Samuel Butler, a contemporary critic of Charles Darwin, proffered an alternative, vitalistic account of evolution. At the same time, he put into question all modern naturalistic treatments of this fundamental idea which presuppose that evolution is mainly a scientific problem. On the contrary, Butler in effect insists, this extremely vague idea calls for not an `explanation' but rather a fairly comprehensive, plausible story that helps elucidate an inherently complex idea. Butler can thus be read as outlining an anthropomorphic (...) class='Hi'>metaphorics that evokes a living Cosmos wherein it might be possible to do justice to the problem which Darwin left unresolved---the problem of heredity. In this picture of the Cosmos Butler links the fundamental notion of organization not to the allegedly universal and immutable `laws of nature,' as the moderns would have it, but rather to dynamically evolving relationships between only more or less stable habits. The variations in extant habits that emergence elicits are moreover the products of quasi-intelligent responses to new challenges from the environment. For Butler follows Lamarck in holding that all organisms possess powers capable of responding to felt needs and/or desires to make alterations in the habits (or instincts) that characterize their modes of existence. He thus in the end effectively bequeaths to his readers a challenge to extend and amplify, if possible, his outline of a promising metaphysical imaginary that can take into account some highly unorthodox conjectures. Normal 0 false false false EN-AU X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";}. (shrink)

Samuel Butler, a contemporary critic of Charles Darwin, proffered an alternative, vitalistic account of evolution. At the same time, he put into question all modern naturalistic treatments of this fundamental idea which presuppose that evolution is mainly a scientific problem. On the contrary, Butler in effect insists, this extremely vague idea calls for not an `explanation' but rather a fairly comprehensive, plausible story that helps elucidate an inherently complex idea. Butler can thus be read as outlining an anthropomorphic (...) class='Hi'>metaphorics that evokes a living Cosmos wherein it might be possible to do justice to the problem which Darwin left unresolved---the problem of heredity. In this picture of the Cosmos Butler links the fundamental notion of organization not to the allegedly universal and immutable `laws of nature,' as the moderns would have it, but rather to dynamically evolving relationships between only more or less stable habits. The variations in extant habits that emergence elicits are moreover the products of quasi-intelligent responses to new challenges from the environment. For Butler follows Lamarck in holding that all organisms possess powers capable of responding to felt needs and/or desires to make alterations in the habits that characterize their modes of existence. He thus in the end effectively bequeaths to his readers a challenge to extend and amplify, if possible, his outline of a promising metaphysical imaginary that can take into account some highly unorthodox conjectures. (shrink)

Butler’s idea of evolution was developed over the publication of four books, several articles and essays between 1863 and 1890. These publications, although never achieving the success expected by Butler, proposed a psychological elaboration of evolution, called ‘unconscious memory’. This was strongly in contrast with the materialistic approach suggested by Darwin’s natural selection. Starting with a historical introduction, this paper aspires to ascertain the logic, meaning and significance of Butler’s idea of ‘unconscious memory’ in the post-Darwinian physiological and psychological Pan-European (...) discussion. Particular attention is devoted to demonstrating that Butler was not only a populariser of science but also an active protagonist in the late Victorian psychological debate. (shrink)

In his theory of evolution, Darwin recognized that the conditions of life play a role in the generation of hereditary variations, as well as in their selection. However, as evolutionary theory was developed further, heredity became identified with genetics, and variation was seen in terms of combinations of randomly generated gene mutations. We argue that this view is now changing, because it is clear that a notion of hereditary variation that is based solely on randomly varying genes that are unaffected (...) by developmental conditions is an inadequate basis for evolutionary theories. Such a view not only fails to provide satisfying explanations of many evolutionary phenomena, it also makes assumptions that are not consistent with the data that are emerging from disciplines ranging from molecular biology to cultural studies. These data show that the genome is far more responsive to the environment than previously thought, and that not all transmissible variation is underlain by genetic differences. In Evolution in Four Dimensions (2005) we identify four types of inheritance (genetic, epigenetic, behavioral, and symbol-based), each of which can provide variations on which natural selection will act. Some of these variations arise in response to developmental conditions, so there are Lamarckian aspects to evolution. We argue that a better insight into evolutionary processes will result from recognizing that transmitted variations that are not based on DNA differences have played a role. This is particularly true for understanding the evolution of human behavior, where all four dimensions of heredity have been important. (shrink)

Nelson and Winter’s An Evolutionary Theory of Economic Change (1982) was the foundational work of what has become the thriving sub-discipline of evolutionary economics. In attempting to develop an alternative to neoclassical economics, the authors looked to borrow basic ideas from biology, in particular a concept of economic “natural selection.” However, the evolutionary models they construct in their seminal work are in many respects quite different from the models of evolutionary biology. There is no reproduction in any usual sense, “mutation” (...) is directed as opposed to blind, and there is no meaningful distinction between phenotype and genotype. Despite these substantial departures from the conceptions of evolutionary biology, I argue that the “evolutionary” economics of Nelson and Winter is indeed a legitimate extension of Darwinian evolutionary principles to a novel domain, and that the traditional conception of evolution by natural selection must be revised. The novel features of evolutionary economics models reflect the distinctive theoretical requirements faced by economists. I further contend that reproduction, heredity, blind variation, and the genotype/phenotype distinction are all inessential to evolutionary theory, and that their role in evolutionary biology is a domain-specific feature of biological theory. (shrink)

To some, a misguided Lamarckian and a fraud, to others a martyr in the fight against Darwinism, the Viennese zoologist Paul Kammerer (1880-1926) remains one of the most controversial scientists of the early 20th century. Here his work is reconsidered in light of turn-of-the-century problems in evolutionary theory and experimental methodology, as seen from Kammerer's perspective in Vienna. Kammerer emerges not as an opponent of Darwinism, but as one would-be modernizer of the 19th-century theory, which had included a role for (...) the inheritance of acquired characteristics. Kammerer attempted a synthesis of Darwinism with genetics and the chromosome theory, while retaining the modifying effects of the environment as the main source of favorable variation, and he developed his program of experimentation to support it. Kammerer never had a regular university position, but worked at a private experimental laboratory, with sidelines as a teacher and a popular writer and lecturer. On the lecture circuit he held forth on the significance of his science for understanding and furthering cultural evolution and he satisfied his passion for the arts and performance. In his dual career as researcher and popularizer, he did not always follow academic convention. In the contentious and rapidly changing fields of heredity and evolution, some of his stances and practices, as well as his outsider status and part-Jewish background, aroused suspicion and set the stage for the scandal that ended his career and prompted his suicide. (shrink)

