Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T03:29:32.486Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Species are Individuals: Theoretical Foundations for the Claim

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Mary B. Williams
Mary B. Williams*
Affiliation:
Center for Science and Culture, University of Delaware
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper shows that species are individuals with respect to evolutionary theory in the sense that the laws of the theory deal with species as irreducible wholes rather than as sets of organisms. ‘Species X’ is an instantiation of a primitive term of the theory. I present a sketch of a proof that it cannot be defined within the theory as a set of organisms; the proof relies not on details of my axiomatization but rather on a generally accepted property of speciation; hence the same argument should work for any axiomatization which captures this generally accepted property of speciation.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 52 , Issue 4 , December 1985 , pp. 578 - 590
Copyright
Copyright © 1985 by 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.)

Footnotes

†

Work on this paper has been supported by NSF grant SES-8206141.

References

REFERENCES

Beatty, J. (1982), “Classes and Cladists”, Systematic Zoology 31: 25–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beckner, M. (1959), The Biological Way of Thought. New York: Columbia University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benson, W. (1972), “Natural Selection for Mullerian Mimicry in Heliconus erato in Costa Rica”, Science 176: 936–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brady, R. (1982), “Theoretical Issues and ‘Pattern Cladistics‘”, Systematic Zoology 31: 286–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bunge, M. (1981), “Biopopulations, not Biospecies, Are Individuals and Evolve”, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 4: 284–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caplan, A. (1981), “Pick Your Poison: Historicism, Essentialism, and Emergentism in the Definition of Species”, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 4: 285–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ghiselin, M. (1966), “On Psychologism in the Logic of Taxonomic Controversies”, Systematic Zoology 15: 207–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ghiselin, M. (1969), The Triumph of the Darwinian Method. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Ghiselin, M. (1974), The Economy of Nature and the Evolution of Sex. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Ghiselin, M. (1981), “Categories, Life, and Thinking”, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 4: 269–83.Google Scholar
Holsinger, K. E. (1984), “The Nature of Biological Species”, Philosophy of Science 51: 293–307.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hull, D. L. (1975), “Central Subjects and Historical Narratives”, History and Theory 14: 253–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hull, D. L. (1976a), “Are Species Really Individuals?”, Systematic Zoology 25: 174–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hull, D. L. (1976b), “The Ontological Status of Biological Species”, in PSA 1974, Cohen, R. S. et al. (eds.). Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol. 32. Dordrecht: D. Reidel, pp. 347–58.Google Scholar
Hull, D. L. (1978), “A Matter of Individuality”, Philosophy of Science 45: 355–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hull, D. L. (1981), “Metaphysics and Common Usage”, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 4: 290–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mayr, E. (1963), Animal Species and Evolution. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mayr, E. (1982), The Growth of Biological Thought. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Mayr, E. et al. (1953), Methods and Principles of Systematic Zoology. New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
McKinsey, J. (1935), “On the Independence of Undefined Ideas”, Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, pp. 291–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Padoa, A. [1900] (1967), “Logical Introduction to Any Deductive Theory”, From Frege to Gödel: A Source Book in Mathematical Logic 1879–1931, Heijenoort, J. van (ed.). Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Patterson, C. (1982), “Classes and Cladists or Individuals and Evolution”, Systematic Zoology 31: 284–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Platnick, N. (1982), “Defining Characters and Evolutionary Groups”, Systematic Zoology 31: 282–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruse, M. (1981), “Species as Individuals: Logical, Biological, and Philosophical Problems”, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 4: 299–300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simpson, G. (1945), “The Principles of Classification and a Classification of Mammals”, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 85: 1–350.Google Scholar
Williams, M. (1970), “Deducing the Consequences of Evolution: A Mathematical Model”, Journal of Theoretical Biology 29: 343–85.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed