The "Darwinian revolution" remains an acceptable phrase to describe the change in thought brought about by the theory of evolution, provided that the revolution is seen as occurring over an extended period of time. The decades from the 1790s through the 1850s are at the focus of this article. Emphasis is placed on the issue of species extinction and on generational shifts in opinion.

Contemporary realist theories of value claim to be compatible with natural science. In this paper, I call this claim into question by arguing that Darwinian considerations pose a dilemma for these theories. The main thrust of my argument is this. Evolutionary forces have played a tremendous role in shaping the content of human evaluative attitudes. The challenge for realist theories of value is to explain the relation between these evolutionary influences on our evaluative attitudes, on the one hand, and (...) the independent evaluative truths that realism posits, on the other. Realism, I argue, can give no satisfactory account of this relation. On the one hand, the realist may claim that there is no relation between evolutionary influences on our evaluative attitudes and independent evaluative truths. But this claim leads to the implausible skeptical result that most of our evaluative judgements are off track due to the distorting pressure of Darwinian forces. The realist’s other option is to claim that there is a relation between evolutionary influences and independent evaluative truths, namely that natural selection favored ancestors who were able to grasp those truths. But this account, I argue, is unacceptable on scientific grounds. Either way, then, realist theories of value prove unable to accommodate the fact that Darwinian forces have deeply influenced the content of human values. After responding to three objections, the third of which leads me to argue against a realist understanding of the disvalue of pain, I conclude by sketching how antirealism is able to sidestep the dilemma I have presented. Antirealist theories of value are able to offer an alternative account of the relation between evolutionary forces and evaluative facts —
an account that allows us to reconcile our understanding of evaluative truth with our understanding of the many non-rational causes that have played a role in shaping our evaluative judgements. (shrink)

What is the Darwinian revolution and why is it important for philosophers? These are the questions tackled in this Element. In four sections, the topics covered are the story of the revolution, the question of whether it really was a revolution, the nature of the revolution, and the implications for philosophy, both epistemology and ethics.

Sharon Street (2006) has argued that, given certain plausible evolutionary considerations, normative realism leads to normative skepticism. Street calls this ‘the Darwinian dilemma’. This paper considers the two most popular responses to the Darwinian dilemma and argues that both are problematic. According to the naturalist response, the evolutionary account of our normative dispositions reveals that there was selection for normative dispositions that were reliable with respect to normative truth. According to the minimalist response, the evolutionary account reveals that (...) there was selection of normative dispositions that were reliable with respect to normative truth. This paper argues that the minimalist response is in principle unacceptable, and that the naturalist response faces a very serious difficulty. (shrink)

After the discovery of the structure of DNA in 1953, scientists working in molecular biology embraced reductionism—the theory that all complex systems can be understood in terms of their components. Reductionism, however, has been widely resisted by both nonmolecular biologists and scientists working outside the field of biology. Many of these antireductionists, nevertheless, embrace the notion of physicalism—the idea that all biological processes are physical in nature. How, Alexander Rosenberg asks, can these self-proclaimed physicalists also be antireductionists? With clarity and (...) wit, Darwinian Reductionism navigates this difficult and seemingly intractable dualism with convincing analysis and timely evidence. In the spirit of the few distinguished biologists who accept reductionism—E. O. Wilson, Francis Crick, Jacques Monod, James Watson, and Richard Dawkins—Rosenberg provides a philosophically sophisticated defense of reductionism and applies it to molecular developmental biology and the theory of natural selection, ultimately proving that the physicalist must also be a reductionist. (shrink)

My book, "The Darwinian Revolution" gives an overview of the revolution as understood at the time of its writing (1979). It shows that many factors were involved, from straight science through philosophical methodology, and on to religious influences and challenges. Also of importance were social factors, not the least of which was the professionalization of science in Britain in the 19th century. Since the appearance of that book, new, significant factors have become apparent, and here I discuss some of (...) the most important -- especially the way in which evolution as an idea came into being as an epiphenomenon of the ideology of cultural progress; the (often tense) interaction between ideas of biological progress and the urge to professionalization, and of how this led to a delay in the full appreciation of what Charles Darwin had done in the "Origin;" and the ongoing divide between biological functionalists and biological formalists, a Kuhnian-type paradigm difference that persists across the Darwinian revolution. (shrink)

