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Full-Text Articles in History of Philosophy
Ecological Laws And Their Promise Of Explanations, Viorel Pâslaru
Ecological Laws And Their Promise Of Explanations, Viorel Pâslaru
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Marcel Weber (1999) argued that the principle of competitive exclusion is a law of ecology that could explain phenomena (1) by direct application, or (2) by describing default states. Since he did not offer an account of explanation by direct application of laws, I offer an interpretation of explanation by direct application of laws based on a proposal by Elgin and Sober (2002). I show that in both cases it is the descriptions of mechanisms that explain phenomena, and not the laws. Lev Ginzburg and Mark Colyvan (2004) argued Malthus’ Law of Exponential Growth is the first law of ecology, …