In the past 150 years there have been many attempts to draw parallels between cultural and biological evolution. Most of these attempts were flawed due to lack of knowledge and false ideas about evolution. In recent decades these shortcomings have been cleared away, thus triggering a renewed interest in the subject. This paper offers a critical survey of the main issues and arguments in that discussion. The paper starts with an explication of the Darwinian algorithm of evolution. It is argued (...) that this ‘formula’ is substrate-neutral, which means that biological evolution might not be the only Darwinian process. Other dynamic systems could evolve as well provided that certain conditions are met. In the case of human culture this seems to be the case. The paper then focuses on the notion of niche construction. It is argued that niche construction plays a crucial role in human evolution because it has altered the sources of natural selection and thus the path of evolution. Next two approaches to cultural evolution are discussed: sociobiology and memetics. I will argue that both approaches have flaws because they either underestimate the influence of culture or they stretch analogies too far. Finally two common objections against the idea of cultural evolution are addressed: Lamarckian inheritance and the issue of guided variation. I will argue that although cultural evolution differs from biological evolution in several respects, these discrepancies do not jeopardize the claim that cultural evolution is essentially Darwinian. (shrink)

In modern times, Lamarck's view of evolution, based on inheritance of acquired traits has been superseded by neo-Darwinism, based on random DNA mutations. This article begins with a series of observations suggesting that Lamarckian inheritance is in fact operative throughout Nature. I then launch into a discussion of human intelligence that is the most important feature of human evolution that cannot be easily explained by mutational selection. Thus, we are smarter than demanded by our evolutionary experience as hunter-gatherers. The difficulty (...) lies in the inability of neo-Darwinism to satisfactorily answer the following question: How can a large energy-costly set of genes, each member of which has little apparent benefit when first created individually, all gather into a permanent existence within a short time period in each and every member of a small population who had a low reproductive output, a low rate of beneficial mutations, and a low level of genetic contact? The article concludes with a speculative but far-reaching epigenetic theory of intelligence that does not require DNA mutation as the exclusive source of evolutionary change. Instead, cranial feedback relating brain chemistry, as affected by brain activity including education, with the genome. When it comes to the fast rate of evolution, and the dissemination of the intelligence trait worldwide, cranial feedback could make all the difference. (shrink)

This article re-contextualizes Sigmund Freud's interest in the idea of the inheritance of acquired characteristics in terms of the socio-political connotations of Lamarckism and Darwinism in the 1930s and 1950s. Many scholars have speculated as to why Freud continued to insist on a supposedly outmoded theory of evolution in the 1930s even as he was aware that it was no longer tenable. While Freud's initial interest in the inheritance of phylogenetic memory was not necessarily politically motivated, his refusal to abandon (...) this theory in the 1930s must be understood in terms of wider debates, especially regarding the position of the Jewish people in Germany and Austria. Freud became uneasy about the inheritance of memory not because it was scientifically disproven, but because it had become politically charged and suspiciously regarded by the Nazis as Bolshevik and Jewish. Where Freud seemed to use the idea of inherited memory as a way of universalizing his theory beyond the individual cultural milieu of his mostly Jewish patients, such a notion of universal science itself became politically charged and identified as particularly Jewish. The vexed and speculative interpretations of Freud's Lamarckism are situated as part of a larger post-War cultural reaction against Communism on the one hand (particularly in the 1950s when Lamarckism was associated with the failures of Lysenko), and on the other hand, against any scientific concepts of race in the wake of World War II. (shrink)

Samuel Butler foi um dos primeiros autores a compreender que o evolucionismo de Darwin precisa de ser completado com urna reflexão sobre a evolução das máquinas. Esta comunicação procura mostrar como a reflexão sobre a evolução das máquinas é importante para compreender um aspecto difícil da teona da evolução de Darwin: a evolução da mente senciente. Sāo os seguintes os aspectos a abordar nesta comunicação: a dificuldade em distinguir entre humano e máquina; a consciência surge na natureza a partir (...) de matenais nāo nobres; a consciência existe na natureza como resultado da evolução; a consciencia humana é produzida por sistemas simples do cérebro; os seres humanos descendem de seres que nāo possuíam consciência; o ser humano no futuro poderá vir a ser um parasita da máquina e poderá viver em simbiose com ela; o espíúto do ser humano onginou-se devido a uma velha associacão com as máquinas; a definiçāo de máquina está incluída na definição da natureza física do homem; a diferença entre as máquinas actuais e o ser humano é mais de grau do que de tipo. Esta comunicação termina com a apresentação termina o de uma conjectura a favor de uma noção de mente alargada. É esta: se existe uma evoluçāo paralela de autómatos e de seres orgânicos desde o início da vida na Terra e se os organismos biológicos evoluem lado a lado com próteses mecánicas e é previsível que existam no futuro formas de simbiose entre humanos e máquinas, segue-se que a mente humana deverá ser entendida num sentido mais alargado do que o habitual. Samuel Butler was one of the first authors that understood that Darwin's evolutionism needs to be completed with a reflection about the evolution of mechanical devices. This paper tries to show that a reflection about the evolution of machines is important to understand a difficult aspect of Darwin's theory of evolution, namely the evolution of the conscious mind. This paper presents the following themes: the utter difficulty of making a distinction between what is human and what is a machine; human consciousness seems to have its origins in very common materials; consciousness exists in nature as a result of evolution; consciousness is a final product of sundries systems in the brain; human beings descend from beings without consciousness; it is possible that the human being will come to be a parasite of the future machines and that there will be some form of symbiosis between humans and machines; the mind of human beings has evolved from a very old association with machines; the very definition of the physical nature of man needs to include the notion of 'machine'; there is a difference of degree between actual machines and human beings and no difference of type. This paper ends with a conjecture in favor of a notion of an extended mind. If there is a parallel evolution of automata and organic beings since the very beginning of life on Earth and if biological organisms evolve side by side mechanical prosthetic devices and if it is foreseeable that in the future there will be symbiosis between humans and machines, it follows that human mind should be understood in a broader sense than what is usual, a sense of an extended mind. (shrink)

William Keith Brooks was an American zoologist at Johns Hopkins University from 1876 until his death in 1908. Over the course of his career, Brooks staunchly defended Darwinism, arguing for the centrality of natural selection in evolutionary theory at a time when alternative theories, such as neo-Lamarckism, grew prominent in American biology. In his book The Law of Heredity, Brooks addressed problems raised by Darwin’s theory of pangenesis. In modifying and developing Darwin’s pangenesis, Brooks proposed a new theory of heredity (...) that sought to avoid the pitfalls of Darwin’s hypothesis. In so doing he strengthened Darwin’s theory of natural selection by undermining arguments for the inheritance of acquired characteristics. In later attacks on neo-Lamarckism, Brooks consistently defended Darwin’s theory of natural selection on logical grounds, continued to challenge the idea of the inheritance of acquired characteristics, and argued that natural selection best explained a wide range of adaptations. Finally, he critiqued Galton’s statistical view of heredity and argued that Galton had resurrected an outmoded typological concept of species, one which Darwin and other naturalists had shown to be incorrect. Brooks’s ideas resemble the “biological species concept” of the twentieth century, as developed by evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr and others. The late-nineteenth century was not a period of total “eclipse” of Darwinism, as biologists and historians have hitherto seen it. Although the “Modern Synthesis” refers to the reconciliation of post-Mendelian genetics with evolution by natural selection, we might adjust our understanding of how the synthesis developed by seeing it as the culmination of a longer discussion that extends back to the late-nineteenth century. (shrink)

