Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-mzp66 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-08T22:32:47.267Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Species Have (Partly) Intrinsic Essences

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

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

Abstract

The paper defends the doctrine that Linnaean taxa, including species, have essences that are, at least partly, underlying intrinsic, mostly genetic, properties. The consensus among philosophers of biology is that such essentialism is deeply wrong, indeed incompatible with Darwinism. I argue that biological generalizations about the morphology, physiology, and behavior of species require structural explanations that must advert to these essential properties. The paper concludes by summarizing my responses to the objection that, according to current “species concepts,” species are relational, and to the objection that essentialism cannot accommodate features of Darwinism associated with variation and change.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 77 , Issue 5 , December 2010 , pp. 648 - 661
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.)

Footnotes

‡

This paper is a greatly shortened version of my “Resurrecting Biological Essentialism” (2008).

References

Biello, David. 2007. “Life's Bar Code: Genetic Tests Unveil 15 New Species of North American Birds.” Science and Technology at Scientific American.com, February 22.Google Scholar
Boyd, Richard. 1999. “Homeostasis, Species, and Higher Taxa.” In Species: New Interdisciplinary Essays, ed. Wilson, Robert A., 141–85. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Devitt, Michael. 2005. “Rigid Application.” Philosophical Studies 125:139–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Devitt, Michael. 2008. “Resurrecting Biological Essentialism.” Philosophy of Science 75:344–82. Repr. in Devitt 2010, 213–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Devitt, Michael. 2009. “Biological Realism.” In From Truth to Reality: New Essays in Logic and Metaphysics, ed. Dyke, Heather, 43–65. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Devitt, Michael. 2010. Putting Metaphysics First:Essays on Metaphysics and Epistemology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dupré, John. 1981. “Natural Kinds and Biological Taxa.” Philosophical Review 90:66–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dupré, John. 1999. “On the Impossibility of a Monistic Account of Species.” In Species: New Interdisciplinary Essays, ed. Wilson, Robert A., 3–22. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Ereshefsky, Marc. 1992a. “Introduction.” In The Units of Evolution: Essays on the Nature of Species, ed. Ereshefsky, Marc, xiii–xvii. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Ereshefsky, Marc. 1992b. “Introduction to Part II: Philosophical Issues.” In The Units of Evolution: Essays on the Nature of Species, ed. Ereshefsky, Marc, 187–98. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Ereshefsky, Marc. 1998. “Species Pluralism and Anti-realism.” Philosophy of Science 65:103–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ereshefsky, Marc. 1999. “Species and the Linnaean Hierarchy.” In Species: New Interdisciplinary Essays, ed. Wilson, Robert A., 285–305. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Ereshefsky, Marc. 2001. The Poverty of the Linnaean Hierarchy: A Philosophical Study of Biological Taxonomy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Ghiselin, Michael T. 1974/1992. “A Radical Solution to the Species Problem.” Systematic Zoology 47:350–83. Repr. in The Units of Evolution: Essays on the Nature of Species, ed. Ereshefsky, Marc, 279–91. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Griffiths, Graham C. D. 1974. “On the Foundations of Biological Systematics.” Acta Biotheoretica 23:85–131.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Griffiths, Paul. 1999. “Squaring the Circle: Natural Kinds with Historical Essences.” In Species: New Interdisciplinary Essays, ed. Wilson, Robert A., 209–28. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Griffiths, Paul. 2002 “What Is Innateness?” Monist 85:70–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hull, David L. 1965/1992. “The Effects of Essentialism on Taxonomy: Two Thousand Years of Stasis.” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 15:314–26; 16:1–18. Repr. in The Units of Evolution: Essays on the Nature of Species, ed. Ereshefsky, Marc, 199–225. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Hull, David L.. 1978/1992. “A Matter of Individuality.” Philosophy of Science 45:335–60. Repr. in The Units of Evolution: Essays on the Nature of Species, ed. Ereshefsky, Marc, 293–316. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Keil, Frank C. 1989. Concepts, Kinds, and Cognitive Development. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Kitcher, Philip. 1984/2003. “Species.” Philosophy of Science 51:308–33. Repr. in In Mendel's Mirror: Philosophical Reflections on Biology, 113–34. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kitcher, Philip. 1989/2003. “Some Puzzles about Species.” In In Mendel's Mirror: Philosophical Reflections on Biology, 135–58. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kitts, David B., and Kitts, David J.. 1979. “Biological Species as Natural Kinds.” Philosophy of Science 46:613–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kornblith, Hilary. 1993. Inductive Inference and Its Inductive Ground: An Essay in Naturalistic Epistemology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Kripke, Saul. 1980. Naming and Necessity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Matthen, Mohan. 1998. “Biological Universals and the Nature of Fear.” Journal of Philosophy 95:105–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mayr, Ernst. 1961. “Cause and Effect in Biology.” Science 134:1501–6.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mayr, Ernst. 1963/1992. “Species Concepts and Their Application.” In Populations, Species, and Evolution, chap. 2. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Repr. in The Units of Evolution: Essays on the Nature of Species, ed. Ereshefsky, Marc, 15–25. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mayr, Ernst. 1982. The Growth of Biological Thought. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Millikan, Ruth Garrett. 2000. On Clear and Confused Ideas. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mishler, Brent D. 1999. “Getting Rid of Species?” In Species: New Interdisciplinary Essays, ed. Wilson, Robert A., 307–15. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Okasha, Samir. 2002. “Darwinian Metaphysics: Species and the Question of Essentialism.” Synthese 131:191–213.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Popper, Karl R. 1950. The Open Society and Its Enemies. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Putnam, Hilary. 1975. Mind, Language and Reality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quine, Willard V. 1960. Word and Object. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Rosenberg, Alex. 1985. The Structure of Biological Science. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruse, Michael. 1987/1992. “Biological Species: Natural Kinds, Individuals, or What?” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 38:225–42. Repr. in The Units of Evolution: Essays on the Nature of Species, ed. Ereshefsky, Marc, 343–61. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Sober, Elliott. 1980/1992. “Evolution, Population Thinking and Essentialism.” Philosophy of Science 47:350–83. Repr. in The Units of Evolution: Essays on the Nature of Species, ed. Ereshefsky, Marc, 247–78. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Sober, Elliott. 1993. Philosophy of Biology. Boulder, CO: Westview.Google Scholar
Stanford, P. Kyle. 1995. “For Pluralism and Against Realism about Species.” Philosophy of Science 62:70–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sterelny, Kim. 1999. “Species as Ecological Mosaics.” In Species: New Interdisciplinary Essays, ed. Wilson, Robert A., 119–38. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Sterelny, Kim, and Griffiths, Paul. 1999. Sex and Death. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wade, Nicholas. 2006. “Scientists Hope to Unravel Neanderthal DNA and Human Mysteries.” New York Times, July 21.Google Scholar
Webster, Gerry, and Goodwin, Brian C.. 1996. Form and Transformation: Generative and Relational Principles in Biology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wiggins, David. 1980. Sameness and Substance. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Wilson, Robert A. 1999. “Realism, Essence, and Kind: Resuscitating Species Essentialism?” In Species: New Interdisciplinary Essays, ed. Wilson, Robert A., 187–207. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar