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Artifact, Cause and Genic Selection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Elliott Sober  and
Richard C. Lewontin
Elliott Sober
Affiliation:
Philosophy Department University of Wisconsin-Madison
Richard C. Lewontin
Affiliation:
Museum of Comparative Zoology Harvard University
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Abstract

Several evolutionary biologists have used a parsimony argument to argue that the single gene is the unit of selection. Since all evolution by natural selection can be represented in terms of selection coefficients attaching to single genes, it is, they say, “more parsimonious” to think that all selection is selection for or against single genes. We examine the limitations of this genic point of view, and then relate our criticisms to a broader view of the role of causal concepts and the dangers of reification in science.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 49 , Issue 2 , June 1982 , pp. 157 - 180
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

This paper was written while the authors held grants, respectively, from the University of Wisconsin Graduate School and the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation and from the Department of Energy (DE-AS02-76EV02472). We thank John Beatty, James Crow, and Steven Orzack for helpful suggestions.

References

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