Biology Studies in the Bay Area

Philosophical Pizza Munch, 8 February

We'll have a Munch on Thursday, 8 February. Laurence Howard will lead a discussion of Shannon's notion of information.

As always, please let Mike G. and me know your preferences if you're coming (veg? allergies?) so we can plan the food and drink. We'll gather in the front lobby at 6:30 and then go up to the IZ&G Department on the 4th floor.

The Academy is at 875 Howard St., between 4th and 5th streets; phone 415-321-8000. Take public transportation to the Powell St. station, and walk south two blocks; or park at the public garage at 5th and Mission ($2/hr.) and walk south 1 block. SamTrans, AC transit, GG transit, and CalTrans all land reasonably close by. The Academy has a web page with all the details.

Suggestions for future Munch topics are very welcome.

Philosophical Pizza Munch, Thursday, 11 January

We'll have a Munch on Thursday, 11 January. Mike Trestman (UC Davis) will lead a discussion of his paper, "The uses of information".

As always, please let Mike G. and me know your preferences if you're coming (veg? allergies?) so we can plan the food and drink. We'll gather in the front lobby at 6:30 and then go up to the IZ&G Department on the 4th floor.

The Academy is at 875 Howard St., between 4th and 5th streets; phone 415-321-8000. Take public transportation to the Powell St. station, and walk south two blocks; or park at the public garage at 5th and Mission ($2/hr.) and walk south 1 block. SamTrans, AC transit, GG transit, and CalTrans all land reasonably close by. The Academy has a web page with all the details.

Suggestions for future Munch topics are very welcome.

Philosophical Pizza Munch, Thursday, December 7

We'll have a Munch on Thursday, 7 December. I'll lead a discussion of GIllian Barker's paper, "Biological levers and extended adaptationism", which is under revision for BIology and Philosophy. Here's the abstract:

Two critiques of simple adaptationism are distinguished: anti-adaptationism and extended adaptationism. Adaptationists and anti-adaptationists share the presumption that an evolutionary explanation should identify the dominant simple cause of the evolutionary outcome to be explained. A consideration of extended-adaptationist models such as coevolution, niche construction and extended phenotypes reveals the inappropriateness of this presumption in explaining the evolution of certain important kinds of features – those that play particular roles in the regulation of organic processes, especially behavior. These biological or behavioral ‘levers’ are distinctively available for adaptation and exaptation by their possessors and for co-optation by other organisms. As a result they are likely to result from a distinctive and complex type of evolutionary process that conforms neither to simple adaptationist nor to anti-adaptationist styles of explanation. Many of the human features whose evolutionary explanation is most controversial belong to this category, including the female orgasm.

As always, please let Mike G. and me know your preferences if you're coming (veg? allergies?) so we can plan the food and drink. We'll gather in the front lobby at 6:30 and then go up to the IZ&G Department on the 4th floor.

The Academy is at 875 Howard St., between 4th and 5th streets; phone 415-321-8000. Take public transportation to the Powell St. station, and walk south two blocks; or park at the public garage at 5th and Mission ($2/hr.) and walk south 1 block. SamTrans, AC transit, GG transit, and CalTrans all land reasonably close by. The Academy has a web page with all the details.

Suggestions for future Munch topics are very welcome.

Roberta Millstein on causes in evolution, December 6

Townsend Center Working Group in the History and Philosophy of Logic, Mathematics, and Science
University of California, Berkeley
Dennes Room (234 Moses Hall)
Wednesday, December 6, 2006, 6-7:30 p.m.

Roberta Millstein (UC Davis, Philosophy)

Finding the Causes in an Evolving Population: Lessons From an Early Drifter

Biologists and philosophers have been extremely pessimistic about the possibility of demonstrating random drift in nature, particularly when it comes to discriminating random drift from natural selection. However, examination of a historical case -- Maxime Lamotte's study of natural populations of the land snail, Cepaea nemoralis in the 1950s -- shows that while some pessimism is warranted, it has been overstated. Indeed, by describing a unique signature for drift, and showing that this signature obtained in the populations under study, Lamotte was able to make a good case for a significant role for drift. It may be difficult to disentangle the causes of drift and selection acting in a population, but it is not (always) impossible. More broadly, this case raises the question of how to disentangle causes when multiple causes are operating. In other words, we need an account that tells us how to figure out which causes are operating, and how to measure their relative effects, if the latter is even possible.

