmann and Lennox, on the other, do in fact support each other: if Aristotle applies the method from the Analytica posteriora with respect to the characteristics of natural kinds, as demonstrated in the works by Gotthelf, Kullmann and Lennox, that is, if he postulates a nexus between differentia and causa after the fashion of mathematics, which, at the same time, is an information to be transferred, then this must necessarily lead to the inconsistency identified by Lloyd: the operational carrier must, on the one hand, be a medium of storage, which is strictly specific to the essential relations of a form; on the other hand, however, as a medium of transfer, it must at the same time be entirely neutral to the essential forms and be able to receive and transmit all sorts of relations.

  7. In the following, we cite the Critique of Pure Reason as KrV, /A in accordance with the original editions. The abbreviation AA refers to the Academy Edition Kant (1902) of the Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Kant (1929 ) refers to the translation of KrV by N. Kemp Smith. Kant (1914 ) refers to the translation of KU by J.H. Bernard (cf. References).

  8. An extended discussion of this point is given in Kuhle and Kuhle (2009).

  9. Henrich (1989) has shown that Kant’s Transcendental Deduction, which is supposed to prove the possession of a system of objectively valid operations of knowledge a priori, is oriented towards the methodology of contemporary juridical ‘deduction writings’. The juridical deduction was exclusively focused on justifying a claim about the legitimacy of a possession or a usage by means of explaining its origin, i.e. by referring to a historical factum like a documented last will (ibid., 34f). Even if the quaestio facti could not be answered completely the quaestio juris could be settled decisively as long as the crucial factual aspects could be given (ibid., 36). For Kant, apparently, mathematics represents such a crucial factum legitimizing the possession claim regarding the faculty of synthetic judgments a priori: “[H]ence, pure mathematics presents itself, like a giant, as a means of proving the reality of a knowledge only derived by pure reason”, and whose “claims of legitimacy are demonstrated through its own existence” (Fortschr., AA 20, 323).

  10. Friedman (1992) points out that Kant’s conception of mathematics too is based on the principle of “constructive iterability that underlies the proof-procedure of Euclid’s geometry” (ibid., 71).

  11. Kant himself draws the analogy between the operations of the pure understanding a priori and the principle of Aristotelian entelechy by characterizing its mode of action “as [if] it were a system of the epigenesis of pure reason” (KrV, B 167, 16–17). Kant’s notion of epigenesis draws on the contemporary debate in biology, and except for some reservations concurs with the Neo-Aristotelian theory by Harvey and C.F. Wolff (up until the second edition of the KrV) and later (in the KU) with that of Blumenbach (cf. Sloan 2002; Zammito 2007). As was made explicit by Ingensiep (1994, 2006), Kant draws this analogy to emphasize a “clear structural correlation”: “As, accordingly to the epigenesis theory, unformed inorganic matter gets transformed under the direction of a ‘purposive endowment’ into something entirely new via the Bildungstrieb and an organism is produced, so via the categories and the raw material of sensibility empirical knowledge is ‘produced’. The organizing productivity, however, lies entirely on the side of categorizing understanding” (ibid., 2006, 70; 1994, 387). Ingensiep is surely right in his interpretation that Kant draws the analogy purely for the sake of structural similarities, without having any ontological implications in mind (cf. discussion in Ingensiep 2006, 68–73). However, this assumption made by Ingensiep does not pose a contradiction to the position held by Zammito (2007): “We have reason to suspect that Kant—however clear he may have been about what he wanted to accomplish in the transcendental deduction—may not have grasped clearly what he was playing with in the analogy to epigenesis” (ibid., 62). In this context, Zammito goes on to demonstrate that “[e]pigenesis incites a fundamental erosion of Kant’s boundary between the constitutive and the regulative, between the transcendental and the empirical: a naturalism beyond anything Kant could countenance, though his own thought carried him there” (ibid., 65). The reason, however, why Kant nevertheless insisted on the analogy to the principle of epigenesis, no matter how problematic for him in other respects, was that it provided him in a mirror-symmetric fashion with a solution to the very same structural linkage problem that also surfaced in the Aristotelian entelechy (cf. below, ftn. 15).