Ideas about heredity and evolution are undergoing a revolutionary change. New findings in molecular biology challenge the gene-centered version of Darwinian theory according to which adaptation occurs only through natural selection of chance DNA variations. In Evolution in Four Dimensions, Eva Jablonka and Marion Lamb argue that there is more to heredity than genes. They trace four "dimensions" in evolution -- four inheritance systems that play a role in evolution: genetic, epigenetic, behavioral, and symbolic. These systems, they argue, can all (...) provide variations on which natural selection can act. Evolution in Four Dimensions offers a richer, more complex view of evolution than the gene-based, one-dimensional view held by many today. The new synthesis advanced by Jablonka and Lamb makes clear that induced and acquired changes also play a role in evolution.After discussing each of the four inheritance systems in detail, Jablonka and Lamb "put Humpty Dumpty together again" by showing how all of these systems interact. They consider how each may have originated and guided evolutionary history and they discuss the social and philosophical implications of the four-dimensional view of evolution. Each chapter ends with a dialogue in which the authors engage the contrarieties of the fictional "I.M.," or Ifcha Mistabra -- Aramaic for "the opposite conjecture" -- refining their arguments against I.M.'s vigorous counterarguments. The lucid and accessible text is accompanied by artist-physician Anna Zeligowski's lively drawings, which humorously and effectively illustrate the authors' points. (shrink)

Vague predicates, those that exhibit borderline cases, pose a persistent problem for philosophers and logicians. Although they are ubiquitous in natural language, when used in a logical context, vague predicates lead to contradiction. This paper will address a question that is intimately related to this problem. Given their inherent imprecision, why do vague predicates arise in the first place? I discuss a variation of the signaling game where the state space is treated as contiguous, i.e., endowed with a metric that (...) captures a similarity relation over states. This added structure is manifested in payoffs that reward approximate coordination between sender and receiver as well as perfect coordination. I evolve these games using a variation of Herrnstein reinforcement learning that better reflects the generalizing learning strategies real-world actors use in situations where states of the world are similar. In these simulations, signaling can develop very quickly, and the signals are vague in much the way ordinary language predicates are vague—they each exclusively apply to certain items, but for some transition period both signals apply to varying degrees. Moreover, I show that under certain parameter values, in particular when state spaces are large and time is limited, learning generalization of this sort yields strategies with higher payoffs than standard Herrnstein reinforcement learning. These models may then help explain why the phenomenon of vagueness arises in natural language: the learning strategies that allow actors to quickly and effectively develop signaling conventions in contiguous state spaces make it unavoidable. (shrink)

Since the 1990s, the terms “Lamarckism” and “Lamarckian” have seen a significant resurgence in biological publications. The discovery of new molecular mechanisms have been interpreted as evidence supporting the reality and efficiency of the inheritance of acquired characters, and thus the revival of Lamarckism. The present paper aims at giving a critical evaluation of such interpretations. I argue that two types of arguments allow to draw a clear distinction between the genuine Lamarckian concept of inheritance of acquired characters and transgenerational (...) epigenetic inheritance. The first concerns the explanandum of the processes under consideration: molecular mechanisms of transgenerational epigenetic inheritance are understood as evolved products of natural selection. This means that the kind of inheritance of acquired characters they might be responsible for is an obligatory emergent feature of evolution, whereas traditional Lamarckisms conceived the inheritance of acquired characters as a property inherent in living matter itself. The second argument concerns the explanans of the inheritance of acquired characters: in light of current knowledge, epigenetic mechanisms are not able to drive adaptive evolution by themselves. Emergent Lamarckian phenomena would be possible if and only if individual epigenetic variation allowed the inheritance of acquired characters to be a factor of unlimited change. This implies specific requirements for epigenetic variation, which I explicitly define and expand upon. I then show that given current knowledge, these requirements are not empirically grounded. (shrink)

Variation, adaptation, heredity and fitness, constraints and affordances, speciation, and extinction form the building blocks of the (Neo-)Darwinian research program, and several of these have been called “Darwinian principles.” Here, we suggest that caution should be taken in calling these principles Darwinian because of the important role played by reticulate evolutionary mechanisms and processes in also bringing about these phenomena. Reticulate mechanisms and processes include symbiosis, symbiogenesis, lateral gene transfer, infective heredity mediated by genetic and organismal mobility, and hybridization. Because (...) the “Darwinian principles” are brought about by both vertical and reticulate evolutionary mechanisms and processes, they should be understood as foundational for a more pluralistic theory of evolution, one that surpasses the classic scope of the Modern and the Neo-Darwinian Synthesis. Reticulate evolution moreover demonstrates that what conventional (Neo-)Darwinian theories treat as intra-species features of evolution frequently involve reticulate interactions between organisms from very different taxonomic categories. Variation, adaptation, heredity and fitness, constraints and affordances, speciation, and extinction therefore cannot be understood as “traits” or “properties” of genes, organisms, species, or ecosystems because the phenomena are irreducible to specific units and levels of an evolutionary hierarchy. Instead, these general principles of evolution need to be understood as common goods that come about through interactions between different units and levels of evolutionary hierarchies, and they are exherent rather than inherent properties of individuals. (shrink)

Preface Phillip R. Sloan, Gerald McKenny, Kathleen Eggleson pp. xiii-xviii In November of 2009, the University of Notre Dame hosted the conference “Darwin in the Twenty-First Century: Nature, Humanity, and God.‘ Sponsored primarily by the John J. Reilly Center for Science, Technology, and Values at Notre Dame, and the Science, Theology, and the Ontological Quest project within the Vatican Pontifical... 1. Introduction: Restructuring an Interdisciplinary Dialogue Phillip R. Sloan pp. 1-32 Almost exactly fifty years before the Notre Dame conference, the (...) world’s largest centenary commemoration of Darwin’s legacy was held at nearby University of Chicago. This event, organized by a committee spearheaded by University of Chicago anthropologist Sol Tax, drew nearly 2,500 registrants. In attendance were the primary leaders... Part 1. Nature 2. Evolution through Developmental Change: How Alterations in Development Cause Evolutionary Changes in Anatomy Scott F. Gilbert pp. 35-60 For the past half-century, the mechanisms of evolution have been explained by the fusion of genetics and evolutionary biology called “the Modern Synthesis.‘ The tenets of the Modern Synthesis have been generally formulated as such: 1. There is genetic variation within the population. 2. There is competition... 3. The Evolution of Evolutionary Mechanisms: A New Perspective Stuart A. Newman pp. 61-89 The Modern Evolutionary Synthesis, based on Charles Darwin’s concept of natural selection in conjunction with a genetic theory of inheritance in a population-based framework, has been, for more than six decades, the dominant scientific perspective for explaining the diversity of living organisms. In recent years, however, with the growth... 4. The Evolvability of Organic Forms: Possible, Likely, and Unlikely Change from the Perspective of Evolutionary Developmental Biology Alessandro Minelli pp. 90-115 Confronted with the extraordinary diversity of animal form, we can ask questions about function and adaptation. How does this animal move? How does it feed? How does it defend itself from its enemies? But we can also ask questions about development, reproduction, and heredity. What mechanisms produce these forms? How are these... 5. Accident, Adaptation, and Teleology in Aristotle and Darwinism David J. Depew pp. 116-143 Charles Darwin framed the Origin of Species to meet criteria for inductive science set out by John Herschel in his Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy. Accordingly, he was distraught when he learned that Herschel, to whom he had sent a copy of his newly published book, was not... 6. The Game of Life Implies Both Teleonomy and Teleology Gennaro Auletta, Ivan Colagè, Paolo D’Ambrosio pp. 144-164 The present contribution is mainly aimed at suggesting the importance of teleonomy and teleology as explanatory mechanisms in biology in the light of recent achievements in the field, and at showing that they play an actual and relevant role in the realm of life. The issue of finality in biology still provokes lively debates in the... Part 2. Humanity 7. Humanity’s Origins Bernard Wood pp. 167-181 One of Charles Darwin’s many achievements is that he began the process of converting the Tree of Life from a religious metaphor into a biological reality. All types of living organisms, be they animals, plants, fungi, bacteria, or viruses, are at the end of twigs that reach the surface of the Tree of Life, and all the types of organisms... 8. Darwin’s Evolutionary Ethics: The Empirical and Normative Justifications Robert J. Richards pp. 182-200 In the increasingly secular atmosphere of the nineteenth century, intellectuals grew wary of the idea that nature had any moral authority. In an earlier age, one might have looked upon the dispositions of nature as divinely sanctioned, and thus one could call upon natural law to ground moral judgment. Certain behaviors, for instance, might have... 9. Crossing the Milvian Bridge: When Do Evolutionary Explanations of Belief Debunk Belief? Paul E. Griffiths, John S. Wilkins pp. 201-231 Two traditional targets for evolutionary skepticism are religion and morality. Evolutionary skeptical arguments against religious belief are continuous with earlier genetic arguments against religion, such as that implicit in David Hume’s Natural History of Religion. Evolutionary arguments are also... 10. Questioning the Zoological Gaze: Darwinian Epistemology and Anthropology Phillip R. Sloan pp. 232-266 This quotation from Darwin’s Descent of Man illuminates an under-explored issue in Darwin’s work---not the issue of evolutionary ethics itself, but the epistemology of experience assumed in his work, and the consequences of his application of this “zoological gaze‘ to human beings. I will term this epistemological stance in this chapter “natural historical... Part 3. God 11. Evolution and Catholic Faith John O’Callaghan pp. 269-298 To begin to examine the relation of orthodox Catholic Christian faith to evolutionary theory and the question of human origins, consider words of the fourth pope, St. Clement: Let us fix our gaze on the Father and Creator of the whole world, and let us hold on to his peace and blessings, his splendid and surpassing... 12. After Darwin, Aquinas: A Universe Created and Evolving William E. Carroll pp. 299-337 At the 2000 Jubilee Session for scientists, held at the Vatican in May of that year, Archbishop Józef Życiński offered an eloquent assessment of contemporary discourse on the relationship between the natural sciences and theology. He ended his address with the comment that what is needed today is a new Thomas Aquinas. I remember... 13. Evolutionary Theism and the Emergent Universe Józef Życiński pp. 338-354 The 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species has been celebrated in the context of an animated debate concerning both scientific and philosophical issues implied by the theory of evolution.1 One finds a deep diversity of attitudes, both methodological and semantic, in the current debates on evolutionary... 14. Beyond Separation or Synthesis: Christ and Evolution as Theodrama Celia Deane-Drummond pp. 355-380 The fervor with which popular discourse on science and religion has continued to bubble up in the anniversary year celebrating Darwin’s achievements shows that the publically perceived conflict between science and religion will not go away. Academic discussion on such matters is therefore not just peripheral to cultural concerns but takes... Part 4. Past and Future Prospects 15. Imagining a World without Darwin Peter J. Bowler pp. 383-403 What would have happened if Charles Darwin had not lived to write On the Origin of Species? Perhaps his bad health caused the early death he feared, or maybe he fell overboard while on the voyage of the Beagle. Would the world have still experienced the Darwinian Revolution under another name, or would the history of science, and... 16. What Future for Darwinism? Jean Gayon pp. 404-423 What future for Darwinism? I will propose some criteria for exploring this question in the domains of both evolutionary biology and the human sciences. Do not expect me to tell you where we will stand thirty years from now. It will be enough to identify a few general tendencies. For the sake of brevity, I will not devote a preamble to explain... Contributors pp. 424-430. (shrink)

The publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species in 1859 ignited a public storm he neither wanted nor enjoyed. Having offered his book as a contribution to science, Darwin discovered to his dismay that it was received as an affront by many scientists and as a sacrilege by clergy and Christian citizens. To answer the criticism that his theory was a theory only, and a wild one at that, he published two volumes in 1868 to demonstrate that evolution was (...) obvious to anyone who cared to look at a bull in a pasture or a dog on a hearth. In response to those who insisted that species were distinct since creation, Darwin pointed to breeders of pigs and pigeons. In reply to those who protested that human intervention is one thing and natural selection another, he argued, "If organic beings had not possessed an inherent tendency to vary, man could have done nothing." To counter those who scorned his descriptions of species in exotic places, he submitted local evidence of cabbages and cauliflower. Based on a wide array of sources, from ancient pictographs to Polish roosters, from skins and from skeletons, from scientific journals and breeding manuals, Darwin assembled a mass of proof--and a hypothesis about species reversion that risked his reputation anew. The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication is a two-volume compilation of his thorough and intensive research and the revolutionary conclusions that resulted. The first portion of his work is dedicated to a meticulous analysis of various aspects of plant and animal life, including an inventory of varieties and their physical and behavioral characteristics, investigation of the impact of a species' surrounding environment and the role that both natural and forced changes in this environment have had. Darwin then turns to a richly detailed discussion of the roles of inheritance and crossing in the development of species. A wealth of illustrations further support and enhance his findings. This fascinating, invaluable, and courageous undertaking eventually formed the foundation for our current understanding of evolution. "In science as in politics the victors tend to write the history books. As a result, the record of the past is edited, intentionally or unintentionally, so that it focuses mainly on the precursors of contemporary orthodoxy. Such a focus may accurately represent the genealogy of modern ideas, but it almost inevitably misrepresents the historical experience of their progenitors... Even the powerful, persuasive, and ultimately triumphant theory of evolution by natural selection required not only defense, but repeated buttressing and revision. Variation showed Darwin hard at work on this rearguard action, using the materials he had at hand... His information was gleaned from the observations of fanciers, breeders, and amateur naturalists, as well as from the treatises of those on the cutting edge of zoology and botany. As hindsight narrows the historical spotlight, it imposes its own sense of hierarchy on the preoccupations of the past. But Darwin was interested in all of these topics, valued all of these sources, and belonged, to a greater or lesser extent, to all of these communities."--from the Introduction. (shrink)

