Natural Selection's Explanatory Scope

Published In

Philosophy Compass

Document Type

Citation

Publication Date

8-23-2022

Abstract

There are ongoing debates in philosophy of biology about what falls within natural selection's explanatory scope. These include debates about whether selection can explain individual-level traits, the extent to which selection can explain distributions of trait frequencies, and whether selection can explain the origin of novel traits. Here I'll survey these debates, suggest which views seem most plausible, and describe some useful conceptual frameworks for thinking about the issues involved.

Rights

© 2022 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

DOI

10.1111/phc3.12881

Persistent Identifier

https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/38453

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