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dc.contributor.authorGarson, Justinen_US
dc.date.accessioned2017-07-03T03:35:41Z
dc.date.available2017-07-03T03:35:41Z
dc.date.issued2016en_US
dc.identifier.isbn978-3-319-32018-2en_US
dc.identifier.isbn978-3-319-32020-5en_US
dc.identifier.otherHPU5160230en_US
dc.identifier.urihttps://lib.hpu.edu.vn/handle/123456789/26078
dc.description.abstractThis book is a critical survey of and guidebook to the literature on biological functions. It ties in with current debates and developments, and at the same time, it looks back on the state of discourse in naturalized teleology prior to the 1970s. It also presents three significant new proposals. First, it describes the generalized selected effects theory, which is one version of the selected effects theory, maintaining that the function of a trait consists in the activity that led to its differential persistence or reproduction in a population, and not merely its differential reproduction. Secondly, it advances “within-discipline pluralism” (as opposed to between-discipline pluralism) a new form of function pluralism, which emphasizes the coexistence of function concepts within diverse biological sub-disciplines. Lastly, it provides a critical assessment of recent alternatives to the selected effects theory of function, namely, the weak etiological theory and the systems-theoretic theory. The book argues that, to the extent that functions purport to offer causal explanations for the existence of a trait, there are no viable alternatives to the selected effects view. The debate about biological functions is still as relevant and important to biology and philosophy as it ever was. Recent controversies surrounding the ENCODE Project Consortium in genetics, the nature of psychiatric classification, and the value of ecological restoration, all point to the continuing relevance to biology of philosophical discussion about the nature of functions. In philosophy, ongoing debates about the nature of biological information, intentionality, health and disease, mechanism, and even biological trait classification, are closely related to debates about biological functions.en_US
dc.format.extent119 p.en_US
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen_US
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherSpringeren_US
dc.subjectBiological Functionsen_US
dc.subjectBiologyen_US
dc.subjectPhilosophyen_US
dc.titleA Critical Overview of Biological Functionsen_US
dc.typeBooken_US
dc.size1,474Kben_US
dc.departmentTechnologyen_US


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