  12. Cf. Kant’s rejection of a “preformation system”, KrV, B 167–8.

  13. Mathieu (1989) has pointed to this problem in the context of Kant’s 1. introduction to the KU, where mention is made of a technique of nature. Through this expression, Mathieu argues, “the fundamental principle of the entire Transcendental Philosophy becomes threatened, because thereby an interdependency within nature is being assumed, which does not result from the spontaneity of the pure understanding. We discover the purpose of nature as a constellation of interdependent relationships, which we have not ourselves ‘imposed’ onto nature” (ibid., 243). Kant continued to deal with this difficulty in his Opus postumum and sought to resolve the problem by arguing in the direction of intentionalism (cf. Mathieu 1989, 220–238). Here, too, however, statements are repeatedly made which underline the acute difficulty of the problem in hand: “The possibility of an organic body can neither be proved nor postulated, even though it is a factum” (OP, AA 22, 481,8); “were it not for the experience providing us with various examples, the possibility of such < organic bodies > would have to be rejected by each and everyone as a pure fantasy of the Count of Palagonia” (OP, AA 22, 383,6). As pointed out by Mathieu, however, the entire criticism breaks down at the very moment that the interdependent relationships of the organic bodies are taken as a factum (Mathieu 1989, 212); in the OP, too, this problem remains unsolved (ibid., 279).

  14. With this solution Kant faces a serious dilemma, because he moves problematically close to the Leibnizian monadology (in his analysis of Kant’s conception of “Wechselwirkung”, Köchy (2004) has pointed out the basic structural similarity between the problems and solutions discussed by Kant and Leibniz). The relationship between the different perspectives of an intellectus archaetypus and intellectus ectypus is already anticipated by Leibniz through the metaphor of a (divine) Ichnographia and (human) Scenographia, respectively (cf. Widmaier 1983). For Leibniz the integration of the different perspectives is unproblematic, since he presupposes the existence of a divine supervisor, who is able to recognize, select and realize the Ordo Optimus Substantiarum, where the different perspectives converge (cf. Widmaier 1983, 829). For Kant’s transcendental philosophical approach, on the other hand, this solution is unacceptable. At the same time, however, it becomes clear that Kant has no choice—not just here but also in his late work (Opus postumum) in context with the Ether deduction—but to draw on Leibnizian solutions if he wants to make his epistemological constructions “work” (cf. Carrier 1991; Waschkies 1991; cf. also below, ftn. 15).

  15. It is interesting to note that in his late work Opus postumum even Kant himself speaks of an unbridged gap in his transcendental philosophy (cf. Förster 2000, 4–74). The context here is the transition from general laws of nature to specific laws, i.e. those which do not merely have formal character but already include some empirical information content. Consequently, the problem faced by the KU, which seemed to be restricted to the organic phenomena alone, turns out to be a general problem of all specific laws, including the laws of physics (cf. Wahsner 2009). Hence, according to our own interpretation, Kant himself already identifies the linkage problem in his OP (cf. ftn. 5). The basic tautological structure of the general laws of nature requires that they must not contain any specific information contents. By way of the general laws of nature (i.e. the categories of pure understanding), the causal-mechanistic relationship between all single experiences (the raw material of sensibility) is being established. These specific information contents are necessarily contingent in relation to the form of their categorial conceptualization. The specific laws of the information content can thus never be derived directly from the causal-mechanistic category, but always require the synthesis by means of a completely different systematic correlation concept—namely that of intentional goal orientation (teleological judgment). Kant is therefore forced to fill the position of the supervisor through the introduction of the structure of an intellectus archaetypus (cf. Lehmann 1939, 66–74; see also Köchy 2004, 95/96). Nevertheless, while in the KU this structure was still treated as being merely a regulative idea, it must be accepted as constitutive idea in the OP (Ether proof; cf. Förster 2000, 82–87), and must furthermore be implemented unilaterally on the side of the receiver as a form of Selbstsetzung (self-positing) (cf. Lehmann 1939, 84–99; Förster 2000, 101–116; cf. above, ftn. 14). This however is impossible and leads in a mirror-symmetric fashion to the same contradictions surfacing in the Aristotelian entelechy, where the entire structure for the information transfer has been implemented on the side of the sender (cf. Sect. 2 and ftn. 11). According to Förster (2000, 164–174), Kant ultimately opts for a pragmatic solution with his Selbstsetzungslehre (self-positing theory); pragmatic in the sense of Wittgenstein. This however, if true, would amount to a total self-destruction of Transcendental Philosophy, since a consistently executed pragmatism is incompatible with the apodictic nature of a system of operations of the pure understanding a priori. Despite all difference in most other respects, Kant would presumably have preferred to concur with Fodor (2008a) in “that the mind’s main concern is not acting but thinking, and that paradigmatic thinking is directed to ascertaining truths. What minds do is think about things” (ibid., 8), and consequently Fodor concludes that “pragmatism is perhaps the worst idea that philosophy ever had” (ibid., 9). However, even Fodor did not realize that Darwin’s methodological technique implicitly carries with it the solution for the discussed epistemological problem (cf. ftn. 17)—which in the following we wish to demonstrate.