Biology Studies Reading Group, 27 November

We'll have a meeting of the Biology Studies Reading Group on November 27, 4:00 to 6:00 PM in 2227 Dwinelle. We'll be discussing a paper by WIlliam Bechtel and Adele Abrahamson, "In search of mitochondrial mechanisms: Interfield excursions between cell biology and biochemistry", to appear in the Journal of the History of Biology.

Comments and suggestions for format and future readings are very welcome.

Philosophical Pizza Munch and BABS, 9 November

For November the Munch will meet jointly with the Bay Area Biosystematists in Berkeley on Thursday, November 9. John Wilkins (Queesnland) will give a talk entitled "The Unseasonable Lateness of Being, Or, Essentialism Comes After Darwin, Not Before."

Abstract: The received view of the history of the species concept is that before Darwin, naturalists held to a view of essentialism, according to which species were constituted by necessary and sufficient traits. I will argue that this is a misunderstanding based on a conflation of the Aristotelian logical and metaphysical tradition of the essence of predicates, with the use of the term "species" and the Greek term "eidos" in natural history. Instead, I will attempt to show that taxonomists (including Darwin) held to a diagnostic or taxonomic essentialism, but that nobody before Darwin, with a possible exception in Grew, argued that a species had a material or causal essence, and that the essentialism of the received view actually arose after Darwin's views, possibly as a reaction to Haeckelian evolutionary ideas in French and German speaking countries, based on the revival of Thomism in Catholic intellectual circles after 1871, between the 1890s and the 1920s. The myth of essentialism appears to be formulated around the centenary of the Origin and after, based perhaps on the early experiences of Mayr as an undergraduate.

John Wilkins is a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Queensland Biohumanities Project. His thesis on species concepts has developed into a book, presently under review for publication as a history of the ideas of "species" through the classical, medieval and modern eras.

The meeting will follow the usual Biosystematists format. We'll assemble in Berkeley for social hour and dinner at 5:30, followed by Wilkins' talk at 7:00. The meeting will be in Valley Life Sciences Bldg (VLSB) Room 2063.

Thanks to Katie Brakora, who thought of this and helped organize it. The cost should be $10 - 12 at the door; please RSVP to Katie (kbrakora at-sign gmail dot com) so she can order enough pizza.

VLSB map

To reach UC by car

To reach UC by public transit

The following Munch will be on Thursday, 7 December. The topic is open, and suggestions are welcome.

See you there...

Philosophical Pizza Munch, 5 October

We'll have a Munch on Thursday, 5 October. Melinda Fagan (History and Philosophy of Science, Indiana U.) will lead a discussion of her preliminary draft "Integrative pragmatism and scientific inquiry".

Biology Studies Reading Group, 30 October

We'll have a meeting of the Biology Studies Reading Group on October 30, 4:00 to 6:00 PM in 2227 Dwinelle. We'll be discussing two papers on early modern natural history by Paula Findlen:

"Anatomy theaters, botanical gardens, and natural history collections". Pp. 272-289 in K. Park and L. Daston (Eds.), The Cambridge History of Science. Volume 3. Early Modern Science. New York: Cambridge University Press.

"Natural history". Pp. 435-468 in K. Park and L. Daston (Eds.), The Cambridge History of Science. Volume 3. Early Modern Science. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Comments and suggestions for format and future readings are very welcome.

Philosophical Pizza Munch, 14 September

We'll have a Munch on Thursday, 14 September. I'll lead a discussion of "Levels of organization". I have some thoughts on the subject that were directly inspired by Helen Longino's presentation at our May munch. I have a partial draft paper to get us started.

As always, please let Mike G. and me know your preferences if you're coming (veg? allergies?) so we can plan the food and drink. We'll gather in the front lobby at 6:30 and then go up to the IZ&G Department on the 4th floor.

The Academy is at 875 Howard St., between 4th and 5th streets; phone 415-321-8000. Take public transportation to the Powell St. station, and walk south two blocks; or park at the public garage at 5th and Mission ($2/hr.) and walk south 1 block. SamTrans, AC transit, GG transit, and CalTrans all land reasonably close by. The Academy has a web page with all the details

Suggestions for future Munch topics are very welcome.

Biology Studies Reading Group September 18: McOuat on species at the British Museum

We'll have a meeting of the Biology Studies Reading Group on September 18, 4:00 to 6:00 PM in 2327 Dwinelle.

We'll be discussing Gordon McOuat's paper, "Cataloguing power: Delineating 'competent naturalists' and the meaning of species in the British Museum". British Journal for the History of Science 34: 1-28 (2001).

Comments and suggestions for format and future readings are very welcome. If you don't want to be on this list, please let me know.