Biologists and philosophers of biology typically regard essentialism about speciesas incompatible with modern Darwinian theory. Analytic metaphysicians such asKripke, Putnam and Wiggins, on the other hand, believe that their essentialist thesesare applicable to biological kinds. I explore this tension. I show that standard anti-essentialist considerations only show that species do not have intrinsic essential properties. I argue that while Putnam and Kripke do make assumptions that contradict received biological opinion, their model of natural kinds, suitably modified, is partially applicable (...) to biological species. However, Wiggins'' thesis that organisms belong essentially to their species is untenable, given modern species concepts. I suggest that Putnam''s, Kripke''s and Wiggins'' errors stem from adopting an account of the point of scientific classification which implies that relationally-defined kinds are likely to be of little value, an account which is inapplicable to biology. (shrink)

Darwin proclaimed his own work revolutionary. His revolution, however, is still in progress, and the changes that are going on are reflected in the contemporary historical and philosophical literature, including that written by scientists. The changes have taken place at different levels, and have tended to occur at the more superficial ones. The new ontology that arose as a consequence of the realization that species are individuals at once provides an analytical tool for explaining what has been happening and an (...) example of the kind of changes that seem in order. It provides a clear distinction between the roles of history and of laws of nature. Pre-Darwinian "evolution" was superficial in the sense that it treated change as either as something pre-ordained or else due to timeless laws of nature, rather than historical contingency. Darwinism puts the ontological emphasis upon concrete, particular things (individuals) and therefore delegitimizes both essentialistic and teleological ways of thinking. However, traditional ways of thinking have persisted, if not explicitly, then often as assumptions and procedures that are merely implicit or even unconscious. As a result, anti-evolutionary attitudes continue to influence the practice of evolutionary biology as well as the study of its history and philosophy. (shrink)

The book presents a new way of understanding Darwinism and evolution by natural selection, combining work in biology, philosophy, and other fields.

The Darwinian revolution supposed and imposed a much broader and more complex concept of environment than that which, until that moment, had been considered by most as part of natural history. Until Darwin, the environment of living beings had been regarded, almost exclusively, as the inanimate surroundings. This pre-Darwinian notion of environment included physicochemical and climatic variables: the living beings themselves were scarcely considered, or they were regarded just as food to be assimilated. In contrast, with Darwin, the (...) influence of living surroundings began to be regarded as having decisive importance for understanding the distribution, configuration, and viability of living beings. The relationships established among different living beings became the main and more significant features of the biological environment. This conceptual change was an exigency derived from the formulation and justification of the theory of natural selection. The idea of struggle for existence supposed by that theory requires that the biotic environment be considered critical in determining the viability of each living being. (shrink)

Over the last four decades arguments for and against the claim that creative hypothesis formation is based on Darwinian ‘blind’ variation have been put forward. This paper offers a new and systematic route through this long-lasting debate. It distinguishes between undirected, random, and unjustified variation, to prevent widespread confusions regarding the meaning of undirected variation. These misunderstandings concern Lamarckism, equiprobability, developmental constraints, and creative hypothesis formation. The paper then introduces and develops the standard critique that creative hypothesis formation is (...) guided rather than blind, integrating developments from contemporary research on creativity. On that basis, I discuss three compatibility arguments that have been used to answer the critique. These arguments do not deny guided variation but insist that an important analogy exists nonetheless. These compatibility arguments all fail, even though they do so for different reasons: trivialisation, conceptual confusion, and lack of evidence respectively. Revisiting the debate in this manner not only allows us to see where exactly a ‘Darwinian’ account of creative hypothesis formation goes wrong, but also to see that the debate is not about factual issues, but about the interpretation of these factual issues in Darwinian terms. (shrink)

The book examines how Darwinism has been used to explain novelty and change in culture through the Darwinian approach to creativity and the theory of memes. The first claims that creativity is based on a Darwinian process of blind variation and selection, while the latter claims that culture is based on and explained by units - memes - that are similar to genes. Both theories try to describe and explain mind and culture by applying Darwinism by way of (...) analogies. Kronfeldner shows that the analogies involved in these theories lead to claims that give either wrong or at least no new descriptions or explanations of the phenomena at issue. Whereas the two approaches are usually defended or criticized on the basis that they are dangerous for our vision of ourselves, this book takes a different perspective: it questions the acuteness of these approaches. Darwinian theory is not like a dangerous wolf, hunting for our self image. Far from it, in the case of the two analogical applications addressed in this book, Darwinian theory is shown to behave more like a disoriented sheep in wolf's clothing. - A revised and much shortened version of a dissertation (2007, Darwinism, Memes and Creativity: A Critique of Analogical Reasoning from Nature to Culture). (shrink)

Mary Winsor (2003) argues against the received view that pre-Darwinian taxonomy was characterized mainly by essentialism. She argues, instead, that the methods of pre-Darwinian taxonomists, in spite of whatever their beliefs, were that of clusterists, so that the received view, propagated mainly by certain modern biologists and philosophers of biology, should at last be put to rest as a myth. I argue that shes right when it comes to higher taxa, but wrong when it comes the most important (...) category of all, the species category. (shrink)

Our goal is to illustrate that Darwinian and autopoietic views of the organism are not as squarely opposed to each other as is often assumed. Indeed, we will argue that there is much common ground between them and that they can usefully supplement each other.

In Darwinian Heresies, which was originally published in 2004, prominent historians and philosophers of science trace the history of evolutionary thought, and challenge many of the assumptions that have built up over the years. Covering a wide range of issues starting in the eighteenth century, Darwinian Heresies brings us through the time of Charles Darwin and the Origin, and then through the twentieth century to the present. It is suggested that Darwin's true roots lie in Germany, not his (...) native England, that Russian evolutionism is more significant than many are prepared to allow, and that the true influence on twentieth-century evolution biology was not Charles Darwin at all, but his often-despised contemporary, Herbert Spencer. The collection was intended to interest, to excite, to infuriate, and to stimulate further work. (shrink)

This short book has been a sketch of the ways in which a Darwinian left would differ from the traditional left that we have come to know over the past two hundred years. In closing, I shall first draw together, in point form, some of the features that I think would distinguish a Darwinian left from previous versions of the left, both old and new; these are features that I think a Darwinian left should embrace today. Then (...) I will cast a glance at more distant prospects. (shrink)

In his recent 2018 book, Resisting Scientific Realism, K. Brad Wray provides a detailed, full-fledged defense of anti-realism about science. In this paper, I argue against the two main claims that constitute Wray’s positive and novel argument for his position, viz., his suggested Darwinian-selectionist explanation of the success of science and his skepticism about unobservables based on radical theory change. My goal is not wholly negative though. Instead, I aim to identify the type of work that an anti-realist like (...) Wray would need to undertake in order to further substantiate their position, viz., taking a stance on inductive inference and support, and the type of realist and anti-realist positions that seem viable. (shrink)

Darwinian humanism proposes that environmental philosophers pursue their work in full recognition of an irreducible ambiguity at the heart of human experience: we may legitimately regard moral action as fully free and fully natural at the same time, since neither perspective can be taken as the whole truth. A serious objection to this proposal holds that freedom and nature may be unified as an organic whole, and their unity posited as a matter of substantive truth, by appeal to teleology. (...) In particular, I consider Hegel's account of the emergence of Absolute Spirit, weigh its advantages and disadvantages as an approach to human moral experience and as a strategic move for environmentalists, and conclude with a refinement of Darwinian humanism and a clarification of its implications for environmental ethics. (shrink)

The generalized Darwinian research programme accepts physicalism, but holds that all life is purposive in character. It seeks to understand how and why all purposiveness has evolved in the universe – especially purposiveness associated with what we value most in human life, such as sentience, consciousness, person-to-person understanding, science, art, free¬dom, love. As evolution proceeds, the mechanisms of evolution themselves evolve to take into account the increasingly important role that purposive action can play - especially when quasi-Lamarckian evolution by (...) cultural means comes into existence. This programme of research brings together, into a coherent field of inquiry, aspects of such diverse fields of research as orthodox Darwinian theory (given its purposive interpretation), the study of animal behaviour, palaeontology, archaeology, history, anthropology, psycho-neurology, artificial intelligence, psychology, sociology, philosophy, linguistics, semantics, history and philosophy of science, and history and philosophy of inquiry more generally (the history and philosophy of ideas and culture). The great advantage of the generalized Darwinian research programme is that it provides a framework for understanding the deeds, achievements and experiences of people in a way that is compatible with the kind of knowledge and understanding achieved in the physical sciences, without being reducible to such knowledge and understanding. It promises to enable us to understand ourselves as a part of the biological domain without our humanity, our distinctive human value, being in any way denied: persons are not reduced to animals, and nor are animals misconceived to be persons. It holds out the hope that we can come to understand the human world as an integral part of the natural world without the meaning and value of the human world being thereby conceptually annihilated. The programme specifies in general terms what we must seek to do in order to develop a coherent understanding of nature and of ourselves which does justice to the character of both. (shrink)

I offer a Darwinian perspective on the existence of aesthetic interests, tastes, preferences, and productions. It is distinguished from the approaches of Denis Dutton and Geoffrey Miller, drawing instead on Richard O. Prum's notion of biotic artworlds. The relevance of neuroaesthetics to the philosophy of art is defended.