Extreme variation in the meaning of the term “species” throughout the history of biology has often frustrated attempts of historians, philosophers and biologists to communicate with one another about the transition in biological thinking from the static species concept to the modern notion of evolving species. The most important change which has underlain all the other fluctuations in the meaning of the word “species” is the change from it denoting such metaphysical entities as essences, Forms or Natures to denoting classes (...) of individual organisms. Several authors have taken notice of the role of metaphysics in the work of particular biologists. An attempt will be made in this paper to present a systematic investigation of the role which metaphysics has played in the work of representative biologists throughout the history of biology, especially as it relates to their species concepts. (shrink)

Extreme variation in the meaning of the term “species” throughout the history of biology has often frustrated attempts of historians, philosophers and biologists to communicate with one another about the transition in biological thinking from the static species concept to the modern notion of evolving species. The most important change which has underlain all the other fluctuations in the meaning of the word “species” is the change from it denoting such metaphysical entities as essences, Forms or Natures to denoting classes (...) of individual organisms. Several authors have taken notice of the role of metaphysics in the work of particular biologists. An attempt will be made in this paper to present a systematic investigation of the role which metaphysics has played in the work of representative biologists throughout the history of biology, especially as it relates to their species concepts. (shrink)

In the years of the post-Darwinian debate, many American naturalists invoked the name of Lamarck to signal their belief in a purposive and anti-Darwinian view of evolution. Yet Weismann’s theory of germ-plasm continuity undermined the shared tenet of the neo-Lamarckian theories as well as the idea of the interchangeability between biological and social heredity. Edward Drinker Cope, the leader of the so-called “American School,” defended his neo-Lamarckian philosophy against every attempt to redefine the relationship between behavior, development, and heredity beyond (...) the epigenetic model of inheritance. This paper explores Cope’s late-career defense of neo-Lamarckism. Particular attention is dedicated to the debate he had with James Mark Baldwin before the publication of Baldwin’s own “A New Factor in Evolution”. I argue that Cope’s criticism was partly due to the fact that Baldwin’s theory of social heredity threatened Cope’s biologistic stance, as well as his attempt to preserve design in nature. This theoretical attitude had a remarkable impact on Baldwin’s arguments for the theory of organic selection. (shrink)

Somewhat surprisingly, evolutionary economists are far from agreeing upon the economic concept of evolution. The debate revolves around the question whether the mechanisms of variation, selection and retention are general principles of evolutionary processes, also valid in economics, or if economic evolution can be described by self-organization. The paper argues that self-organization is a useful concept, but has not yet fulfilled the aspiration to describe economic evolution as an endogenous process. In self-organization models important aspects, like novelty generation or the (...) attribution of its economic quality, are introduced exogenously. In verbal descriptions however, even critics of general evolutionary principles sketch these processes in a way that is perfectly compatible with the universal principles. The paper thus argues that the controversy is mainly based on a misinterpretation of Universal Darwinism and tries to clarify the concept. It concludes that variation, selection and retention are in fact general evolutionary principles; as self-organization maybe is. (shrink)

An original quantum foundations concept of a deep learning computational Universe is introduced. The fundamental information of the Universe (or Triuniverse)is postulated to evolve about itself in a Red, Green and Blue (RGB) tricoloured stable self-mutuality in three information processing loops. The colour is a non-optical information label. The information processing loops form a feedback-reinforced deep learning macrocycle with trefoil knot topology. Fundamental information processing is driven by ψ-Epistemic Drive, the Natural appetite for information selected for advantageous knowledge. From its (...) substrate of Mathematics, the knotted information processing loops determine emergent Physics and thence the evolution of super-emergent Life (biological and artificial intelligence). RGB-tricoloured information is processed in sequence in an Elemental feedback loop (R), then an Operational feedback loop (G), then a Structural feedback loop (B) and back to an Elemental feedback loop (R), and so on around the trefoil in deep learning macrocycles. It is postulated that hierarchical information correspondence from Mathematics through Physics to Life is mapped and conserved within each colour. The substrate of Mathematics has RGB-tricoloured feedback loops which are respectively Algebra (R), Algorithms (G) and Geometry (B). In Mathematics, the trefoil macrocycle is Algebraic Algorithmic Geometry and its correlation system is a Tensor Neural Knot Network enabling Qutrit Entanglement. Emergent Physics has corresponding RGB-tricoloured feedback loops of Quantum Mechanics (R), Quantum Deep Learning (G) and Quantum Geometrodynamics(B). In Physics, the trefoil macrocycle is Quantum Intelligent Geometrodynamics and its correlation system is Quantum Darwinism. Super-emergent Life has corresponding RGB-tricoloured loops of Variation (R), Selection (G) and Heredity (B). In the evolution of Life, the trefoil macrocycle is Variational Selective Heredity and its correlation ecosystem is Darwin’s ecologically “Entangled Bank”. (shrink)

Vague predicates, those that exhibit borderline cases, pose a persistent problem for philosophers and logicians. Although they are ubiquitous in natural language, when used in a logical context, vague predicates lead to contradiction. This paper will address a question that is intimately related to this problem. Given their inherent imprecision, why do vague predicates arise in the first place? I discuss a variation of the signaling game where the state space is treated as contiguous, i.e., endowed with a metric that (...) captures a similarity relation over states. This added structure is manifested in payoffs that reward approximate coordination between sender and receiver as well as perfect coordination. I evolve these games using a variation of Herrnstein reinforcement learning that better reflects the generalizing learning strategies real-world actors use in situations where states of the world are similar. In these simulations, signaling can develop very quickly, and the signals are vague in much the way ordinary language predicates are vague—they each exclusively apply to certain items, but for some transition period both signals apply to varying degrees. Moreover, I show that under certain parameter values, in particular when state spaces are large and time is limited, learning generalization of this sort yields strategies with higher payoffs than standard Herrnstein reinforcement learning. These models may then help explain why the phenomenon of vagueness arises in natural language: the learning strategies that allow actors to quickly and effectively develop signaling conventions in contiguous state spaces make it unavoidable. (shrink)

There are two main senses of ‘mechanism’, both deriving from the metaphor of nature as a machine. One sense refers to contrivance or design, as in ‘the plant’s mechanism of attracting butterflies’. The other sense refers to cause or law process, as in ‘the mechanism of heredity’. In his work on evolution, Charles Darwin showed that organisms are produced by a mechanism in the second sense, although he never used this language. He also discussed contrivance, where he did use the (...) language of mechanism. This discussion relates metaphor in general and Darwin’s use of the machine metaphor in particular to the problem of the nature of science, concluding that one use of the metaphor reinforces the objective nature of science and the other use reinforces the subjective nature of science. (shrink)

Save for Anthropologists, few social scientists have been among the participants in the discussions about the appropriate structure of a ‘Universal Darwinism’. Yet evolutionary theorizing about cultural, social, and economic phenomena has a long tradition, going back well before Darwin. And over the past quarter century significant literatures have grown up concerned with the processes of change operating on science, technology, business organization and practice, and economic change more broadly, that are explicitly evolutionary in theoretical orientation. In each of these (...) fields of study, the broad proposition put forth by Darwin that change proceeds through a process involving variation, systematic selection, renewed variation... has proved both persuasive and powerful. On the other hand, the evolutionary processes involved in these areas differ in essential ways from those we now know are operative in the evolution of biological species. The objective of this essay is to highlight those differences, which a ‘Universal Darwinism’ needs to encompass, if it is to be broad enough to be a theory that is applicable to the evolution of human cultures as well as evolution in biology. (shrink)

