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"Godfrey-Smith, Peter"
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Darwinian populations and natural selection
In 1859 Charles Darwin described a deceptively simple mechanism that he called “natural selection,” a combination of variation, inheritance, and reproductive success. He argued that this mechanism was the key to explaining the most puzzling features of the natural world, and science and philosophy were changed forever as a result. The exact nature of the Darwinian process has been controversial ever since, however. The author draws on new developments in biology, philosophy of science, and other fields to give a new analysis and extension of Darwin's idea. The central concept used is that of a “Darwinian population,” a collection of things with the capacity to undergo change by natural selection. From this starting point, new analyses of the role of genes in evolution, the application of Darwinian ideas to cultural change, and “evolutionary transitions” that produce complex organisms and societies are developed.
eBook
النظرية والواقع : مقدمة في فلسفة العلم
يقوم هذا الكتاب في الأساس على محاضرات في (فلسفة العلم) ألقاها المؤلف في جامعة ستانفورد خلال أحد عشر عاما، ولهذا فهو خلاصة لتلك المحاضرات لكن دون أن يقتصر عليها، إذ يحمل أيضا تأثير عدد لا حصر له من تعليقات الطلبة وأسئلتهم وأبحاثهم طوال تلك المدة، مضافا إليها ملاحظات أدلى بها ثلة من زملاء المؤلف وأصدقائه والكتاب موجه لطالب الفلسفة خصوصا، لكن المؤلف أراد له أن يصل لشريحة واسعة من القراء، فلا حاجة للقارئ بأن يكون على أي اطلاع مسبق بالفلسفة، لأن الغاية الأولى هي تقديم بعض الموضوعات الرئيسية المتكررة في فلسفة العلم، مع القيام في الوقت نفسه بسرد قصة مفهومة ومثيرة للاهتمام حول كيفية تطور هذا الحقل خلال القرن المنصرم أو ما قبل ذلك بقليل.
Book
Reafference and the origin of the self in early nervous system evolution
Discussions of the function of early nervous systems usually focus on a causal flow from sensors to effectors, by which an animal coordinates its actions with exogenous changes in its environment. We propose, instead, that much early sensing was reafferent; it was responsive to the consequences of the animal's own actions. We distinguish two general categories of reafference—translocational and deformational—and use these to survey the distribution of several often-neglected forms of sensing, including gravity sensing, flow sensing and proprioception. We discuss sensing of these kinds in sponges, ctenophores, placozoans, cnidarians and bilaterians. Reafference is ubiquitous, as ongoing action, especially whole-body motility, will almost inevitably influence the senses. Corollary discharge—a pathway or circuit by which an animal tracks its own actions and their reafferent consequences—is not a necessary feature of reafferent sensing but a later-evolving mechanism. We also argue for the importance of reafferent sensing to the evolution of the body-self, a form of organization that enables an animal to sense and act as a single unit. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Basal cognition: multicellularity, neurons and the cognitive lens’.
Journal Article
Reproduction, symbiosis, and the eukaryotic cell
This paper develops a conceptual framework for addressing questions about reproduction, individuality, and the units of selection in symbiotic associations, with special attention to the origin of the eukaryotic cell. Three kinds of reproduction are distinguished, and a possible evolutionary sequence giving rise to a mitochondrion-containing eukaryotic cell from an endosymbiotic partnership is analyzed as a series of transitions between each of the three forms of reproduction. The sequence of changes seen in this “egalitarian” evolutionary transition is compared with those that apply in “fraternal” transitions, such as the evolution of multicellularity in animals.
Journal Article
Learning and the biology of consciousness: a commentary on Birch, Ginsburg, and Jablonka
Birch, Ginsburg, and Jablonka suggest that Unlimited Associative Learning is a “transition marker” in the evolutionary process that produced consciousness, and organizes research by tying together a range of “hallmarks” of consciousness. I argue that the features they recognize as “hallmarks” are indeed important in the evolution of consciousness, but UAL may have a more limited role.
Journal Article
MIND, MATTER, AND METABOLISM
I discuss the bearing on the mind-body problem of some general characteristics of living systems, including the physical basis of metabolism and the relation between living activity and cognitive capacities in simple organisms. I then attempt to describe stages in the history of animal life important to the evolution of subjective experience. Features of the biological basis of cognition are used to criticize arguments against materialism that draw on the conceivability of a separation between mental and physical. I also argue against commonly held views about the \"multiple realizability\" of mental states of the kind seen in humans. The aim of the paper is to reconfigure and narrow the \"explanatory gap\" between mental and physical.
Journal Article
A tortoise–hare pattern seen in adapting structured and unstructured populations suggests a rugged fitness landscape in bacteria
In the context of Wright’s adaptive landscape, genetic epistasis can yield a multipeaked or “rugged” topography. In an unstructured population, a lineage with selective access to multiple peaks is expected to fix rapidly on one, which may not be the highest peak. In a spatially structured population, on the other hand, beneficial mutations take longer to spread. This slowdown allows distant parts of the population to explore the landscape semiindependently. Such a population can simultaneously discover multiple peaks, and the genotype at the highest discovered peak is expected to dominate eventually. Thus, structured populations sacrifice initial speed of adaptation for breadth of search. As in the fable of the tortoise and the hare, the structured population (tortoise) starts relatively slow but eventually surpasses the unstructured population (hare) in average fitness. In contrast, on single-peak landscapes that lack epistasis, all uphill paths converge. Given such “smooth” topography, breadth of search is devalued and a structured population only lags behind an unstructured population in average fitness (ultimately converging). Thus, the tortoise–hare pattern is an indicator of ruggedness. After verifying these predictions in simulated populations where ruggedness is manipulable, we explore average fitness in metapopulations ofEscherichia coli. Consistent with a rugged landscape topography, we find a tortoise–hare pattern. Further, we find that structured populations accumulate more mutations, suggesting that distant peaks are higher. This approach can be used to unveil landscape topography in other systems, and we discuss its application for antibiotic resistance, engineering problems, and elements of Wright’s shifting balance process.
Journal Article
Gradualism and the Evolution of Experience
In evolution, large-scale changes that involve the origin of complex new traits occur gradually, in a broad sense of the term. This principle applies to the origin of subjective or felt experience. I respond to difficulties that have been raised for a gradualist view in this area, and sketch a scenario for the gradual evolution of subjective experience, drawing on recent research into early nervous system evolution.
Journal Article
Dewey and the Question of Realism
An interpretation is given of John Dewey's views about \"realism\" in metaphysics, and of how these views relate to contemporary debates. Dewey rejected standard formulations of realism as a general metaphysical position, and interpreters have often been taken him to be sympathetic to some form of verificationism or constructivism. I argue that these interpretations are mistaken, as Dewey's unease with standard formulations of realism comes from his philosophical emphasis on intelligent control of events, by means of ordinary action. Because of his views about relations, Dewey's views in this area do risk collapsing into an overly holistic position. I discuss how these problems might be avoided, and consider also how Dewey's views about naturalism and realism might usefully inform ongoing work.
Journal Article