The controversy between Biometricians and Mendelians has been called an inexplicable embarrassment since it revolved around the mistaken identification of Mendelian genetics with non-Darwinian saltationism, a mistake traced back to the non-Darwinian William Bateson, who introduced Mendelian analysis to British science. The following paper beings to unravel this standard account of the controversy by raising a simple question: Given that Bateson embraced evolution by natural selection and that he studied the causes of variation within a broadly Darwinian (...) framework of problems and questions, how are we to understand the claim that he was a non-Darwinian? A brief survey of possible responses to this question is followed by an alternative proposal: the controversy will be considered as a struggle among Darwinians about the future course of Darwinism. On this account, Darwin's own work led to the juncture at which Mendelians and Biometricians parted company, indeed, the Origin itself prepared the divergent methodological stances subsequently adopted by Bateson and his antagonists. The inexplicable embarrassment is dissolved through the parsimonious reconstruction of the profound substantive conflict between Biometricians and Mendelians as a chapter in the articulation and differentiation of the Darwinian research programme. (shrink)

In Darwinian Myths, Edward Caudill examines the ability of Darwin's theory to inspire legends, focusing particularly on the impact of social Darwinism on popular culture. This compelling testimony to the power of myth shows the ways in which, over the years, Darwin's ideas - twisted, truncated, and misapplied - have been appropriated by individuals, governments, and cultural elites to lend credibility to xenophobic, racist, and imperialist political movements and policies. Caudill uses newspaper and magazine accounts and correspondence to trace (...) the myth-making and promotional efforts of Darwin himself, as well as the transformation of his empirically based theory into the philosophy of social Darwinism. (shrink)

Darwinian Evolution and Classical Liberalism brings together a collection of new essays that examine the multifaceted ferment between Darwinian biology and classical liberalism.

Darwinian Evolution and Classical Liberalism brings together a collection of new essays that examine the multifaceted ferment between Darwinian biology and classical liberalism.

(1992). Darwinian models of culture: Toward replacing the nature/nurture dichotomy. World Futures: Vol. 34, Evolutionary Models in the Social Sciences, pp. 43-57.

It is argued that purposive action of living things plays a crucial role in Darwinian evolution. As evolution proceeds, the mechanisms of evolution evolve as well, giving an increasingly important role to purposive action - to be understood in a sense which is compatible with physics (the atom of purposiveness being the thermostat). Nine versions of Darwinian theory are distinguished. The first denies that purposive action has any role in evolution at all; each successive version gives an inceasingly (...) important role to purposive action. Of fundamental importance is The Principle of Non-Circularity: The theory must not presuppose what it seeks to explain. (shrink)

Some philosophers suggest that the development of scientificknowledge is a kind of Darwinian process. The process of discovery,however, is one problematic element of this analogy. I compare HerbertSimon's attempt to simulate scientific discovery in a computer programto recent connectionist models that were not designed for that purpose,but which provide useful cases to help evaluate this aspect of theanalogy. In contrast to the classic A.I. approach Simon used, ``neuralnetworks'' contain no explicit protocols, but are generic learningsystems built on the model (...) of the interconnections of neurons in thebrain. I describe two cases that take the connectionist approach a stepfurther by using genetic algorithms, a form of evolutionary computationthat explicitly models Darwinian mechanisms. These cases show thatDarwinian mechanisms can make novel discoveries of complex, previouslyunknown patterns. With some caveats, they lend support to evolutionaryepistemology. (shrink)

