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Articles 1 - 22 of 22

Full-Text Articles in Philosophy of Science

The Mirage Of A Space Between Nature And Nurture By Evelyn Fox Keller (Review), David Depew Feb 2012

The Mirage Of A Space Between Nature And Nurture By Evelyn Fox Keller (Review), David Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Mariska Leunissen, Explanation And Teleology In Aristotle’S Science Of Nature, David J. Depew Dec 2010

Mariska Leunissen, Explanation And Teleology In Aristotle’S Science Of Nature, David J. Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Darwinian Controversies: An Historiographical Recounting, David Depew Dec 2009

Darwinian Controversies: An Historiographical Recounting, David Depew

David J Depew

This essay reviews key controversies in the history of the Darwinian research tradition: the Wilberforce-Huxley debate in 1860, early twentieth-century debates about the heritability of acquired characteristics and the consistency of Mendelian genetics with natural selection; the 1925 Scopes trial about teaching evolution; tensions about race, culture, and eugenics at the 1959 centenary celebration Darwin’s Origin of Species; adaptationism and its critics in the Sociobiology debate of 1970s and, more recently, Evolutionary Psychology; and current disputes about Intelligent Design. These controversies, I argue, are etched into public memory because they occur at the emotionally charged boundaries between public-political, technical-scientific, and …


David Sedley, Creationism And Its Critics In Antiquity, David Depew Dec 2007

David Sedley, Creationism And Its Critics In Antiquity, David Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


John Gibson, Fiction And The Weave Of Life, David J. Depew Dec 2006

John Gibson, Fiction And The Weave Of Life, David J. Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Bert Bender, Evolution And The Sex Problem (Review), David Depew Feb 2006

Bert Bender, Evolution And The Sex Problem (Review), David Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Darwinisms’S Multiple Ontologies, David J. Depew Dec 2004

Darwinisms’S Multiple Ontologies, David J. Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Darwinism, Design And Complex Systems Dynamics, David Depew, Bruce Weber Dec 2003

Darwinism, Design And Complex Systems Dynamics, David Depew, Bruce Weber

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


The Philosophy Of Biology: An Episodic History, David Depew, Grene Marjorie Dec 2003

The Philosophy Of Biology: An Episodic History, David Depew, Grene Marjorie

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


[James Mark] Baldwin And His Many Effects, David Depew Dec 2002

[James Mark] Baldwin And His Many Effects, David Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Protecting Evolutionary Theory From Bad Company: J. Strick, Sparks Of Life: Darwinism And The Victorian Debates Over Spontaneous Generation (Review), David J. Depew Dec 2002

Protecting Evolutionary Theory From Bad Company: J. Strick, Sparks Of Life: Darwinism And The Victorian Debates Over Spontaneous Generation (Review), David J. Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Aristotle, Naturalist.” Invited Review Essay Of James Lennox, Aristotle’S Philosophy Of Biology, David J. Depew Dec 2001

Aristotle, Naturalist.” Invited Review Essay Of James Lennox, Aristotle’S Philosophy Of Biology, David J. Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Developmental Systems, Darwinian Evolution,And The Unity Of Science, Bruce Weber, David Depew Dec 2000

Developmental Systems, Darwinian Evolution,And The Unity Of Science, Bruce Weber, David Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


The Baldwin Effect: An Archeology, David Depew Dec 1999

The Baldwin Effect: An Archeology, David Depew

David J Depew

Abstract: “The Baldwin effect” stands for a wide variety of ways in which learn ing can be conceived as guiding adap tive evolution ary change. An analysis of the history of this notion reveals that it does not reliably refer either to a theory-neutral empirical phenomenon or to a single theoretical hypothesis. On the contrary, articulations of the general idea depend on distinctive, but in commensurable, theoretical backgrounds. In reconstructing the conceptual history of the Baldwin effect I hope to support contemporary explorations of idea by encouraging the articulation of new theoretical frameworks in which it might make sense. I …


The New Philosophy Of Science And Its Lessons, David J. Depew Dec 1999

The New Philosophy Of Science And Its Lessons, David J. Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Darwinism And Developmentalism: Prospects For Convergence, David Depew Dec 1997

Darwinism And Developmentalism: Prospects For Convergence, David Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Intelligent Design And Irreducible Complexity, David Depew Dec 1997

Intelligent Design And Irreducible Complexity, David Depew

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Natural Selection And Self-Organization: Dynamical Models As Clues To A New Evolutionary Synthesis, Bruce Weber, David Depew Dec 1995

Natural Selection And Self-Organization: Dynamical Models As Clues To A New Evolutionary Synthesis, Bruce Weber, David Depew

David J Depew

The Darwinian concept of natural selection was conceived within a set of Newtonianbackground assumptions about systems dynamics. Mendelian genetics at first did not sit well with the gradualist assumptions of the Darwinian theory. Eventually, however. Mendelism and Darwinism were fused by reformulating natural selection in statistical terms. This reflected a shift to a more probabilistic set of background assumptions based upon Boltzmannian systems dynamics. Recent developments in molecular genetics and paleontology have put pressure on Darwinism once again. Current work on self-organizing systems may provide a stimulus not only for increased problem solving within the Darwinian tradition, especially with respect …


Darwinism Evolving: Systems Dynamics And The Genealogy Of Natural Selection, David Depew, Bruce Weber Dec 1994

Darwinism Evolving: Systems Dynamics And The Genealogy Of Natural Selection, David Depew, Bruce Weber

David J Depew

Darwinism Evolving examines the Darwinian research tradition in evolutionary biology from its inception to its turbulent present, arguing that recent advances in modeling the nonlinear dynamics of complex systems may well catalyze the next major phase of Darwinian evolutionism.While Darwinism has successfully resisted reduction to physics, the authors point out that it has from the outset developed and applied its core explanatory concept, natural selection, by borrowing models from dynamics, a branch of physics. The recent development of complex systems dynamics may afford Darwinism yet another occasion to expand its explanatory power.Darwinism's use of dynamical models has received insufficient attention …


Evolution, Ethics, And The Complexity Revolution, David Depew, Bruce Weber Dec 1994

Evolution, Ethics, And The Complexity Revolution, David Depew, Bruce Weber

David J Depew

No abstract provided.


Evolution In Thermodynamic Perspective: An Ecological Approach, Bruce H. Weber, David J. Depew, C Dyke, Stanley N. Salthe, Eric D. Schneider, Jeffrey S. Wicken, Robert E. Ulanowicz Dec 1988

Evolution In Thermodynamic Perspective: An Ecological Approach, Bruce H. Weber, David J. Depew, C Dyke, Stanley N. Salthe, Eric D. Schneider, Jeffrey S. Wicken, Robert E. Ulanowicz

David J Depew

Recognition that biological systems are stabilized far from equilibrium by self-organizing, informed, autocatalytic cycles and structures that dissipate unusable energy and matter has led to recent attempts to reformulate evolutionary theory. We hold that such insights are consistent with the broad development of the Darwinian Tradition and with the concept of natural selection. Biological systems are selected that re not only more efficient than competitors but also enhance the integrity of the web of energetic relations in which they are embedded. But the expansion of the informational phase space, upon which selection acts, is also guaranteed by the properties of …


Evolution At A Crossroads: The New Biology And The New Philosophy Of Science, David Depew, Bruce Weber Dec 1984

Evolution At A Crossroads: The New Biology And The New Philosophy Of Science, David Depew, Bruce Weber

David J Depew

No abstract provided.