This paper describes the historical background and early formation of Wilhelm Johannsen's distinction between genotype and phenotype. It is argued that contrary to a widely accepted interpretation his concepts referred primarily to properties of individual organisms and not to statistical averages. Johannsen's concept of genotype was derived from the idea of species in the tradition of biological systematics from Linnaeus to de Vries: An individual belonged to a group - species, subspecies, elementary species - by representing a certain underlying type. (...) Johannsen sharpened this idea theoretically in the light of recent biological discoveries, not least those of cytology. He tested and confirmed it experimentally combining the methods of biometry, as developed by Francis Galton, with the individual selection method and pedigree analysis, as developed for instance by Louis Vilmorin. The term "genotype" was introduced in W. Johannsen's 1909 treatise, but the idea of a stable underlying biological "type" distinct from observable properties was the core idea of his classical bean selection experiment published 6 years earlier. The individual ontological foundation of population analysis was a self-evident presupposition in Johannsen's studies of heredity in populations from their start in the early 1890s till his death in 1927. The claim that there was a "substantial but cautious modification of Johannsen's phenotype-genotype distinction" from a statistical to an individual ontological perspective derives from a misreading of the 1903 and 1909 texts. The immediate purpose of this paper is to correct this reading of the 1903 monograph by showing how its problems and results grow out of Johannsen's earlier work in heredity and plant breeding. Johannsen presented his famous selection experiment as the culmination of a line of criticism of orthodox Darwinism by William Bateson, Hugo de Vries, and others. They had argued that evolution is based on stepwise rather than continuous change in heredity. Johannsen's paradigmatic experiment showed how stepwise variation in heredity could be operationally distinguished from the observable, continuous morphological variation. To test Galton's law of partial regression, Johannsen deliberately chose pure lines of self-fertilizing plants, a pure line being the descendants in successive generations of one single individual. Such a population could be assumed to be highly homogeneous with respect to hereditary type, and Johannsen found that selection produced no change in this type. Galton, he explained, had experimented with populations composed of a number of stable hereditary types. The partial regression which Galton found was simply an effect of selection between types, increasing the proportion of some types at the expense of others. (shrink)

Guided by key insights of the four great philosophers mentioned in the title, here, in review of and expanding on our earlier work (Burchard, 2005, 2011), we present an exposition of the role played by language, & in the broader sense, λογοζ, the Logos, in how the CNS, the brain, is running the human being. Evolution by neural Darwinism has been forcing the linguistic nature of mind, enabling it to overcome & exploit the cognitive gap between an animal and its (...) world by recognizing environmental structures. Our work was greatly influenced by Heidegger’s lecture notes on metaphysics (Heidegger, 1935). We found agreement with recent progress in neuroscience, but also mathematical foundations of language theory, equating Logos with the mathematical concept of structure. The mystery of perception across the gap is analyzed as radiation and molecules impinging on sensory neurons that carry linguistic information about gross environmental structures, and only remotely about the physical reality of elementary particles. The most important logical brain function is Ego or Self, guiding the workings of the brain as a logos machine. Ego or Self operates from neurons in frontopolar cortex with global receptive fields. The logos machine can function only by availing itself of global context, its internally stored noumenal cosmos NK, and the categorical-conceptual apparatus CCA, updated continually through the neural default mode network (Raichle, 2005). In the Transcendental Deduction, Immanuel Kant discovered that Ego or Self is responsible for conscious control in perception relying on concepts & categories for a fitting percept to be incorporated intoNK. The entire CNS runs as a “movie-in-the-brain” (Parvizi & Damasio, 2001), at peak speed processing simultaneously in a series of cortical centers a stack of up to twelve frames in gamma rhythm of 25 ms intervals. We equate global context, or NK, with our human world, Heidegger’s Dasein being-in-the-world, and are able to demonstrate that the great philosopher in EM parallels neuro-science concerning the human mind. (shrink)

The role of content in computational accounts of cognition is a matter of some controversy. An early prominent view held that the explanatory relevance of content consists in its supervenience on the the formal properties of computational states (see, e.g., Fodor 1980). For reasons that derive from the familiar Twin Earth thought experiments, it is usually thought that if content is to supervene on formal properties, it must be narrow; that is, it must not be the sort of content that (...) determines reference and truth-conditions. An interesting alternative to this view has recently been proposed by Egan (1995). According to Egan, the explanatory role of content is such that contents must in general be broad to be explanatorily relevant. But Egan’s view involves a non-realist interpretation of content assignments. I will argue here that this non-realism about contents is undermotivated. A realist variation on her view of the explanatory role of content, however, would survive this criticism. This realist variation, I suggest, shares with the views of other commentators on Marr’s theory (e.g., Burge 1986; Shapiro 1993; forthcoming) certain commitments concerning the supervenience base of visual contents and processes. I will argue, however, that these commitments beg important questions regarding the individuation of cognitive states and processes. I conclude, contrary to Burge and Shapiro, that Marr’s theory does not favor anti-individualism. (shrink)

The relatively late acceptance of Darwinism in German biology and paleontology is frequently attributed to a lingering of Lamarckism, a persisting influence of German idealistic Naturphilosophie and Goethean romanticism. These factors are largely held responsible for the vitalism underlying theories of saltational and orthogenetic evolutionary change that characterize the writings of many German paleontologists during the first half of the 20th century. A prominent exponent of that tradition was Karl Beurlen, who is credited with having been the first German paleontologist (...) to present a full-fledged theory of saltational evolution and orthogenetic change. A review of Beurlen's writings reveals motives and concerns far more complex, however, and firmly rooted in contemporary völkisch thought and Aryan Science. Beurlen's mature theory of evolution can indeed be understood as his own contribution to Aryan Geology and Biology, tainted as it was with National-Socialist ideology. Evolutionary biologists of the time who opposed the theories of Beurlen and likeminded authors, i.e., idealistic morphology, typology, saltational change, orthogenesis and cyclism did so on Darwinian principles, which ultimately prevailed. But at the time when the battle was fought, their adherence to the principle of natural selection was likewise ideologically tainted, namely in terms of racial theory. National-Socialist ideology was unable to forge a unity of evolutionary theory in Germany even amongst those of its proponents who endorsed this ideology. (shrink)