The evolutionary synthesis of the 1930s and 1940s integrated the study of biological microevolution and biological macroevolution into the theoretically consistent and hugely productive field of evolutionary biology. A similar synthesis has yet to occur for the study of culture, and the social sciences remain fragmented and theoretically incompatible. Here, it is suggested that a Darwinian theory of cultural evolution can promote such a synthesis. Earlier non-Darwinian theories of cultural evolution, such as progress theories, lacked key elements of (...) a Darwinian theory of cultural evolution that are necessary to promote a synthesis, while other contemporary theories of cultural evolution, such as memetics, make too stringent neo-Darwinian assumptions that are inconsistent with evidence regarding cultural transmission. Several examples are given which indicate the beginnings of an evolutionary synthesis for culture, where patterns of cultural macroevolution have been explained in terms of underlying cultural microevolutionary forces. Finally, it is argued that experimental simulations of cultural evolution can play an important role in this emerging synthesis. (shrink)

The concept of Darwinian Happiness was coined to help people take advantage of knowledge on how evolution has shaped the brain; as processes within this organ are the main contributors to well-being. Fortuitously, the concept has implications that may prove beneficial for society: Compassionate behavior offers more in terms of Darwinian Happiness than malicious behavior; and the probability of obtaining sustainable development may be improved by pointing out that consumption beyond sustenance is not important for well-being. It is (...) difficult to motivate people to act against their own best interests. Darwinian Happiness offers a concept that, to some extent, combines the interests of the individual with the interests of society. (shrink)

One of the most deeply entrenched ideas in Popper's philosophy is the analogy between the growth of scientific knowledge and the Darwinian mechanism of natural selection. Popper gave his first exposition of these ideas very early on. In a letter to Donald Campbell, 1 Popper says that the idea goes back at least to the early thirties. 2 And he had a fairly detailed account of it in his "What is dialectic?", a talk given in 1937 and published in (...) 1940: 3 If we want to explain why human thought tends to try out every conceivable solution for any problem with which it is faced, then we can appeal to a highly general sort of regularity. The method by which a solution is approached is .. (shrink)

Street formulated a Darwinian Dilemma for realist theories of value. Much criticism of her formulation of the dilemma targets the second horn, posed by the scientifically implausible assumption of a tracking relation between our attitudes and evaluative truth. This paper shows how a recent wave of metaethical realism, most prominently defended by Scanlon, succeeds without a tracking relation and thus avoids the Darwinian Dilemma in Street's formulation. However, Scanlon's approach, which builds on the concept of a reason relation (...) and defends a metaphysically pluralist, domain‐specific conception of truth, runs into another version of the Darwinian Dilemma. The problem is not that Scanlon's realism assumes a tracking relation but that it assumes what I call reason monolithism – the idea that there is one possible expression of the faculty of reason and that this cognitive faculty could not be otherwise, which is scientifically implausible on similar grounds. (shrink)

This book proposes a radically evolutionary approach to biolinguistics that consists in considering human language as a form of species-specific intelligence entirely embodied in the corporeal structures of Homo sapiens. The book starts with a historical reconstruction of two opposing biolinguistic models: the Chomskian Biolinguistic Model (CBM) and the Darwinian Biolinguistic Model (DBM). The second part compares the two models and develops into a complete reconsideration of the traditional biolinguistic issues in an evolutionary perspective, highlighting their potential influence on (...) the paradigm of biologically oriented cognitive science. The third part formulates the philosophical, evolutionary and experimental basis of an extended theory of linguistic performativity within a naturalistic perspective of pragmatics of verbal language. The book proposes a model in which the continuity between human and non-human primates is linked to the gradual development of the articulatory and neurocerebral structures, and to a kind of prelinguistic pragmatics which characterizes the common nature of social learning. In contrast, grammatical, semantic and pragmatic skills that mark the learning of historical-natural languages are seen as a rapid acceleration of cultural evolution. The book makes clear that this acceleration will not necessarily favour the long-term adaptations for Homo sapiens. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION I first read Charles Darwin's masterpiece, On the Origin of Species , some twenty years ago. At once I fell under its spell - an emotion which ...