  16. Ernst Mayr (1985) summarised this point as follows: “Natural selection represents not only the rejection of any finalistic causes that may have a supernatural origin, but it rejects any and all determinism in the organic world.” (ibid., 770). This however does not mean that Darwin abandons the principle of the causal nexus, but—as we will show in the following—it means that in his technique the causal nexus no longer possesses a unified referential system. According to the causal-mechanistic “law” of natural selection, an information content as complementary causal component is needed with which this mechanism can be “loaded”. This component is not derivable from the mechanism itself (cf. ftn. 3). De facto Darwin’s Evolutionary Theory even posits that the mechanism of Natural Selection has developed historically from the information contents. Thus, if one really wanted a causal derivation from one single referential system, then consequently this system would also have to include the information content as a causal component—this however would be the equivalent to the concept of a Kantian intellectus archaetypus (or a Leibnizian divine Ichnographia; cf. ftn. 14). Darwin evades this problem by positing two independent referential systems for observing only one empirical phenomenon.

  17. Fodor’s (2008b) claim of a “tension between Darwinism and theories that are intensional” (ibid., 1) is of interest here. Fodor’s critique holds perfectly true under the assumption that Darwinism works with the premise of a tautological information structure. However, according to our interpretation, Darwin’s Theory implies a non-tautological information transfer which produces intensional contexts without being intentional. On the contrary then, it is extensionality, i.e. the existence of contexts where the tautological substitution of coextensional expressions is valid, which is necessarily tied up with intentionality. And in this case Fodor’s critique of Darwinism becomes obsolete (more of this below).

  18. Cf. Ernst Mayr (1985, 760): “Virtually all the proofs for evolution listed by Darwin in the Origin actually consist of evidence for common descent”.

  19. Cf. Ernst Mayr (1985, 757): “[O]rganic evolution consists of two essentially independent processes, transformation in time and diversification in (ecological and geographical) space. The two processes require a minimum of two entirely independent and very different theories”.

  20. In this context, one of our (anonymous) referees points out the following: “Darwin however writes that ‘the law of the Conditions of Existence is the higher law; as it includes, through the inheritance of former adaptations, that of Unity of Type’ (206). So according to him there is a connection between these laws.” This point we do not argue against. With both laws, Conditions of Existence and Unity of Type, Darwin makes reference to the famous debate between Georges Cuvier and Etienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire in the year 1830 (cf. Richards 2009, 178–179). While Cuvier and Geoffroy assumed that their respective positions were incompatible with one another, Darwin was able to demonstrate that the empirical findings under the different perspectives could in both cases be explained through the mechanism of descent with modification by means of Natural Selection. This however does not mean that the two observational perspectives themselves are compatible with one another! Instead, Darwin adhered to a strict separation between the two perspectives by drawing on two completely different metrical referential systems (cf. Sect. 5). The crucial point is that the two referential systems are incommensurable with one another: that which under the perspective of Unity of Type appears as a rule-based characteristic of organisms constitutes some random variable under the perspective of Conditions of Existence. The deeper cause for this incompatibility lies in a methodological necessity: the non-tautological information transfer does not involve a supervisor position which could instruct the separation between law-based structure and information content (cf. ftn. 5); however, scientific observation and proof must be based on a tautological metric, i.e. on the distinction between law-based structure on the one hand and contingent information content on the other (cf. ftn. 2 and ftn. 3); consequently, that which was excluded as contingent information content in the first step, must by necessity be made subject to a tautological metric in a second step so as to enable one to explain what de facto became an event. As a result, however, it is impossible to observe through both referential systems at one and the same time (cf. ftn. 21).

  21. The separation of proof for rule and proof for cause results from the fact that a non-tautological information transfer must be scientifically observed and explained by way of a tautological metric. Since the proof for rule-based structures depends on the identification of identity relations (cf. ftn. 2), it is necessary that a tautological metric be imposed on the non-tautological process. This application procedure requires that the information contents be extracted as boundary conditions which do not have any effect on the rule-based structure (cf ftn. 3). If the basic premise were that the real information transfer itself is tautological in structure, the mere proof of a rule would be sufficient to solve the problem, since in such a case the proof for rule would be identical to the proof for cause—the intentional goal orientation. In Aristotle, the referential system for this rule is the functional unity of form; in Kant, it is the systematic unity of the operations of the pure understanding a priori. As has been demonstrated, however, both these assumptions lead to an irresolvable linkage problem (cf. ftn. 5), namely a gap between tautological metric and information contents (cf. ftn. 15). The premise of a non-tautological information transfer, on the other hand, deliberately takes into account the absence of a supervisor position (cf. ftn. 5). Here, the cause for the rule can only be found in those contingent boundary conditions (information contents) that had to be excluded in the first step. In this context, the scientific observation of the cause for the rule requires a second independent tautological metric through which the information contents themselves can be observed with regard to their rule-based structure (cf. ftn. 20). In the case of a non-tautological information transfer the proof for the existence of a rule can on principle not coincide with the proof for its cause (cf. ftn. 16). A shared identity of both referential systems could only be achieved if we were dealing with a reality structure that was created by a Kantian intellectus archaetypus (cf. Sect. 3). However, this is not possible if we stand by the assumption that the scientific observer is prone to make mistakes, i.e. if we acknowledge that the observer’s thinking and the object of his thinking are not correlated a priori by means of a common referential system (cf. ftn. 1).

