Hostname: page-component-6bb9c88b65-2jdt9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-07-25T00:19:21.662Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

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
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

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.

Information

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

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

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

REFERENCES

Achinstein, P. (1974), “The Identity of Properties”, American Philosophical Quarterly 11, 4: pp. 257–75.Google Scholar
Armstrong, D. (1978), Universals and Scientific Realism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Carnap, R. (1947), “On the Application of Inductive Logic”, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 8: pp. 133–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cartwright, N. (1980a), “Do the Laws of Nature State the Facts?”, Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 61, 1: pp. 75–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cartwright, N. (1980b), “The Truth Doesn't Explain Much”, American Philosophical Quarterly 17, 2: pp. 159–63.Google Scholar
Dawkins, R. (1976), The Selfish Gene. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Doolittle, W. and Sapienza, C. (1980), “Selfish Genes, The Phenotype Paradigm, and Genome Evolution”, Nature 284: 601–3.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fisher, R. (1930), The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection. New York: Dover.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goodman, N. (1965), Fact, Fiction, and Forecast. Indianapolis: Bobbs Merrill.Google Scholar
Joseph, G. (1979), “Riemannian Geometry and Philosophical Conventionalism”, Australasian Journal of Philosophy 57, 3: pp. 225–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Joseph, G. (1980), “The Many Sciences and the One World”, Journal of Philosophy LXXVII, 12: 773–90.Google Scholar
Lewontin, R. (1970), “The Units of Selection”, Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 1, 1: pp. 1–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewontin, R. (1974), The Genetic Basis of Evolutionary Change. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Lewontin, R. and Dunn, L. (1960), “The Evolutionary Dynamics of a Polymorphism in the House Mouse”, Genetics 45: pp. 705–22.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Li, C. (1955), Population Genetics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Mayr, E. (1963), Animal Species and Evolution. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mills, S. and Beatty, J. (1979), “The Propensity Interpretation of Fitness”, Philosophy of Science 46: 263–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Orgel, L. and Crick, F. (1980), “Selfish DNA: The Ultimate Parasite”, Nature 284: pp. 604–7.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Reichenbach, H. (1958), The Philosophy of Space and Time. New York: Dover.Google Scholar
Shoemaker, S. (1980), “Causality and Properties”, in Inwagen, P. van (ed.), Essays in Honor of Richard Taylor. Dordrecht: Reidel.Google Scholar
Sober, E. (1980), “Holism, Individualism, and the Units of Selection”, in P. Asquith and R. Giere (eds.) PSA 1980, vol. 2, Proceedings of the 1980 Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association: East Lansing, Michigan.Google Scholar
Sober, E. (1981a), “Evolutionary Theory and the Ontological Status of Properties”, Philosophical Studies 40: 147–176.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sober, E. (1982a), “Realism and Independence”, NoÛs, forthcoming.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sober, E. (1982b), “Why Logically Equivalent Predicates May Pick Out Different Properties”, American Philosophical Quarterly, forthcoming.Google Scholar
Williams, G. (1966), Adaptation and Natural Selection. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Wimsatt, W. (1980), “Reductionistic Research Strategies and Their Biases in the Units of Selection Controversy”, in T. Nickles (ed.), Scientific Discovery, vol. 2, Case Studies. Dordrecht: Reidel.CrossRefGoogle Scholar