The myth of true, lifelong love promoted low divorce rates among farmers who depended on each other for survival. In the urban ecology after industrialization, it became increas­ingly clear that long-term monogamy goes against human nature. In the Scandinavian Modern Breakthrough, a late-1800s literary movement, Henrik Ibsen, August Strindberg, and others clashed in a battle over modern mating morality. Each interpreted Darwin to fit their own agenda, suggesting naturalistic understandings of “free love” and “true mar­riage,” some of which were laughable (...) while others landed authors in prison. Evolutionary theory from our present era suggests that human mate choice is guided by three brain systems: erotic lust, romantic love, and feelings of deep attachment; our species thus evolved for serial pair-bonding with extra-pair copulation. Using these and other evolutionary insights, this article evaluates narratives from the Modern Breakthrough, which laid the foundation for today’s gender-equal and sexually liberal Nordic societies. (shrink)

There are two distinct strands within modern philosophical ethics that are relevant to environmental philosophy: an empiricist strand that seeks a naturalist account of human conduct and a humanist strand rooted in a conception of transcendent human freedom. Each strand has its appeal, but each also raises both strategic and theoretical problems for environmental philosophers. Based on a reading of Kant's critical solution to the antinomy of freedom and nature, I recommend that environmental philosophers consider the possibility of a (...) class='Hi'>Darwinian humanism, through which moral agents are understood as both free and causally intertwined with the natural world. (shrink)

Originally published in 1979, The Darwinian Revolution was the first comprehensive and readable synthesis of the history of evolutionary thought. Though the years since have seen an enormous flowering of research on Darwin and other nineteenth-century scientists concerned with evolution, as well as the larger social and cultural responses to their work, The Darwinian Revolution remains remarkably current and stimulating. For this edition Michael Ruse has written a new afterword that takes into account the research published since his (...) book's first appearance. "It is difficult to believe that yet another book on Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution could add anything new or contain any surprises. Ruse's book is an exception on all counts. Darwin scholars and the general reader alike can learn from it."--David L. Hull, Nature "No other account of the Darwinian Revolution provides so detailed and sympathetic an account of the framework within which the scientific debates took place."--Peter J. Bowler, Canadian Journal of History "A useful and highly readable synthesis...skillfully organized and written with verve, imagination, and welcome touches of humor."--John C. Greene, Science. (shrink)

Most studies on the reception of Darwinism in France focus on the scientific community. This essay investigates the popular press. Widely discussed in French newspapers in 1878, Darwinism was connected with a sensational murder case in which two well-educated young men, Aimé Barré and Paul Lebiez, killed an elderly woman. Before his arrest, Lebiez had given a public lecture on the Darwinian “struggle for life.” Competing factions of the press explicitly linked the case with Darwinism to advance either conservative (...) or republican political agendas, which brought Darwinism into the public eye. This essay argues that Charles Darwin’s instrumentalization was decisive in spreading his theory in French society. That same year, the Academy of Sciences elected Darwin to membership after six failed attempts. (shrink)

Interactionism holds that explanatory and interpretive projects are mutually enriching. If so, then the evolutionary and cognitive science of religions’ explanatory theories should aid interpretive projects concerning religious meaning. Although interpretive accounts typically focus on the local and the particular, interpreters over the past century have construed Freud and Marx as offering general interpretive theories. So, precedent for general interpretive theorizing exists. 4E cognitive science, which champions how cognition is embedded in natural and cultural settings, extended into external structures, enacted (...) via motor routines, and embodied via representations rooted in human bodily form, has encouraged interpretive researchers. Theories of embodied cognition especially have embraced a sweeping view of meaning that attends to the emotions’ role and to their evolutionary origins. That inspires a 6E cognitive science that attends to the emotional and evolved dimensions of cognition too and opens up the possibility of general interpretive theories of broadly Darwinian character. Evolved cognitive systems qualify as maturationally natural cognition, which exhibits a distinctive constellation of features. The by-product theory holds that religious representations’ engagement of maturationally natural cognition fosters religions’ success. Representations with some minimal violation of intuitive expectations concerning some ontological category grab attention, stick in memory, and preserve the many automatic inferences accompanying the category. The empirical evidence for this and other elaborations of the by-product view suggests that it discloses dynamics of evolved cognition and associated emotions that tend to guide the pursuit of religious meanings systematically toward well-worn grooves in the semantic landscape. (shrink)

As Dobzhansky wrote, nothing in biology makes sense outside the context of the evolutionary theory, and this truth has not been sufficiently explored yet by medicine. We comment on Shanks and Pyles' recently published paper, Evolution and medicine: the long reach of "Dr. Darwin", and discuss some recent advancements in the application of evolutionary theory to carcinogenesis. However, we disagree with Shanks and Pyles about the usefulness of animal experiments in predicting human hazards. Based on the darwinian observation of (...) inter-species and inter-individual variation in all biological functions, Shanks and Pyles suggest that animal experiments cannot be used to identify hazards to human health. We claim that while the activity of enzymes may vary among individuals and among species, this does not indicate that critical events in disease processes occurring after exposure to hazardous agents differ qualitatively between animal models and humans. In addition, the goal is to avoid human disease whenever possible and with the means that are available at a given point in time. Epidemics of cancer could have been prevented if experimental data had been used to reduce human exposures or ban carcinogenic chemicals. We discuss examples. (shrink)

Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection is considered in its application to human beings in this book. Brian Baxter examines the various sociobiological approaches to the explanation of human behaviour which view the human brain, and so the human mind, as the product of evolution, and considers the main arguments for and against this claim. In so doing he defends the approaches against some common criticisms, such as the charge that they are reductionist and dehumanising. The implications of these (...) arguments for the social sciences and humanities are assessed, as is the naturalistic view of ethics to which they lead. A key issue examined in the book is the connection between this Darwinist perspective on human beings and modern environmental ethics, which also often assume that human beings are part of an evolved living world. The implications of these positions for the meaningfulness of human life are also examined.Throughout the discussion, the positions in sociobiology and environmental ethics developed by Edward O Wilson are taken as an exemplar of the characteristic features of a Darwinian worldview, and the arguments of Wilson and his chief critics are thoroughly examined. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that accurate indexical representations have been crucial for the survival and reproduction of homo sapiens sapiens. Specifically, I want to suggest that reliable processes have been selected for because of their indirect, but close, connection to true belief during the Pleistocene hunter-gatherer period of our ancestral history. True beliefs are not heritable, reliable processes are heritable. Those reliable processes connected with reasoning take the form of Darwinian Algorithms: a plethora of specialized, domain-specific inference rules (...) designed to solve specific, recurrent, adaptive problems in social exchange contexts. Humans do not reason logically, but adaptively. (shrink)

Against most social constructivist accounts of hunting this paper seeks to identify an embodied account of hunting and angling as a means of understanding its paradoxical popularity in late modernity. It evaluates the significance of two pro-hunting and angling discourses, those of Isaak Walton and Neo-Darwinian writers and argues that the appeal of hunting and angling, as evidenced through their copious literatures, descends from Walton rather than Neo-Darwinian sources. In particular it is the development of a highly sensual (...) relation with the natural world that the Waltonian discourse encourages, in contrast with the visualism of touristic encounters, that may account for its enduring popularity. (shrink)

In this work I characterize Darwinian approaches to human behavior and mind, especially evolutionary psychology, and analyze the main criticisms that these approaches have received. To this end I resort to Jean Marie Schaeffer’s criticism of the thesis of human exceptionality and the semantic perspective of scientific theories of Ronald Giere. I conclude that the main criticisms are not applicable to evolutionary psychology as a research program. I also conclude that it cannot be held a priori that the (...) class='Hi'>Darwinian approach is not applicable to the human mind and behavior. Finally, I discuss some educational implications of these debates. (shrink)

An attempt is made to answer this question by first analyzing the structure of Darwinian inheritance as it is exemplified in the current biological theory of evolution. Based on this analysis a generalized framework for Darwinian inheritance containing conditions which must be met by all proper Darwinian evolutionary theories is developed. Subsequently this framework is employed to assess, in part, the adequacy of Toulmin's evolutionary epistemology. Although Toulmin asserts that Darwinian inheritance operates in conceptual development, the (...) framework is used to show that the structure of concepts which he presents is unable to support the requirements for this kind of inheritance. It is concluded that Toulmin's evolutionary theory is not truly Darwinian. (shrink)

If the coming of the last universal cellular ancestor marks the crossing of the “Darwinian Threshold”, pre-LUCA evolution must have been pre-Darwinian. But how did pre-Darwinian evolution actually operate? Bringing together and extending insights from both earlier and more recent contributions, this essay advances three principal arguments regarding the pre-Darwinian evolution. First, in the pre-Darwinian epoch, survival essentially meant persistence within the prebiotic system, and it depended mostly on chemical variation and interaction. Second, selection operated (...) upon four different properties: chemical; chemical-physical; vesicles’ capacities in absorbing, engulfing, and merging; and protocells’ coupling of metabolism, replication, and division. Third, division evolved from a state without tight coupling of replication with division to a state of tight coupling. Eventually, protocells with a tight coupling of replication with division became the First Universal Cellular Ancestors and then LUCA. (shrink)