  22. If human rationality is to be studied as evolutionary product, it must be understood as a pragmatic problem solving strategy in concrete situations, as is the case for all other organisms; i.e. the aspect of systematic-tautological judgment must be excluded here in order to establish comparability to non-human forms of rationality (Hurley & Nudds 2006; Platt et al. 2007). In this context there is also the mediating idea of folk logic as a kind of evolutionary rationality special to humans (Sterelny 2006).

  23. See also the discussion above (Sect. 2).

  24. In axiomatic-deductive mathematics, the noose of a self-referential negation of the non-tautological information transfer is pulled together most tightly—it is never really closed, but it is only closed relative to its premises, which cannot be integrated into the range of proof; the main point however is that the mathematical judgment is intentionally separated from the transfer of empirical information.

  25. Cf. footnote 1.

  26. Cf. footnote 20.

  27. Cf. footnote 21.

  28. It is interesting to note in this context that in the Origin Darwin repeatedly presents his reflections in the form of thought experiments. Therein, the different components of his theory are reduced to a functional model serving as concrete example (e.g. wolves, 90–91; eye, 186–187; bumble bees, 73–74) by which to examine the functional relations supposedly existing in the real evolutionary process. However, demonstrated by James G. Lennox (1991b), Darwin does not use these thought experiments as arguments for the truth of his theory—rather, they are “intended as tests, not of the truth of the statements comprising the theory, but of the explanatory potential of the theory” (ibid., 223). The presentation of proof for biological evolution as an empirical fact is accomplished by way of a different line of argumentation.

  29. Smith is of the opinion that a true analogy exists between the origin of information in the DNA and in a Morse code: “In biology, the coder is natural selection” (ibid., 179). Hence, according to Smith, the principle of multiple realizability also applies in biology (ibid., 179). However, if genes function as symbols-“in that there is no necessary connection between their form (sequence) and their effects” (ibid., 177) –, their extreme conservatism becomes a problem, as for example in the case of the regulatory gene for the induction of the eye development, which has been preserved in Drosophila and Mucus from a common ancestor for about 500 million years (ibid., 188). De facto this conservatism is exactly one of those indicators continuously mentioned by Darwin: it indicates the increasing alienation of a processual historical tradition, which gives proof to the Community of Descent and which, due to the indistinguishability of transfer structure and information content, has to be expected in a non-tautological information transfer. Hence, conservatism is the opposite to spontaneous intentional new creation, which can constantly express its goals by new arbitrary symbols, thereby representing the principle of multiple realizability. By ignoring the contradiction that the process of biological evolution supposedly draws on an intentional tautological transfer structure, Smith comes to the following conclusion: “Intelligent design and natural selection produce similar results. One justification for this view is that programs designed by humans to produce a result are similar to, and may be indistinguishable from, programs generated by mindless selection” (ibid., 193–194). If this were so, Darwin’s entire argumentation in the Origin of Species would indeed be pointless, since it is continuously based on the assumption that there are criteria according to which structures generated through intentionality (=Intelligent Design; Creationism) can be objectively distinguished from structures of a non-intentional evolution through Natural selection!

  30. In this context, Hodge (2009) also reconstructs that Darwin implicitly abandoned his plan from 1837/38 to get through to the “lawful causes of change” (ibid., 54) while working on the Origin (ibid., 68).

  31. The fact that gravitation depends on a historical, singular decision whose causal circumstances can be observed empirically has only in our times become a point of scientific interest and technical possibility (Randall 2005).

  32. Given the premise of a non-tautological (i.e. intensional) information structure there can be no clear difference between historical explanation and covering law explanations, as Fodor (2008b, 22) claims. Rather, under this premise, all scientific explanations must be historical, covering law explanations being only an incomplete part of them, i.e. one of the two independent observational metrics. And as Darwin has shown, these tautological metrics should not be mistaken as representatives of the information structure, which is being observed with their help. As Fodor might say: ‘you shouldn’t let your epistemology do your metaphysics’—Darwin at least didn’t.

  33. Cf. footnote 21.

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Acknowledgment

We are grateful to Anneliese Kuhle (Department of English Philology, Freie Universität Berlin) for translating the text into English. We also wish to express our thanks to two anonymous referees for their careful commentaries and helpful critical remarks.

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Kuhle, M., Kuhle, S. Connecting Information with Scientific Method: Darwin’s Significance for Epistemology. J Gen Philos Sci 41, 333–357 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10838-010-9140-y

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