This article re-contextualizes Sigmund Freud's interest in the idea of the inheritance of acquired characteristics in terms of the socio-political connotations of Lamarckism and Darwinism in the 1930s and 1950s. Many scholars have speculated as to why Freud continued to insist on a supposedly outmoded theory of evolution in the 1930s even as he was aware that it was no longer tenable. While Freud's initial interest in the inheritance of phylogenetic memory was not necessarily politically motivated, his refusal to abandon (...) this theory in the 1930s must be understood in terms of wider debates, especially regarding the position of the Jewish people in Germany and Austria. Freud became uneasy about the inheritance of memory not because it was scientifically disproven, but because it had become politically charged and suspiciously regarded by the Nazis as Bolshevik and Jewish. Where Freud seemed to use the idea of inherited memory as a way of universalizing his theory beyond the individual cultural milieu of his mostly Jewish patients, such a notion of universal science itself became politically charged and identified as particularly Jewish. The vexed and speculative interpretations of Freud's Lamarckism are situated as part of a larger post-War cultural reaction against Communism on the one hand, and on the other hand, against any scientific concepts of race in the wake of World War II. (shrink)

Iceland has not been known as a contributor to the history of science. This small nation in the North-Atlantic has only in recent decades made its mark on international science. But the Icelandic naturalist Thorvaldur Thoroddsen (1855-1921) is an exception to this generalisation, for he was well known at the turn of the 20th century in Europe and America for his research on the geography and geology of Iceland. Though Thoroddsen's contribution to these sciences is of great interest there is (...) another very interesting side to his career. This is his transformation from "mechanist" to "vitalist," which is the main focus of this paper. Thoroddsen, who began his career as a follower of Darwinism and Haeckelian monism, started to express his worries about materialism in society in 1902 culminating in a full-fledged denial of materialism in politics and science in 1910. Thoroddsen's transformation is in its nature a very complex process, but overall it can be traced to his view that materialism was destroying the Danish and Icelandic societies. In the years before 1902 Thoroddsen was a monistic atheist, relatively liberal in his politics, a firm believer in the power of the natural sciences, and considered the laws of physics the key to human progress. His views were strikingly similar to the ones Haeckel expounded in "The Riddle of the Universe" (1899), whose reception in Germany is explored in this paper in order to contextualise Thoroddsen's transformation. Between 1902 and 1910, however, Thoroddsen rejected this worldview in favour of conservative politics and ontological dualism, becoming a staunch believer in a higher, godly, authority. The theories of Darwin and Haeckel were now obsolete and needed to be replaced by the idea of purpose, direction and the final goal of life (Teleology). In order to understand Thoroddsen's transformation, I focus on the interaction of scientific knowledge, politics and other cultural issues in his writings. This is done by looking at Thoroddsen's views on biology, on the natural sciences in general, and on politics as published in Icelandic articles, manuscripts and letters in the period 1872 to 1910. I show that the transformation was due to influences from the German holistic movement, Thoroddsen's engagement with the Royal elite in Denmark and its political concerns, new developments in physics, and from personal traumas and professional disappointments. I also show that Thoroddsen's transformation seems to be a good example of the social shaping of scientific knowledge. (shrink)

"Reality and Mystical Experience" proposes and demonstrates the use of a new hermeneutical tool for the study of philosophical and religious foundations. The tool, which I call "publicity-presence-awareness terminology," offers a way to examine, understand, and classify different conceptions about the nature of reality in terms of their different approaches to certain shared metaphysical problems. Such an analysis helps, in turn, to clarify the basis for and significance of mystical experience within these traditions. ;The schema proposed here is especially useful (...) for philosophical studies across differing worldviews because it accommodates both inter- and intracultural realities and truths. This project defines "reality" and "truth" in terms of "publicity" and "presence." The publicity-presence distinction proposed here provides, in turn, a formal, much more culturally neutral and thus useful version of the traditional "universal-particular" and "attribute-particular" distinctions. ;The project has two parts. Part One defines the terms that make up the schema; Part Two looks at what publicity-presence-awareness terminology might reveal about the metaphysical presuppositions of three different religious traditions: Madhyamaka Buddhism, Advaita-Vedanta Hinduism, and patristic Christianity. In each case, the analysis demonstrates how each religion offers a fundamentally different yet equally valid approach to metaphysical mystery. Taken together, the three studies show that insight into metaphysical ultimacy does not express itself within just one metaphysical paradigm but rather in a natural typology of metaphysical views--different species that express a common mystery in a variety of ways. Moreover, just as biological organisms must be well-formed in order to live, the three species of metaphysics examined here suggest certain parameters for well-formed, viable metaphysics. ;Part Two also shows how the metaphysical presuppositions of each view govern certain features of the mystical traditions. The three studies look at how mystical awareness is distinguished from conventional awareness within each context, and how mystical traditions might offer context-specific remedies for the metaphysical limitations of their parent religions. (shrink)

The main goal of Henri Bergson’s philosophy of nature is to offer a dynamic understanding of living phenomena. It is in this context that we main­tain that the author left us a “bio-philosophy,” that is, an interpretation which, by adopting a positive model of biology as a cognitive paradigm, describes the essential character of living activity as time or duration. Bergson’s posi­tive metaphysics, which brings science to the metaphysical field and provides an inner perspective of the vital principle, consolidated itself (...) in the study of evolutionary theories like Darwinism. However, the specificity of the perspective Bergson presents to us lies in the fact that he positions himself as a philosopher and not as a scientist: he does not seek a merely scientific explanation of reality, but an integral vision that allows us to give scientific evolution a metaphysical reading. Thus, when Bergson upholds the insufficiency of pure Darwinism, and proposes a true evolutionism, it is because he thinks that the only way to understand the evolutionary nature of life is by overcoming a strictly mechanistic perspective. For Bergson, such an interpretation results from the artificial way in which our intellectual functions deconstruct reality and lead to an incomplete and fragmented reading of the evolution of organisms. As a philosopher he seeks an explanatory level which, being scientifically based, is not restricted to the physico-chemical limits of reality. For that reason, Bergson claims that the inner cause of evolution is an activity where growth and division occur as a natural result of the divergence of life’s tendencies. (shrink)

The Theory of Evolution has, since Darwin, been sustained by contributions from many sciences, most especially from molecular biology. Philosophers, like biologists and the man in the street, have accepted the idea that the contemporary form of evolutionary theory has arrived at a convincing and final structure. As it now stands, natural selection is thought to work through the information-handling mechanism of the DNA molecule. Variation in the genome?s constructive message is achieved through random errors of processing called mutations. How (...) that mechanism and its revision works, and how much information it can hold are fundamental questions for the Neo-Darwinian theory to face. It is argued here that neither the operation nor the data content of the genome, as science understand them, can underpin the role Darwinism assigns to natural selection. It follows that we cannot put our confidence in the explanatory force of Darwinian reasoning, but neither is there an alternative to it. (shrink)

Segundo Bernard Lonergan, a possibilidade de objectivarmos a estrutura imanente do sujeito cognoscente e agente exige um percurso de auto-transcendência cognitiva e de auto-transcendência moral. Esse dinamismo de "auto-apropriação da auto-consciência intelectual e racional começa por uma teoria do conhecimento, estende-se até uma metafísica e uma ética e ascende até uma concepção e uma afirmação de Deus, a qual é confrontada finalmente pelo problema do mal, exigindo a transformação de uma inteligência que confia em si mesma num intellectus quaerens idem". (...) Assim, o presente artigo pretende ser uma introdução ao reconhecimento do alcance e do impacto atribuído por Bernard Lonergan quer à gnosiologia quer à ontologia. Para tal, procede-se a uma apresentação do significado próprio do "acto de intelecção" e do sentido dos diferentes modos de operação consciente do sujeito, bem como a uma identificação das diversas configurações da experiência que essa compreensão revela, nomeadamente em ordem a uma explicitação das noções concretas, irrestritas e dinâmicas de "ser proporcionado" e de "ser transcendente". /// Taking into account that for Bernard Lonergan, the immanent structure of the human being as an agent and as a subject requires a process of cognitional and moral self-transcendence, the article intends to show how for Lonergan this dynamism of self-appropriation of one's own intellectual and rational self-consciousness begins as cognitional theory, expands into a metaphysics and an ethics, mounts to a conception and an affirmation of God, only to be confronted with the problem of evil and its inevitable demand for the transformation of the self-reliant intelligence into anintellectus quaerens fidem. The article, therefore, explores the relationship between the several meanings of "insight", the different modes of conscious operations of the subject, and the diverse configurations of experience, as disclosed by the dynamic, concrete, and irrestricted notions of "proportionate being" and "transcendent being". (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to offer a critical approach to the theory of autopoiesis in order to see how it challenges mainstream Darwinism. In the first part of the paper, I characterize Darwinism from the concepts of natural selection, heredity, reproduction, and evolution. This characterization is absolutely schematic, and I hope not controversial at all, since my aim is to provide a general background for the discussion of the rest of the paper. The second part presents the main (...) tenets of the theory of autopoiesis, also paying special attention to the concepts of natural selection, heredity, reproduction, and evolution. The third and final part considers some criticisms that have been directed against the theory and suggests some new ones. As I said, my intention is to offer a critical approach, so that I pretend to assess neither autopoiesis nor Darwinism. The assessment, it seems to me, would be a matter of scientific debate—not properly of philosophy. Therefore, given that my approach attempts to be a conceptual clarification, my contribution to the contemporary debate about Darwinism is twofold. On the one hand, I show that conceptually autopoiesis constitutes an important challenge to Darwinism, but on the other, I also show that some fundamental aspects of the theory appear to be both epistemologically and empirically problematic, which perhaps helps to understand why autopoiesis is not widely accepted in mainstream Darwinism. (shrink)

Generalized Darwinism models cultural development as an evolutionary process, where traits evolve through variation, selection, and inheritance. Inheritance describes either a discrete unit’s transmission or a mixing of traits. In this article, we compare classical models of cultural evolution and generalized population dynamics with respect to blending inheritance. We identify problems of these models and introduce our model, which combines relevant features of both. Blending is implemented as success-based social learning, which can be shown to be an optimal strategy.

The genesis of actuality from potentiality, with the apparent role of the observer, is an important and unsolved problem which essentially defines science‟s view of reality in a variety of contexts. Observation then becomes lawful and not emergent. Panentheism is needed to provide a mechanism for order outside of blind efficient causality, in a Universal final causality. Classical physics is over a hundred years out of date, yet scientific models remain mechanistic and deterministic. Deism, a remnant of classical cosmology, is (...) examined and rejected by scientists and philosophers, and certain pre-scientific notions of religion are scorned, putting the matter to rest. Quantum physics, in its basic form, is necessary if there is to be any philosophical or scientific notion of free will and self-determination, as potentiality. Quantum metaphysics is also needed because classical physics is fundamentally limited to localized external relations, lacking the internality and non-locality of relatedness. God, or the equivalent, is necessary to complete the equation. Physicists now tell us that reality is fundamentally mental and is created by observation. Observation is here taken to mean experience, with experience going all the way down to the lowest order of a Universal mentality. (shrink)

This paper draws on material from the dissertation books of the University of Edinburgh's student societies and surviving lecture notes from the university's professors to shed new light on the debates on human variation, heredity and the origin of races between 1790 and 1835. That Edinburgh was the most important centre of medical education in the English-speaking world in this period makes this a particularly significant context. By around 1800 the fixed natural order of the eighteenth century was giving way (...) to a more fluid conception of species and varieties. The dissolution of the ‘Great Chain of Being’ made interpretations of races as adaptive responses to local climates plausible. The evidence presented shows that human variation, inheritance and adaptation were being widely discussed in Edinburgh in the student circles around Charles Darwin when he was a medical student in Edinburgh in the 1820s. It is therefore no surprise to find these same themes recurring in similar form in the evolutionary speculations in his notebooks on the transmutation of species written in the late 1830s during the gestation of his theory of evolution. (shrink)

Moore argues as follows: (1) "Metaphysics is the most general attempt to make sense of things." (1) (2) "Because of its generality, metaphysics is the one branch of philosophy that is not the philosophy of this or that specific area of human thought or experience. It is 'pure' philosophy." (8) (3) It is "a fundamentally creative exercise." (17) Against Moore, I argue that it is rather philosophy that is the most general attempt to make sense of things. Alternatively, and in (...) my view preferably, Moore might have argued as follows: (1) 'Pure' philosophy is the most general attempt to make sense of things. (2) Because of its generality, it is not concerned with this or that area of human thought or experience. (3) It is a fundamentally uncreative exercise. (shrink)

Both biologists and philosophers often make use of simple verbal formulations of necessary and sufficient conditions for evolution by natural selection (ENS). Such summaries go back to Darwin's Origin of Species (especially the "Recapitulation"), but recent ones are more compact.1 Perhaps the most commonly cited formulation is due to Lewontin.2 These summaries tend to have three or four conditions, where the core requirement is a combination of variation, heredity, and fitness differences. The summaries are employed in several ways. First, they (...) are often used in pedagogical contexts, and in showing the coherence of evolutionary theory in response to attacks from outside biology. Second, they are important in discussions of extensions of evolutionary principles to new domains, such as cultural change. The summaries also have intrinsic scientific and philosophical interest as attempts to capture some core principles of evolutionary theory in a highly concise way. Despite their prominence, both the proper formulation and status of these summaries are unclear. Standard formulations are subject to counterexamples, and their relations to formal models of evolutionary change are not straightforward. Here I look closely at these verbal summaries, and at how they relate to formal models. Are the summaries merely rough approximations that have no theoretical role of their own? Perhaps they could operate as theoretical statements in Darwin's time, but have now been superseded by more exact treatments. (shrink)

For evolution by natural selection to occur it is classically admitted that the three ingredients of variation, difference in fitness and heredity are necessary and sufficient. In this paper, I show using simple individual-based models, that evolution by natural selection can occur in populations of entities in which neither heredity nor reproduction are present. Furthermore, I demonstrate by complexifying these models that both reproduction and heredity are predictable Darwinian products (i.e. complex adaptations) of populations initially lacking these two properties but (...) in which new variation is introduced via mutations. Later on, I show that replicators are not necessary for evolution by natural selection, but rather the ultimate product of such processes of adaptation. Finally, I assess the value of these models in three relevant domains for Darwinian evolution. (shrink)